emccomas

The son-in-law is just waiting for the widow to pass away so he can get control of all of these and sell them off for his own profit. Makes me sick to think about it, but she is keeping peace in the family by not selling off all of the old Corvettes.

Her daughter actually told her one day that she (the daughter) was upset because her mother was selling off her inheritance. Mind boggling. The daughter is going to inherit a 160 acre farm and cattle ranch, with a four bedroom house, and two rental houses, and she is worried about this. No, her @#%%$#@ husband is worried about this.

emccomas

This one?

roadster65

Ed; that's what the definition of a Noble Man is - doing the right thing - Wish you well - GV

dmaxx3500

sad,all that stuff has sat in the weather for 1-50 years,,most of its not worth much,but some could be the ''holy grail'' of car parts

all those parts,and 99% of people even corvette guys now they fit something-but what years?
back then a lot of parts didn't fit and were ''hand-fitted'' to cars

the only real way to figure it out would be to take everything and somewhat clean it,lay it out in a big building and go thru it piece-by-piece

I just went thru this with a friend,
his child hood friend passed and he had a 20 room school filled with cars/parts,after 2 weeks we barely scratched the surface of what was there

emccomas

It is definitely a challenge, but one that I enjoy (most of the time, anyway)

I don't expect to sell off all of the cars and parts before the widow passes. The son-in-law has convinced her that he will restore the old Corvettes for the grandchildren.

Ha!

I am not sure I would get into a vehicle after this dude did an oil change to it, much less a restoration.

Robert61

I know a lot here mouth about EBay. It's my favorite store. You don't have to know anything about the value all you have to know is how to post pics. The world will tell you what it's worth. A 57 Nomad had to be fairly rough to bring $6300. I would gladly give that for a decent shape nomad and I'm not looking for one. Yep there is going to be work envolved but when you ship it you know it's sold and you don't have to deal with all of the lowballers and tire kickers.

ptjsk

You're a good man Ed! I can't believe the so called friend would offer her $500.00 for a '57 Nomad. She's lucky you stepped in and put a stop to that nonsense!

That barn/storage building full up parts is amazing. Man....I would just love to rummage through that stuff to discover what's there. It sure looks like she's got a lot of value in parts alone.

Great watching your posts on the cars, and/or the parts!

Pat

Easy Rhino

LOL - I like the predictability of that vote, but think you're absolutely right. Those cars will never be restored, will continue to deteriorate, and the widow is being held hostage by the family for the daydream of those cars being saved at the cost of what she could sell them for, or the parts. I would bet actual money against that family none of those cars will ever be rationally drivable again. But, it's their cars and their money.

The "good news" is that those of you with early C1s have more valuable and unique cars due to those rust buckets not being real cars anymore.

Boyan

You can probably make at least one good car with those parts.

MOXIE62

Wonder what Paragon would give you for all that stuff. Seems like they also have a graveyard of old corvettes.

elwood13

We all know the son in law will do nothing. You could tell her that if the son in law really wants to get these cars, he needs to go clean all those parts areas up. Put up shelves, organize and label everything. If he is to lazy to do that then she should sell it all. I’m glad you are sticking up for her.

AZDoug

The parts collection is probably worth more than most of the cars.
I see the kids, or maybe teenagers, enjoyed playing trampoline on the roofs and hoods.
Sounds like Hillbilly central around there.

Doug

Railroadman

What makes it worse is that when the son in law finally gets control, he will put an extreme value on those poor old relics and they will sit there ANOTHER 30 years because nobody will pay what he dreams they are worth. Actually, most of those either COULD be brought back, or could be good donor sources for keeping other cars going. I have seen a '57 which was in very similar shape to those turned into a gem. But it sounds like the offspring are controlled by greed and will likely wind up with LESS money in the long run.

(And yes, Rhino, I figured there's about zero percent chance of either of those scenarios I mentioned actually happening! )

TCracingCA

And I thought I met had met an interesting group when like Dick Guldstrand died. I actually went up free, or for discount parts to see if they could continue the parts line business. They had dreams of making all kinds of money, but wouldn’t listen, wouldn’t learn what I was showing them, telling them. They even had customer projects apart, that they didn’t know what was what, laying around! If I was crooked and evil, I could have handed them a fraction of what a Tri-carb set up was worth, that belonged to a car down in the garage belonging to a customer.
Therefore unless someone in control of that horde becomes a Corvette expert fast, I can’t see real parts coming out of there easy to complete a whole car, unless someone spends considerable time and is given access to find everything (near impossible I would say) or if someone comes along who is willing to just buy it all!

SupremeDeluxe

Ed, you are one of the "good guys" to help out here. I've done this in a few cases, on a vastly smaller basis, and it's a lot of work.

Unfortunately, the pool of buyers seems to get smaller and increasingly opportunistic (borderline savage) with the passage of time.

426 Hemi

Man ain't that the truth.

I was involved pretty good in one of these deals. With the exception of maybe 3 friends of the deceased, all the other "friends" had an embarrassingly open and verbal feeling of entitlement to everything on the cheap.

GTOguy

Dead right. Have seen this several times with hoarder situations. The sad thing was,valuable as the parts were, (car parts, guns, antiques,etc.) they would have been worth six times more had they been STORED properly. Lots of un issued civil war era weapons rusted and pitted (seatrain leaked and had peeing rats in it), and lots of NOS chrome and electrics and steering wheels and you name it, stored on the dirt floor of chicken coupes. Amazing how much better valuables keep if they are stored inside, off the dirt, in a dry area.

emccomas

I steer clear of the "family" situation. I work for the widow.

I have told everyone, including the son-in-law, that is she wants those cars burnt to the ground, I will go get the gas and the matches.

emccomas

I figure that there are 5 restorable Corvettes out there. The 1954, both 1956s (although one will take quite a bit of work), the 1957, and the black 1962.

But, I did see doors and trunk lids for some of the "basket case" cars, like the Turquoise 1960 up in the attic.

The son-in-law was given a fairly complete 1960 roller when the husband passed away. He has done absolutely nothing with it since then (8 years or so).

Greg

Amen brother!
I think the "Quote" button should not be available to some.
Unlimited bandwidth or not, I DON'T need to see the same pics loaded 5 times in the same thread!

By the way, there is a MOUNTAIN of great stuff there jv