Someone is selling a 1973 corvette on craigslist for 3300. It was in his brothers barn who passed away and he recently took it out. He said the body and engine seem to be in good shape, the inside is a little rough, the seats look fine, the dash seems ok, but it's really dirty in the inside, hard to say how good or bad it is. It will for sure need new paint and body work. The front is the worst, the front bumper is kind of broken, it's still attached but its kind of cracked. It is the base model 350 engine, which I believe is 190-200hp. So not the best engine available, but still decent. Has the chrome bumper intact.
I got him to go down to 2,000. Im wondering if it's worth it or not.
I Figure costs will be like this
2,000 for the car
2,000 for paint
2,000 for body work
1,000 for interior work engine work and other misc work.
He said the car does not currently run, not sure if it just needs gas or what, he said the engine looks fine.
It seems to be mostly or all original, I can't really tell myself but i'd have to ask to see if he knows.
So 7,000 I think would get it cleaned up nice and looked pretty nice. Maybe not a show car, but still nice. What do you think? worth it? Or don't bother?
Instead of trying to add pics I'll just give you the link to the post.
http://milwaukee.craigslist.org/cto/3964226054.html

thanks!

 

Hello and welcome to the forum. I think you are seriously underestimating the costs associated to bringing this car into a "nice" condition.
Are you doing the labor yourself?

 

I just bought this (Monday) 73 barn find for 6k been sitting and not tagged since 1987.
https://www.corvetteforum.com/c3-gen...-lots-pix.html
A little tune, battery and fuel, it fires right up and rebuilding the frontend right now. More pix would really help us too.
Unless you do all the work yourself including body and paint, you will blow that budget really quick. With that being said study and a lot of help here, you can do the work yourself and save a ton of money but your budget is still low.
Hope this helps!
Scott

 

I didn't think I was under estimating the budget THAT much.
My brother got his 1980 trans am painted for 2,000 even. It looks pretty nice. I thought 2,000 would be enough for body work, the major part is the front end which isn't TERRIBLE and then just a few dents and other minor misc. body work. And then 1,000 also seems pretty right to me for any engine work and interior work needed.
I don't think i'll be able to do the paint or body work myself, at least not most of it, I'll probably be able to do the interior work myself and my dad can help me with any engine problems depending on how bad they are. I looked at your pics, fatcat, Yours doesn't looks miles better than the one for sale in my area and mine is like a quarter of the price so it can't be a bad deal can it? I can't really say for sure until I see it.
I don't really want to spend more than 7,500$ because thats pretty much all I have.

 

The 73 looks otherwise original, but additional pix would help, especially under the hood. You can bet the engine needs more than "just gas" to be up and running. I do not see $2000 in bodywork, but you definitely need a front bumper cover.

Make no mistake, this 73 needs a lot of work.

Now for the important part: since the car is part of an estate, does the brother have legal title to it and can actually sell the car?

Good Luck.

 

Don't get me wrong and I guess I didn't answer your original question. I think $2000 is a good deal all day long and your budget will get you driving a safe car if you do the work yourself. If however you plan to take it to a shop for mechanical repairs, that is a whole other deal. Paint, man that is such a huge range! $600 at Maaco (not recommending) $2000 maybe ok or not $5000 should be good driver quality 10k and on and on. Body work I am really not an the right guy to answer that. My car actually needs very minor work on the body and I posted the thread not to say yours isn't a good deal but just as a current market point of reference for you. In the CL Pix it looks like the is a lot of cracks in the front clip but that may be dust or something. If it were me, I would probably buy that car of that is dust. It would scare me personally to death if it were cracks but that is because I want to do all my own work.
Based on what I can see a picture of the engine compartment may change that. Hahaha hey, here a roller with no engine or tranny is 2k.
Keep us updated.

 

what would your estimated cost in body work be?

 

I'd say the body work depends on the damage (seen or unseen), as FatCat pointed out, there sure is a lot of stress cracks and it's all repairable, but none of it is easy to do well. I agree with the others, that you're underestimating the cost, esp. the interior and engine.

What you're going to find out about C3 ownership of a vintage car, that sat for years and has decades old parts on it, is you're inevitabily going to run into "While You're There". As an example, let's start with the engine. You pull the engine, look down and what do you see? The power steering control valve and ram are leaking badly. This is waaay easier to do, with the engine out, so... while you're there. And then, you see that the all the control arm bushings are shot too, and believe me, it's way easier to do, with the engine out, so while you're there...

Then you notice that all the ball joints are wasted. The windshield wiper motor looks like it hasn't moved a blade across the windshield since Reagan was President. The heater core hoses have been lopped off, so you know you need a heater core and you might as well replace it, because you don't want to trust a 40 year old heater core, with your new interior, right? So while you're there.... Oh, the brakes, damn them brakes, they're shot too and the calipers are frozen as well and the rear parking brake is inoperative. Hey, that coolant overflow tank and the windshield washer tank look like malaria victims, they're so yellow!

And how about that radiator. Wow, the original one, hope it still works and all the rubber sealant around it is totally toast, you'll need a whole new set. Gawd, look at the headlight mechanisms! They are creaky looking and the vacuum lines are cracked leaking junk and how about the actuators, do those work? I dunno, but they're ancient history, that's for sure. The motor mounts on my 74' were totally wasted and had to replace them both.

So the engine is out, but that manual transmission, let's look at that. I rebuilt mine, because, 'While I was There'... was way easier, now than later, so pull that, but the transmission mount rubber was detoriated to junk, so now I need new tranny mounts. Might as well put new U-joints there too. Thank God, somebody put an entirely new rear suspension in the 74' with new trailing arms, leaf springs, half shafts and rubber, because most of that stuff is now 40 years old and will likely need replacing at some time or another. There's little bits of rubber between each leaf and you'd be amazed at how they look after 40 years. So while you're there...

But, saying all that, it's a good price and good starting point, I just don't think you can get away with that little money, as nearly all of us, have waaay more invested in these cars, than what we could get for them, so it becomes a labor of love.

 

I don't see any body work needed other than the bumper cover. I do not see any damage which needs to be repaired. Do you have additional pictures of the car? Apparently you've seen the car; does it have damage? Anything on the right side of the car we haven't seen?

If you are speaking of body work in terms of paint preparation, you'll need to talk to the folks who are going to paint the car.

Any body work estimate from me would be a moot point anyway. I do my own work so my only costs would be my time. I could include cost of materials in the figure, but since I already have most that stuff out in the shop, I may not need to purchase anything.

 

What do you think a good condition 73 is worth? With such a small budget this is not a car to buy at all! Rust would be the biggest problem for sure. At 2 to 3 grand for an old vette sure that's a good deal without much rust, but with your expectations of such low dollar invested and not being able to do much on your own, keep looking and save up some more money for a better car.

 

Center console looks like it's missing. I would want to know why, and whether its still there.

Still, for $2,000.00, you could probably get your money back parting it out, even if you discover you can't get it going to $7,500.00.

FWIW, if you don't care about chrome bumpers, you can usually get into a pretty decent mid-seventies Corvette for around $5,500 if you keep your eyes open. EDIT: http://milwaukee.craigslist.org/cto/4019700739.html or http://milwaukee.craigslist.org/cto/4009873062.html or http://milwaukee.craigslist.org/cto/4009382055.html (which I personally think is supremely cool albeit a bit weird). Or across the pond: https://grandrapids.craigslist.org/cto/3974646461.html or https://grandrapids.craigslist.org/cto/4011634661.html or https://grandrapids.craigslist.org/cto/3982806146.html and don't forget THE FIRE GOD: http://holland.craigslist.org/cto/3965869136.html. That thing is seriously weirdly 70sly customly awesomely.

Granted, you've got more valuable parts in the 73 probably, but be prepared to start shoveling money if its parked because something quite working and no one wanted to fix it... It has the highest value potential of anything you're going to find for that sort of price, but it might take a lot of your own labor or money to get there.

 

he sent me a few pics, ill try to add them
I've never seen the car in person, but i have seen pics and he's talked to me. Im still not sure what I will do, but we'll see. I'm still not sure if it is worth it. The main attration to me is that it is a earlier c3 model. One of the benefits of the earlier c3's is that they are more powerful. But this one only has the base 350, which is only as strong as the L82s on the later ones. It does have the chrome bumper on the rear though, not sure if it is worth it just for the bumper or If I am better off getting a complete later c3 for like 6 grand.







I added the pics but I don't know if they are viewable, I clicked on insert image then copy and pasted the link from my email where I was viewing the picture.

 

If you pay $2000 for a Corvette paint job, it will not be good. People do not pay $10,000-$15,000 for a top notch paint job just for the heck of it.

 

unless its rusted out, that is a great deal for 2,000. I would buy it if the frame and birdcage looked good. Especially the fact I would be doing all my own work. The body looks good, maybe just needs a front nose pc. You could do that yourself.

 

Who pays that much for a paint job? A simple respray doesn't cost anywhere near that, particularly if you take care of most of the body and prep work yourself. $2,000 will buy you a paint job. Maybe not perfect, but it'll work. You might need to wetsand and buff, but so what?

Image links do not work. Need to put on photobucket, picasa, or another publicly available site and then hit insert image in the post and past in the link into the box that comes up.

 

Lots of people pay $10k + for quality paint work. The majority of cost is associated with body preparation prior to spray. The OP states that he won't be doing the body work, but really, this cost can be lowered greatly with help on this forum. The front bumper could be addressed, and the body could be prepped. Now if repairs are required...I would personally leave that to the experts.

My PO paid around $8k for paint and body work in the mid-90's. Still looks perfect today. It won't sun fade or start cracking 6 months after constant sun exposure. If you pay $2k for preparation and paint work, you will most likely NOT get a long-lasting quality job. This is why I'm always leery when someone sells a car immediately after restoration. Better have those receipts handy. Was gelcoat applied for example?

In this case, bolt a new bumper cover on, get it driver-ready and paint it when you can afford it. These cars fulfill our hobby interests, so go get dirty.

And of course "while I'm at it" is a true phenomenon, though one thing was left out: pull the engine and start the "while I'm at it" process and your car is off the road for MUCH longer than you anticipated. Reading from many on the forum, it can be years. Do you want to drive or wrench and fulfill your hobby?

 

Heck I can buy a paint job for $600 if I want and make it look real nice doing it myself but cannon said, he probably couldn't do the body and paint so that is why you see the posts. 10-15k! there's a lots of those paint jobs out there and on this forum. If he does all the prep, has materials and pays someone to shoot the paint only, he could get a really nice job. I would say finding someone to do that may be tough. I think the total budget for paint and body was 4k and that may be realistic but only left a $1000 or so for mechanical and interior. Unless the engine and transmission are in great shape, not going to happen.
There are a lot of unknown factors here. Is the engine any good? Who knows at this point, the 73 I just bought was a running car, does the tranny need rebuilt, front end and brakes alone for good parts if it need caliper, pads, control arms etc, will exceed $1000 if he hires the work done and $400-500 if he does it himself. I could buy the car and spend $5000 and make it work but I would do all the work including body and paint myself saving 1000's in labor. It really all depends on what he can do himself.

 

If it comes with boxes of (take off) parts, documentation and clear title, it is a steal at $2,000... especially if you are doing most of the work yourself save for machining.

 

The time it spends off the road, really depends on three things: Time, money and how much help you have. It doesn't have to be years, it could be a matter of months.

We pulled both the engine and trans out of the 74' and had them back in within a few months, but then again, my Shop Partner and I are single and we're at the Shop nearly every day and weekends!

I also whipped out the trusty low int. Visa and threw money at it too (8k). I consider it another car payment. If you have the parts you need, right there, instead of waiting, it goes much faster!

Paragon Corvette and other vendors offer a discount for restorers who are going to be buying a lot of parts, look into it. Make lists, bag and tag every thing and take lots and lots of photos, because these cars are tough to work on and many of the parts and assemblies go on 'Just so'.

A must have is a FSM and the AIM too, as well as the owners manual!

 

Buy it. Spend a little of your time fixing it up. You can do all of the work yourself if you are even slightly mechanically inclined. This forum and an AIM are 2 of the most useful tools you could have. You may be under-estimating your repairs but over time you will get them done. Its not a race unless you are looking to drive this car as a daily driver. Then maybe you should have your head checked. Do please keep in mind that reproduction parts are more costly than you think and they can be quite difficult to work with.