Cars With A "Story"

I was looking at a car, it ticked all the right boxes but in checking it out it had an accident or some other source of damage in its past. From the internet trail, it appears to have been damaged, fixed over a relatively long time, sold or traded to a dealer, then spent the rest of its life shuffling from dealer to dealer.
The selling dealer was pretty forthright with the info it was damaged but I lost interest because I don't want to deal with the "story" and told him that. What piqued my interest was I made the comment that even though I didn't intend to ever sell the car, I wasn't going to be the one to take the depreciation hit due to the story. His response was "Oh, the price is already fully depreciated for the damage". Of course any salesman worth his salt is only selling things that are such a bargain it should be illegal, but I am curious what Fchat's opinion is.
Would you buy a 599 with a story? Is a discount enough to compensate for the unknown, potential headaches, and difficulty in reselling should you choose to? Can a car with a story be worth more than one without? Or do you view them as a commodity, as any other car, and a bit knocked off the bottom line compensates for all flaws?

 

Need year and asking price.


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Car with a story are a current conditioning by the marketing of services for people to avoid them due to perceived inferior value.

The ultimate determinant should be based on condition of the vehicle. Most of the buyers of cars today have no clue of what they are buying, or are only along for the perception of the brand.

Case in point. How many $50 million GTO’s have been hit and rebuilt? Lots...

A family friend smashed a 250 LM as it was raced, and put back together after bending it, and it only went up in value.

This car fax, no hits, no stories car stuff is entirely a perception issue.

If you have no intention of selling the car, and it checks out in its condition for a worthwhile price, nothing wrong with buying it.

The irony is that almost all of the most valuable cars on the planet have been smashed and put back together or taken entirely apart and restored. Granted, due to the volume of modern cars produced, they may never achieve the status of the older ones, but the perception drives market value. Considering the market is made up of mostly status seekers, the real value will be outnumbered by the weighted average of the rest of the market compared to the minority. This is from a sell side perspective.

With that said, from a buy side perspective, if you are buying with the intention of never selling, there are fantastic deals to be had.

A scratch, dent, minor shunt, with proper fix, can decrease the purchase price by a significant margin. The question will be the condition of the vehicle, which will take time to sort out.

Just $0.02

 

I was very close to buying the infamous 599 with the rebuilt title from a couple months ago. In fact, we had agreed to a price and it was down to flying out/driving it home.......didn't work out which is fine.
My previous Ferrari was hit in the side by a 16yr old kid 2 or 3 months into owing it. I sent it to Chicago to a world class restoration shop and they did immaculate work. The repairs were photo documented and I was very public about it here. That helped me when I eventually sold it and it brought a great price. I drove it for 3 years without issues.
I was thinking the same with the above 599 mainly because it was a minor accident and I could see all of the pre/post pics and the work was done by a reputable shop. I wasn't afraid of it at all because of that and because I keep my sports cars and drive them hard and am not in it for 'investments'. It would be different if they had to replace suspension bits, do any straightening, etc....I'd walk.

FWIW, YMMV....

 

And 599's are fairly rare. They just didn't make that many cars so eventually, most will have some kind of story.

 

I would be trying to find out what the nature of the accident was. Some accidents can be put right with bolting on some new parts and giving the car a lick of paint. Some however require cutting and welding to parts that were never intended to be cut and welded. Normally its very hard to confirm how well this stuff was done; even with photos of the repairs, you still wont have anything to prove how strong those welds are, or what the effect the heat had on the structure, or how the stress is redistributed due to the an-isotropic strength of the repaired areas. Metal work hardens too, so a damaged and straightened section of metal will have different properties to a virgin piece. This is all stuff that we would look at and control when say repairing a pressure vessel. In the car repair business, its much more "if it looks fine, it probably is".

These cars aren't so rare that you wont find another. Then again, everything has its price, its just whether its cheap enough for it not to bother you for the rest of your ownership.

 

Thanks for the responses. I should have clarified what I meant by a story, which was an issue (accident or whatever) that you have no idea how severe it was, or how it was fixed. I should have asked did *you* buy a car with a story

 

I did. I bought a 2007 599 not long ago (not the one JimShadow mentioned). I definitely took a chance, but the owner sent lots of pictures, including the damage before being fixed. It's branded, but I am driving it a lot and I've bought other branded Ferrari's and had few problems. I think you should see the pictures of the wrecked car, if at all possible. That will tell you a lot. Also, you should see the repair bills. Call who repaired it. A lot of Ferrari's get totaled because insurance people don't think they can be fixed. Someone will buy them at auction, fix them, drive them a bit, then sell them. So long as they are sorted and the damage wasn't horrible (no bent frames) then you should be good.

 

I refuse to buy cars with stories. Mileage yes, stories no. That's just me. Unless I created the story

 

No story cars for me. I'm not in it for the investment (as we all know, that's delusional for most models), but I don't keep my cars more than a few years. I'm always looking for the next toy, so resale is a factor. Unless I found something so phenomenally-priced that I could buy it, fix it, drive it, and flip it for a profit (yeah, right!), I won't take the hit. Why bother? There are too many nice cars available without dodgy histories.