How expensive was your first car?

[GordonW]

My first car cost me only "sweat equity".

1966 Opel Kadett Model 32 Coupe. Dad bought it not-running- I think for about $35- as part of a bunch of Opels we gathered up, to fix up. Dad was a Buick mechanic- so he knew all about them, and kind of fell in love with them. Of course, in the 1973-74 gas crisis, it was easy to fall in love with a car that could get 40MPG!

I was just getting into working on cars as a kid- and Dad told me "here, you take that one- do whatever you want with it, but don't touch any of the others". That was fine with me- I sat down with a factory service manual (Dad would bring them home when they were throwing them out at the dealership- I think we had every B-O-P and Opel manual that there was, between 1964 and 1980), and started to try to find out why it wouldn't run.

One day, I actually managed to get it started. Smoked so bad at first, that my Mom- who was over at her parent's house next door- thought that I had set the whole yard on fire. She found out what was happening- that MY car was running- and called my Dad- "Do you know what YOUR son has done? He's got that junk car you gave him, RUNNING!" Dad's response was something like "Huh- maybe I SHOULD let him work on some of the OTHER ones"...

The kicker? I was like 7 years old at the time. The only way I could work on the engine, was to climb into the engine compartment, sit on the radiator or the inner fenderwell, and take stuff apart and put it back together again.

That started about a 10 year run of fixing up cars with my Dad- which led eventually to a string of Opel GTs that I fixed up from junk- and one of which was my car in my first few years of college.

Here's a picture of one, very much like what I had when I was 7. Same body style, and even the same colors- it was red when I got it, and I later painted it (with spray cans) to have the matte-black areas on the hood like the one in the picture (Kadett Rallye graphics, in essence):



I did find a set of GT/Rallye wheels for mine, eventually.

Wound up keeping it for a while, then sold it to my cousin, to help finance buying parts for one of my first Opel GTs.

My cousin was totally a flake- one day, we saw what looked like my old car sitting on a side-lane in a field a few miles from home. We checked on it- yep, the same car. And it had been sitting there for several weeks! We found out that he had been out smoking dope with his friends- they ran out of gas, wandered off, and just forgot where they put it!

We towed it home, and told him he couldn't have it back. He was too sheepish and/or apathetic to argue with us.

Wound up using it for a while- then it got rusty enough that it wasn't viable anymore. It sat in the back of our property until about 15 years ago, when my Dad cleaned out the last of the old cars- off to the scrapyard it went. Kinda sad... but I still have the memories how that car more or less started me in my life-long tendency for fixing almost anything I can get my hands on...

Regards,
Gordon.

 

[Pio1980]

My first car cost me only "sweat equity".

1966 Opel Kadett Model 32 Coupe. Dad bought it not-running- I think for about $35- as part of a bunch of Opels we gathered up, to fix up. Dad was a Buick mechanic- so he knew all about them, and kind of fell in love with them. Of course, in the 1973-74 gas crisis, it was easy to fall in love with a car that could get 40MPG!

I was just getting into working on cars as a kid- and Dad told me "here, you take that one- do whatever you want with it, but don't touch any of the others". That was fine with me- I sat down with a factory service manual (Dad would bring them home when they were throwing them out at the dealership- I think we had every B-O-P and Opel manual that there was, between 1964 and 1980), and started to try to find out why it wouldn't run.

One day, I actually managed to get it started. Smoked so bad at first, that my Mom- who was over at her parent's house next door- thought that I had set the whole yard on fire. She found out what was happening- that MY car was running- and called my Dad- "Do you know what YOUR son has done? He's got that junk car you gave him, RUNNING!" Dad's response was something like "Huh- maybe I SHOULD let him work on some of the OTHER ones"...

The kicker? I was like 7 years old at the time. The only way I could work on the engine, was to climb into the engine compartment, sit on the radiator or the inner fenderwell, and take stuff apart and put it back together again.

That started about a 10 year run of fixing up cars with my Dad- which led eventually to a string of Opel GTs that I fixed up from junk- and one of which was my car in my first few years of college.

Here's a picture of one, very much like what I had when I was 7. Same body style, and even the same colors- it was red when I got it, and I later painted it (with spray cans) to have the matte-black areas on the hood like the one in the picture (Kadett Rallye graphics, in essence):

View attachment 1351253

I did find a set of GT/Rallye wheels for mine, eventually.

Wound up keeping it for a while, then sold it to my cousin, to help finance buying parts for one of my first Opel GTs.

My cousin was totally a flake- one day, we saw what looked like my old car sitting on a side-lane in a field a few miles from home. We checked on it- yep, the same car. And it had been sitting there for several weeks! We found out that he had been out smoking dope with his friends- they ran out of gas, wandered off, and just forgot where they put it!

We towed it home, and told him he couldn't have it back. He was too sheepish and/or apathetic to argue with us.

Wound up using it for a while- then it got rusty enough that it wasn't viable anymore. It sat in the back of our property until about 15 years ago, when my Dad cleaned out the last of the old cars- off to the scrapyard it went. Kinda sad... but I still have the memories how that car more or less started me in my life-long tendency for fixing almost anything I can get my hands on...

Regards,
Gordon.

I rode the train past the Opelwerke in Russelsheim twice a day, five days a week in the later 1980s during my last army hitch.

 

[OvenMaster]

In 1978, I was 19. Got a black 1963 Chevy Impala Sport Coupe (2-door hardtop). 283 V8, Powerglide auto, 113,000 miles. $100.
Went to clean it up and there was so much steel missing from the floors it wasn't worth fixing up.
There was even a piece of the frame missing under the trunk. No wonder the bumper wobbled.
Sold it to a young fella who wanted to make it into a race car for $125.

 

[sanford12]

dcmfan if it makes you fell anybetter in 76 i passed on one of these for 4000

I passed on a nice 1966 Shelby GT 350 convertible for $4600. Was 1980. Drove by it everyday going to work. I could have picked up the winged Daytona version for 1500. It wasn't that old and was already a rusty derelict in someones front yard. The price was written in that liquid white shoe polish on the side of the car. When I was a kid the Ford dealer in town had a white Boss 429 that he couldn't sell. Years later I met a guy who passed on it because he wanted a burgundy one. I don't remember exactly what they wanted for it just that it was cheap. Then there was the 68 427 Corvette around 1990 that was a bank repo for $3600. That was a mistake because I could have easily afford it and knew then that it would go up in value. Guy down the street bought it.

My first car was in 1974 and was a 1971 MG BGT $2500 bucks. Spent a lot of time under the hood

 

[rickb119]

My first was a '48 Plymouth coupe for $35.00. The old man I bought it from had removed the trunk lid and welded in a metal box so he could haul wood. Butt ugly but I learned to drive a stick shift with it (up and down the alley til I got my permit). It topped out at about 50, down hill with a tail wind.

 

[GordonW]

I passed on a nice 1966 Shelby GT 350 convertible for $4600. Was 1980. Drove by it everyday going to work. I could have picked up the winged Daytona version for 1500. It wasn't that old and was already a rusty derelict in someones front yard. The price was written in that liquid white shoe polish on the side of the car. When I was a kid the Ford dealer in town had a white Boss 429 that he couldn't sell. Years later I met a guy who passed on it because he wanted a burgundy one. I don't remember exactly what they wanted for it just that it was cheap. Then there was the 68 427 Corvette around 1990 that was a bank repo for $3600. That was a mistake because I could have easily afford it and knew then that it would go up in value. Guy down the street bought it.

My first car was in 1974 and was a 1971 MG BGT $2500 bucks. Spent a lot of time under the hood

One regret I still have (a little) is that my Dad and I passed on a '68 Shelby GT500KR, in the early 1980s. Wasn't running (it needed a bottom-end rebuild- it had a knock), but AFAICT, it was all there, including the correct wheels. Red with white graphics. Could have gotten it for $2000.00. For me, as a teenager at that time, it might as well have been $200,000... I didn't have anywhere close to enough for me to buy it myself, then...

Regards,
Gordon.

 

[Pio1980]

One regret I still have (a little) is that my Dad and I passed on a '68 Shelby GT500KR, in the early 1980s. Wasn't running (it needed a bottom-end rebuild- it had a knock), but AFAICT, it was all there, including the correct wheels. Red with white graphics. Could have gotten it for $2000.00. For me, as a teenager at that time, it might as well have been $200,000... I didn't have anywhere close to enough for me to buy it myself, then...

Regards,
Gordon.

Investment grade miss, for me, a 1932 Pierce Arrow V12 5 window coupe in very nice garaged cdx in the early 1960s, $1250 from the same gent that sold me the '28 Dodge Bros Victory Six. He said even if I came up with the money, it was too much classic car for me as a school age teen on the other end of purchase otherwise, and he was right. Parts, ect, were already very competitive at that level.
Seller btw was Melville Held, gear-head /car nut brother of artist/ illustrator/ cartoonist John Held Jr.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Held_Jr.
PostScript;
Great "classic" cars of the 1930s investment value has not stabilized across the board and started to fall, while muscle cars of the 1960s and 1970s are ascendant, with the selloff of the older pre-war car collector demographic and the rise of the post-war Boomer aspirant performance American iron owners, flush with successful career cash and keen interest.

 

[SiliconTi]

Bought my first car in 1986, it was a 1973 Camaro RS for $450 with a damaged nose. Drove it into the ground, then spent $200 on a Ford Fiesta (MK1 and possibly my favorite car ever after I added some horsepower) and drove that into the ground.

 

[sirianni]

1973 Dodge Dart $3750.00

 

[rustycat]

$0 - given a 1980 Chevette by my older sister. It was worth every penny - NOT!

 

[mr_light]

I bought my First car in 1973 (I was 16) for $1100, a 1968 Firebird 350 H.O. (High Output) package. Four speed Muncie transmission, Hurst shifter. 39k miles. It's been down hill since then...

 

[Dr Tinear]

I made several mistakes in choosing and purchasing my first car. It was a 1978 Mercury Zephyr (mistake #1, buying from the first production year of a new model). I bought it in 1979 as a used Hertz rental car (mistake #2, buying a car that had doubtless been beaten on by dozens of drivers). It was powered (if that's the correct word) by a 3.3-liter inline Six with a single-barrel carburetor that was rated at 85 net horsepower (mistake #3). I paid $3000 for it, which was a competitive price for a year-old Zephyr that had not been in an accident. Thirty-nine years later, I still look back at that car as the worst automotive purchase I ever made. The engine stalled and sputtered until it was fully warmed up, acceleration was non-existent, and it visited the shop far too often for a late-model car. In 1981 I traded it in on a brand-new Chevrolet Citation 4-door hatchback and was delighted to be rid of it.

 

[ehoove]

First car was a 1957 Pontiac Super Cheiftan 4 door. Mine had Grey and white leather interior, and was traded by a now deceased friends grandparents.
$300
Regards,
Jim

 

[avionic]

Around $1000..Purchased in 1974. 1970 Grabber blue Torino.
Very similar to this photo. Only I had a set of Keystone Classic wheels

And a bigblock under the hood.

 

[noogies]

I passed on a nice 1966 Shelby GT 350 convertible for $4600. Was 1980.

Not a '67? I ask because they only built four of them in '66.

 

[Donal64]

1953 Ford . I think it was a Customline. I was 14 or 15 the first time I bought it from my cousin for $50. Maybe about 1965. I worked the weekend for him, making $6 per week. He held back $3 per week for me till I had the money. Then I sold it back to him, and after awhile, I bought it again, then wound up wrecking it. The couple times I washed it, I used a Brillo pad. He lived near a foundry and it had pollution imbedded in the paint.

 

[sanford12]

Not a '67? I ask because they only built four of them in '66.

Pretty sure it was a 66. I was no slouch on Mustangs back then and they're completely different looking. Now I feel worse as it may have been super rare and that I didn't know

 

[Hyfi]

1964 Ford Falcon with 3 Speed on the column - $400 from my mother

 

[Route 66]

My first car was a '66 Mustang that I bought in 1971. The seller had it listed as $700 firm. I asked him if he'd be willing to take $650. He said "no, the price is $700." I then asked him if he'd take $675. He asked "will that really help you?" I told him yes because I also needed to buy insurance for it. He agreed to the $675 so that I could get the insurance.

 

[Pio1980]

Pretty sure it was a 66. I was no slouch on Mustangs back then and they're completely different looking. Now I feel worse as it may have been super rare and that I didn't know

The televised car auctions are quite a revelation on what is selling these days, and what isn't.
It does seem tho' that the list of cars that didn't go thru the "just-another-old-car" stage is a short one.