Before you bid
What decides whether a collector car purchase goes well, most of which is not the car. What the fees do to your real ceiling, what the condition grades mean, what an inspection has to cover, how the auction format changes your tactics, how to pay without being defrauded, and what it costs to get the car home, registered, insured and properly put away.
What you will actually pay at a collector car auction
Buyer's premium, sales tax, transport and recommissioning stack on top of your bid. The formula for your real ceiling, with a worked example showing an 18% overshoot.
Condition grades, and why yours is probably one lower
The 1-to-6 condition scale every price guide quotes by, what actually separates a #2 from a #3, and why most cars advertised as excellent are a grade below.
The pre-purchase inspection, era by era
What to demand from an inspection on a collector car, from pre-war structure to OBD-II scans - and why the seller's recommended shop is the wrong shop.
Collector car paperwork, and what it is worth
Title brands, open titles, originality documentation, numbers-matching claims and the 25-year import rule. What to verify before you bid, not after you win.
Reserve, soft close and proxy bids: how car auctions actually work
Reserve versus no reserve, why a hard close and a soft close demand opposite tactics, what a proxy bid is for, and the five venue terms to read before bidding.
Paying for a car you just won, without being defrauded
Wire fraud targets the hours after the hammer falls. How intercepted payment instructions work, the one verification that stops them, and what never to pay for by wire.
Shipping a collector car, and the signature that decides liability
Open versus enclosed, how to verify the carrier rather than the broker, how to prepare the car - and why the delivery receipt you sign decides whether you have a claim.
Registering an out-of-state collector car, and what the tax will be
You pay tax where you register, not where you buy. Use tax, credit for tax paid elsewhere, what historic plates restrict, and the emissions trap on a car missing its original equipment.
Collector car insurance: agreed value, and what it asks of you
Why an ordinary policy pays the wrong number, how agreed value differs from the stated value that sounds like it, what the figure should be, and the gaps people find late.
Storing a collector car, and what sitting does to it
Moisture, ethanol, flat spots, seized parking brakes and brake fluid on a two-year clock. How to store a car properly, how to wake it up - and what 'barn find' actually costs.