There’s a good mechanic when you need one? That was my plea after eyeing-up a thirty-year-old rally car recently listed at a CollectingCars.com online auction.
I was keen, but said car – a race-prepped 1994 Renault Clio Williams – was over 1000km away and I had no way of getting to Sydney before the seven-day listing ended.
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What I needed was a trusted source to check the hot hatch’s vitals and test drive it to ensure the Frenchie went as good as it looked in the photos.
But this being a UK-import model never sold in Australia, I didn’t feel it was an inspection job for the local NRMA bloke, good as he might be.
I was after a proper marque specialist, ideally with motorsport expertise, and good luck finding one of those at short notice.
There’s no happy ending.
I never found my Knight in Shining Overalls, so only made a low-ball bid on the Renault and missed out.
I’m not brave enough to drop five figures on a car only seen online, but may have been had a trusted source given me a detailed pre-purchase report.
Mechanics in demand
Here’s where opportunity knocks for you mechanics, especially those with speciality and experience in classic, rare and exotic cars.
There are lots of people in need of your services, so it could prove an interesting way to earn serious pocket money.
In Australia, enthusiast vehicle online auctions are booming.
Hundreds of cars go live each week, and the “clock is ticking” auction format means many enthusiasts can’t help themselves.
I’m as guilty as the next car guy.
After a few beers/wines/rums and scrolling through classifieds and auctions (come on, you do it too), up pops that Mustang you always promised yourself.
Or Torana. Or 911. Or rally-ready but fragile French hatchback.
You’re hooked.
And ready to bid your hard-earned on a four-wheeled temptress. Years ago I did just that, bidding a mighty $1012 on eBay for a ’91 Saab 900i.
I may have had one too many coldies, and certainly hadn’t run it past the wife, so winning the retro Swede was quite the surprise. Let’s just say I wish I’d had it inspected before making my impulsive bid.
As these auction sites gain in popularity, so does demand for expert inspections and evaluations. Just think.
An auction goes live for a vehicle in Melbourne. There’s a guy in Perth, Townsville or Broken Hill who wants it, but the cost of flying there to inspect is restrictively expensive. And who knows if they’ll win the auction, even if they personally give it the seal of approval?
Having an independent expert local to the car checking it over would be far more cost and time effective. A potential bidder would fork out a few hundred bucks for the mechanic’s expertise, but that’s savvy insurance against buying a clunker.
Because as we know, at auctions there’s no warranty or consumer guarantees as is (usually) given by licensed car dealers.
To spin it another way, as online auctions become a more commonplace way to sell a car, the seller could personally pay for a mechanic to do an independent appraisal for all interested bidders to see.
With a pre-inspection report shown alongside pretty pictures of the car being auctioned, that’s a massive barrier to purchase removed for the potential buyers.
So here’s the million-dollar opportunity.
If a mechanic fancies specialising in doing these pre- and during-auction reports, and becomes a region’s trusted go-to source for it, there’s likely lots of work available.
You’d have got my dollars if I could have found such an expert when I was flirting with making a higher bid on that online rally car.
Booming industry
Car auctions have been around for decades, but online bidding only properly arrived with eBay in the early 2000s. And cars were far from that site’s speciality.
Established car auction sites soon realised the potential, such as Grays, Pickles and Manheim.
These sell thousands of cars under the hammer, typically ex-fleet, ex-government and ex-rental “everyday” cars, plus repossessions, write-offs, and unwanted dealer trade-ins.
There are decent vehicles to be had that way, but you’ll find many unloved and unroadworthy basket cases too. And, on such auction sites, they’ll typically have basic descriptions and average photos taken in a warehouse.
Most of the new online auction sites specialising in collectable cars do things differently.
The main ones featuring Australian cars for sale include Collecting Cars (co-founded by Top Gear’s Chris Harris), Trading Garage, Seven 82 Motors and Chicane Auctions.
As I write, on these you can window shop or bid on things like a 2018 Aston Martin DB11, 1967 Shelby GT500, 1986 BMW E30 M3, 2012 Holden HSV Maloo, 1973 Ford XA GT Falcon and 1962 Jaguar MkII.
Something for everyone, really.
I spoke to Collecting Cars’ Chief Executive, Edward Lovett, who said online-only auction sites like theirs allowed sellers to “reach further and faster” to car enthusiasts, evidenced by over 25,000 sales in the past six years.
“I’d encourage anyone to bid willingly, but as always when buying a car, have some caution,” he said.
“It’s our responsibility to try and give buyers as much information and the ability to ask questions (to the seller), plus have any inspections done during the auction.”
Lovett acknowledged there’s a risk element to buying at auction, but that’s really no different to buying privately. That’s why he recommends having a professional or expert inspect any car ahead of serious bidding – boosting work opportunities for Aussie mechanics.
Such an inspection would really help complete the picture.
When you check out listings on Collecting Cars, a video of the vehicle (usually running) is on the page, plus hundreds of images showing impressive detail.
Photo-wise, It’s full disclosure.
“We use professional photographers, and if they turn up to an owner’s house and something doesn’t look or feel right, or if the owner doesn’t want them to take a photo of X, Y, or Z, the photographer would alert us to that,” Lovett said.
“I think having a photographer turn up to someone’s house mitigates a huge part of the risk in buying a car online.”
Billion-dollar sales
What’s clear is Aussies don’t mind taking a punt on a classic or exotic vehicle, even if buying sight unseen. Lovett said Collecting Cars Australasian sales results last month exceeded $7.3 million from 102 auction lots.
Meanwhile, its global platform has sold more than 20,000 lots – vehicles and licence plates – with total sales exceeding $1.8 billion.
A dangling carrot for sellers is no listing fees nor any fees on the final sale price. It’s the buyer picking up a 6 per cent premium on the winning bid for cars, or 10 per cent for parts and plates, plus GST.
Minimum fee is $2200, and maximum is $12,100, even if the sale figure exceeds a million big ones.
For Collecting Cars in Australia, private plates have proved the biggest ticket items. Two-digit NSW plates are the most lucrative, with “55” fetching $1,625,000. Yep, a flat bit of metal with numbers on for the price of a flashy house.
On the car front, an Aussie buyer bought an ex-Rod Stewart 1997 Ferrari F50 from Britian for almost £3 million ($6.24 million), then promptly imported it to Sydney.
“We only made £6000 ($12,500) on that sale,” Lovett said.
“The likes of (auctioneer) Bonhams would have charged £450,000 ($935,000) in buyer’s commission alone.”
Lovett said reserve prices are set realistically or they won’t take on the vehicle, and they use AI to spot and block any dodgy activity such as shield bidding where a bid is placed on behalf of the owner to artificially inflate the price.
Most of you reading this will be car enthusiasts, and one of the joys of these new online auction sites is they actually publish final sale prices – the old auction mobs rarely do.
It means we get to see the current true market value for certain special cars, and there are plenty of “what ifs” as something you had your eye on sells for less than you’d have paid.
The most dangerous auction lots are ones with just a couple of hours remaining… the price looks good and you feel like making a cheeky bid.
No time, in these instances, to have a mechanic check the car over. But Aussies are natural gamblers – especially with a drink or three onboards – and the “she’ll be right” attitude can very much apply to auctions.
It’s why I bought that unroadworthy Saab 900i, have bid on many other cars I really don’t need, and why one of my good friends made a last-minute bid on an old Austin without checking where it was located.
He duly won, and only then learned it was up in Darwin, almost 4000km drive from his Melbourne home. Fun times.
What’s clear is online vehicle auctions are only going to become a more commonplace way to sell. Savvy mechanics finding a way to be the go-to for inspections should be able to cash in big time.