When The Nicest Version Of A Car Isn’t Worth What You Think It Is

You don’t have to be Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein to come to the logical conclusion that, if at least two examples of a car exist, there has to be a nicest version and a worst version. For extremely rare and valuable cars like the Ferrari 250 GTO, collectors and appraisers often have a good idea of exactly who owns those superlative vehicles. For more common cars, like a 1993 Oldsmobile Silhouette, it’s a lot harder to know.

This is the fun of online auction sites and virtual marketplaces. Eventually, some niece or nephew gets bequeathed a perfectly clean 1996 Subaru SVX, and we all get to gawk at how pristine the steering wheel is, and how the wood inserts have somehow resisted cracking for all these years. I’m definitely of the belief that cars should be driven, but there’s something appealing about having the cleanest version of a car, which is usually achieved by a car not being driven all that much relative to its age.

I thought of this as I watched the auction for a 1999 Mitsubishi 3000GT VR-4 over at Cars & Bids. This is a rare-ish car, with fewer than 300 sold in the last year. It also has some features that make it specifically valuable, including the “Combat Wing” rear spoiler and revised headlights. I’m generally not a fan of white cars, but I think Glacier White-over-tan is the ideal spec for this car. Other than the 18-inch chrome-finished alloy wheels, it’s pretty much perfect.

If you’re not aware, the 3000GT VR-4 was, as Doug DeMuro put it when talking about a different car, peak Japanese sports car from the end of the Bubble Era.

The hard-top convertible is wild, too, and if you can’t get white-over-tan, then red-over-black is the second-best combination. These are desirable cars, both as historic objects and for drivers. This was as far into the future as Mitsubishi could look, and the combination of a turbocharged engine with all-wheel drive, active aero, and four-wheel steering feels very much like what life is like a quarter of a century later.

Also this this was capable of a sub-5-second 0-60 mph trip, thanks to the 300+ horsepower turbo V6 and excellent traction. Here’s MotorWeek‘s take:

I revise my earlier ranking of colors. I still think white-over-tan is the best, but maybe tennis ball yellow-over-black is the second best? Either way, it looks great at Roebling Road Raceway. While it doesn’t carry the same cultural appeal as an MKIV Toyota Supra or R32 GT-R, it’s a performance car you’ll enjoy driving.

What is a pristine version of one of these worth? What’s the best one worth? A red 1999 with 3,800 miles on the ODO was sold on BaT for $75,000 in 2022. Was this the nicest one? Perhaps. It also sold near the peak of bonkers pandemic pricing, so as a comparable, it’s a little hard to judge. Just to provide a huge range, there’s also a 9,000-mile Spyder SL for sale with bidding below $10,000 and a 1994 with 91,000 miles that sold earlier this month for $24,500.

Back to the 1999 I mentioned earlier, I’m not sure this is the nicest one of these in private hands. It’s maybe not the lowest mileage 3000GT in existence at 27,300 miles, but it’s possibly the best of the last model year of this vehicle. I mean, look at this thing:

There doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with this specific vehicle other than some touched-up paint and tires that are seven years old, which is to say it’s nicer than almost anything any of us on the site own.

Especially with the wing, which is taller than all but one Torchinsky, I am enamored with this car. I think that this is probably the exact one to get, and the fact that it isn’t so low in miles that it’s not drivable makes it even more appealing.

Let’s also please enjoy the interior together:

The seller, P1 Exotics, took photos that make me just want to climb into the car and never leave.

So what is this car worth? Surprisingly, it hit $58,000 and didn’t meet the reserve.

This gets into the interesting psychology of both buyers and sellers in these situations. If this is your childhood dream car, and you are of means, the upper limit is likely very high. The same is true if you had one of these and had to get rid of it for some reason.

But how do you handicap that as a seller? There are maybe a few people who fit that description for a car like this Mitsubishi. That Silhouette I referenced earlier? That’s a real car, with only 69,000 California miles on it when it was sold in March.

A super clean Dustbuster is still a Dustbuster, so the $10,000 the family got for that particular Olds seems like a high-but-fair price. That’s double the price someone got for this 23,000-mile automatic Ford Tempo GL coupe. That’s not to say that ’90s Fords can’t fetch big money; this 150-mile F-150 SVT Lightning just crossed the line at $75,000 even.

In the case of the Lightning, it’s probably both an emotional purchase and a reasonable investment. These are well-appreciated trucks, and that is almost certainly the nicest one anywhere outside of Ford’s collection. And even then, maybe it’s nicer!

Where does this leave the 3000GT VR4? Looking at the market comps, only two cars on BaT have transacted for more than $50,000 since 2016, and both were lower miles. Maybe the reserve was set at $60,000, which would put it in between the two highest sold cars on BaT. Or maybe it was set at $67,000, which is what this exact car sold for on Cars & Bids in June of last year.

Logically, we know there was one person willing to spend over $65,000 for one of these cars, but maybe not two people. Either way, there’s good news at the end of this story. The seller and the highest bidder were united after the auction and were able to come to an agreement.

I am a person who would spend silly money for the nicest Cayman Green Ford Escort GT, though thankfully I don’t have the discretionary budget to wield at the moment. What car would you want the nicest version of, and what would you be willing to pay for it?

Top photo: C&B