I knew for sure the 69 Ranchero would be a loser from a financial standpoint when I bought it. I didn't buy it to try to make money or even break even. I bought it for something to do after a few years of empty nesting. My first choices for projects were 60s Camaros and Mustangs. Then, a 70-73 Camaro. Then a Jeep CJ. None of those could be had within my budget, or were complete basket cases if so, so I settled for the Ranchero. I thought it was kinda cool to boot. Well, 4 years and many thousands of dollars later, I decided to sell for several reasons. One, it just costs too much. Hundreds spent nearly every month for years, and the second, more recent reason, momma wants to downsize and move 2 hours away to be close to our soon to arrive first grandchild. Won't have room for a project then. Anyhow, I put it up for sale last fall for $9800, which is thousands less than invested but, again, I knew it wasn't worth the investment. I got pretty much no interest at that price, even though lots of people would ask if it was for sale or would say how cool it was when I was out buying gas or running errands over the previous few years. Some even thought I should keep it "rat rod" looking rather than paint it. Anyhow, I eventually lowered to $7500 and got lots of people wanting to trade me motorcycles, old rusty tractors, bombed out off road jeeps and a whole host of other junk. Even a dirty, faded early 2000s Mustang plus free tattoos for the Mrs. and me. What a deal. Took the ad down and put it back up a few times on Marketplace and eventually lowered to $6500. Besides the usual scammers, had a couple promising inquiries that resulted in no-shows and ghosting thereafter. I messaged another seller of a 69 in my state with a much nicer ride than mine about how his sale was going. He started at $12 or $14k or thereabouts and continually lowered . He said he had received no interest at all except for the same type of junk trade offers I had. I saw that he eventually got down to $7k then the ad was gone. I assume he finally sold it. I expect he had well more than $20k in it but that is just speculation. He may have gotten it for free to start with. No idea. All this to say, the market for Rancheros seems to be very limited. It costs the same amount to restore or refurbish an old Mustang as it does a Ranchero and is the same amount of work so presumably there will be less of a financial hit and more of a resale market if one decides to sell eventually. That's what I will do the next time around, if there is a next time. I may just do what a lot of people say, buy one already restored and let somebody else take the financial hit. Not a lot of fun in that though. I'm not a big car show guy but I wouldn't show a car that someone else restored if I were. I would drive the heck out of it though. Anyhow, thanks for suffering through my rant and thanks to the many of you on this forum that helped me during my refurb. Out.
Sorry to hear your story Boiler; I always enjoyed the detailed videos of your work and figured that you'd end up keeping the Ranchero. I think your idea of buying a drivable car that still needs just a little work is a great solution; you get a drivable classic that you can spend some time improving. From what I read, most folks only recoup about half of what they have in the car if they decide to sell. Good luck in the future, and don't be a stranger here. Please post videos of any project you undertake.
Boiler agree with BB usually you don't get the money back. You do it because you enjoy it . You went in right with idea of something to play with take up some time. The unfortunate reality is only so many people are into these cars. With a upcoming move and wanting to downsize kind of puts you in a bind. Good luck with everything.
Thanks guys. I guess I'm mostly surprised by just how little interest there has been in it. Have received no inquiries about it on this forum at all. That is probably a function of how few people, relatively speaking, there are on here with a reasonable distance from me. But even on Marketplace I've not had one single person actually come take a look at it. None. At all. Just a bunch of knuckleheads asking stupid questions like is it a V6 or V8 and like I said, literally a couple dozen at least one sided trade offers, sight unseen. Probably going to repost on Marketplace again soon and see what happens. Again.
Finally sold it at a huge loss. I did enjoy it and learned some things from the project while it was here so not a total loss. Not having to move and pay to store somewhere is worth something too I guess.
