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Old 09-21-2004, 02:42 PM
autounion autounion is offline
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Join Date: Jul 2001
Location: Motor City. MI
Posts: 73
Wrong end of the telescope!!!

i think many of you are too busy looking at the wrong end of the telescope. the term 'collectible' is as subjective as it is misleading. i would be using the term 'desireable' instead.
i'm an indy dealer. i can tell you this much about dealer auctions, whenever an older, clean, reasonable miles S-body Benz comes in the lane its a dealer feeding frenzy. based on 'book value', the older S-Class bring more proportionally than the newer series of MB's. i have seen dealers consistently pay 2-3 times book value on these older cars. why? well, there's still a lot of folks who can't shell out $40-80K to get world-class engineering.

and, there's no real mystery to it. as one poster said, some of this is due to wanting when you could'nt afford it. as many MB's were very advanced for their time, they still make excellent road cars even now. the S-class will always be a grand automobile no matter what and the long body runs help to blur the line of model-year. this, and more, add up to a 'mystique-value-quotient' that adds desire for the brand.

as a matter of fact, just today i bought an '85 500SE. i've always thought these cars had some wonderfully subtle styling features and they were leaner looking than the U.S. version cars. when i put it on my lot at $4-5K, there'll be a lot of prospects who will only be able to comparison-shop that price with a Taurus at 100K miles. what would you rather have?
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