New Item on Never Do Again List: Car Parting!

[glassman]

For once, I will have to disagree with Budnicks. From personal experience, the Corvette crowd is equaled to the Hudson crowd in being "Cheapskates".

 

[patrick66]

Hudson and Mopar owners - what a bunch of damn cheapskates! LOTS of experience with both.

 

[monaco66coupe]

I have run into more than a few cheapskates, and also some polite People as well. However, There is no way to know which one will show up.Basically, if they are a jerk on the Phone, nosy, or say: "What do you have, and "I just want to come over to see". I don't help them. On the good side, I have never seen two Mopar Guys get into a fist fight over who's car won first place at a car show, But I did at an All Ford(Mustang) show.Hilarious it was.
The nicest customer I had was a Gentleman from Sweden. I had a complete 70' Challenger A/C setup for a 440, so I put it on Ebay. The winning bidder paid $398.00. I told him by Email what the total shipping was, and he said: I only want the High pressure line",Keep the rest. he went on to say how rude some Mopar guys were when he tried to just buy the line, so he bid on the whole thing thinking I would be the same. I told him I can't sell just the line, but I did pay his shipping, as I felt bad for him.
I then reposted the rest, and somebody from Norway bought the remaining parts.

The funniest Guy was a person from maybe 6 hours north of Grand forks in Canada. I had a 55' Desoto For sale on Ebay, and he won the car.However, I told him I wanted to fix the choke first, before he picked it up, in order to drive the car on the trailer. He appeared very grateful, and shared some bad news,as he had also bought two cars in Arizona that were sitting in a storage lot on the U.S. Border because when they showed up, the titles were not for the two cars. The sellers had by then disappeared, and now he was in a quandary. I assured him my Title was clean, and scanned it to him. It was 60* out when he showed up and he was sweating like we were in Florida or something. Even his Dog was overheated. The heat he said, was oppressive! HA HA (May in Nebraska?) Very nice Guy.

 

[Budnicks]

Hudson and Mopar owners - what a bunch of damn cheapskates! LOTS of experience with both.

LOL....
Never dealt with the Hudson Crowd, did have a few experiences with the Corvette crowd thou...

For once, I will have to disagree with Budnicks. From personal experience, the Corvette crowd is equaled to the Hudson crowd in being "Cheapskates".

 

[mopar 3 B]

This idea just popped into my head. It's insane, but what the Hell.

Why not have a 'Parting Out' party/yard sale/garage sale. Put an ad on Craiglist or wherever that states you have the Wagon and it's going to be parted out. The catch is that the buyer needs to come to remove the part. That way you can just charge for the part and not factor in the labor or shipping. Kind of like a junkyard but for just 1 car. Who cares if people aren't super gentle with other parts, you were already going to toss the car already. Maybe do the 'sale' somewhere that's not at your house, a neutral site possibly?

You guys are smart, think about it as a concept. Maybe it can work? Would this be something that you can do at a Carlisle or the like? I don't think there are rules at the shows that say you can't work on things. Are there?

And are you going to cover the liability on some stup cutting of a finger or dropping the car on himself. Even if you were offering the parts free some idiot would find some reason to sue.

- - - Updated - - -

Was not even aware there was a demand for C body parts and I have saved them for how many years.

 

[MarPar]

Was not even aware there was a demand for C body parts and I have saved them for how many years.

watcha got???

I have a 69 Newport that could use a few parts....pm me

 

[Bruzilla]

As Budnicks will attest, no one is cheaper than me. But even while I'll squeeze every dime to death to get the best deal, I know if there's a part I need that there's not many of, and I find one for sale, I better buy it. I didn't like paying $30 for a wiper knob, and damn sure didn't want to pay $80 for a plastic Roadrunner nameplate, but these parts are damn hard to find and when they come up for sale you need to snag them. My outlook is yeah, I'm paying more than I think I should have to, but I'm saving a lot of money by shopping and dealing for the more common parts so it all balances out.

What's bugging em now is after having this car listed as a parts source for a month, I'm just now hearing a lot of "could you pull the..." requests from people. I'm trying to get this thing buttoned up and towed off before the zoning guys start giving me problems, and now folks are wanting stuff pulled that I have to undo a lot of stuff I've done to get to. Very frustrating...

 

[Jeremiah]

I love selling nice parts at fair prices but my time equals money and I can't afford to have somebody's hand in my pocket. I even give my return customers 10% off, throw in bonus parts, etc.

 

[Daves69]

As Budnicks will attest, no one is cheaper than me. ............and damn sure didn't want to pay $80 for a plastic Roadrunner nameplate, but these parts are damn hard to find and when they come up for sale you need to snag them....................

What plastic RR nameplate are you referring to If I may ask. TIA

 

[petieg383]

And are you going to cover the liability on some stup cutting of a finger or dropping the car on himself. Even if you were offering the parts free some idiot would find some reason to sue.

That's what the release form is for!! Hehe.

 

[Bruzilla]

As Budnicks will attest, no one is cheaper than me. ............and damn sure didn't want to pay $80 for a plastic Roadrunner nameplate, but these parts are damn hard to find and when they come up for sale you need to snag them....................

What plastic RR nameplate are you referring to If I may ask. TIA

This one...

 

[Budnicks]

As Budnicks will attest, no one is cheaper than me. But even while I'll squeeze every dime to death to get the best deal, I know if there's a part I need that there's not many of, and I find one for sale, I better buy it. I didn't like paying $30 for a wiper knob, and damn sure didn't want to pay $80 for a plastic Roadrunner nameplate, but these parts are damn hard to find and when they come up for sale you need to snag them. My outlook is yeah, I'm paying more than I think I should have to, but I'm saving a lot of money by shopping and dealing for the more common parts so it all balances out.

What's bugging em now is after having this car listed as a parts source for a month, I'm just now hearing a lot of "could you pull the..." requests from people. I'm trying to get this thing buttoned up and towed off before the zoning guys start giving me problems, and now folks are wanting stuff pulled that I have to undo a lot of stuff I've done to get to. Very frustrating...

Extremely Frugal is a better description...LOL

 

[mmissile]

watcha got???

I have a 69 Newport that could use a few parts....pm me

View attachment 296549

I have a NOS grille for that car.

 

[MarPar]

pm sent

 

[Jeremiah]

Also, one thing I do when parting out a car is photograph, bag/tag and organize the parts as they come off of the car. Once the weather gets bad and things slow down I start listing the parts on Ebay for prices that I feel are worth my time to ship, etc. after all of the Ebay and Paypal fees. I always include a full pic of the car the parts came off of. Lots of times guys will hit me up for stuff that I have not listed. One other tip is if possible list a part number because many of us search by that criteria and it will show up in a google search.

I have a tiered system of pricing, from lowest to highest:

In person, friend
In person, Craigslist, ect.
In person, relative

Mail Order, various web forums
Mail Order, Ebay

Ebay is the worst because you automatically lose 12% of your sale when the auction ends and payment is made.

That said I have more Ebay sales than anything. I often wonder if it is because you can pay with a credit card.

For my sales made on this web forum and others, small parts are the majority of what is shipped out. Even if it's a turn signal housing socket or other small, hard to find part I clean my parts and make sure they are going to work. This practice has helped make return customers more than anything. Shipping is often more expensive than the parts in this case.

There will be lots of tire kickers, cheapskates, and people that ask for shipping quotes only to disappear and never be heard from again. For every three of those types where will be one grateful, happy customer that will make it worth the time and effort.

Hell, half of the time I try to talk people into fixing their parts instead of buying stuff we have.

Lastly, don't ruin your hobby by making it into a business. Sure we are making a little scratch here and there selling parts but the time to pack, ship, answer emails, etc. actually funds and creates project stagnation at the same time. It pretty much ends up being a labor of love. Making $1500 over a parts car is hard earned money, especially if spot welds need to be cut!

Hang in there and keep the money on your mind!

 

[wahya]

Since I only have one car, how could it be more than a hobby. Even for some that have lots of cars, it is only a hobby.
I have been fishing for most of my life and many years ago, I got a commercial fishing license and was able to pay off a medical debt. After that was accomplished, I kept the license and was able to break even most of the time on fishing trips that were increasingly becoming more expensive.
After awhile, it started to become less fun and more of a challenge to pay for my hobby. If I lost a big fish, it made me mad and frustrated. I gave up the practice and just fish for fun. It is so much more relaxing now that I know it's going to cost me x amount of money and it didn't matter what I caught so much.

 

[Bruzilla]

That's the problem. Money isn't on my mind. Getting to work on my Roadrunner is on my mind, but I can't do that until I can get all the parts off the wagon and get it towed out of the driveway. I would have it yanked as soon as I got the drivetrain out, but my challenge is to get the drivetrain for free, so I need to make back the $800 I spent on the car.

 

[mosquito13]

Parted out motorcycles for 5 years. The forums sucked if you were trying to make $. I ended up selling only on ebay and only to lower 48. Set the price take lots of picks box it and have a good scale. My local pack and ship showed me how to charge shipping and I used them only( shipping cost were then fixed as part of auction) build fleacebay and paypal fees in the items cost. In the end it worked out for myself after getting past the learning curve , but didnt get rich. Ended up quiting because of the bad people... buying stuff and filing complants that the used parts were not new...,or never received even though tracking showed delivered, or bastards would return a part but just send a empty box and file complant with ebay. Long story to get to my point. I will sell parts on forums like this one. ask far or low price to build Karma and good will. Glad this site has a trader score . Wish it was more stream lined to fill out though.

 

[Bruzilla]

The other challenge is this is a station wagon, and there aren't many left, and damn few get parted out. So what is a part worth? I had a guy in Pittsburgh contact me about rear area carpet hold down strips and asked me how much I wanted for them. I told him I had no clue as I had never seen them for sale before, so shoot me an offer and I'll see if it sounds good. He offered $50 and shipping and that sounded fine by me. They could be worth $500, but who knows. But other guys refuse to make an offer unless I make one first, and I have to tell them I'll just start at $200 and we'll see where it goes.

 

[wahya]

When I had my 71 parts car and paying for inside storage, I made it a point to strip everything I could off of it. I then put it on a trailer and took it to the parts/scrap yard. When I pulled up to the yard, the guy came out with his forklift and as he was picking it up he said wow, haven't seen one of these in a while. He took it inside the gate and put it down. He then says well, you didn't leave me too much. I took in the title to the counter and the guy tells me all he can give me is 25 dollars.
So what was I to do, tell him put it back on the trailer.
I was talking to a strictly scrap guy several months later and he told me he would have given me a lot more, just for the scrap metal. On the other hand, I saved money, as I was able to store parts in my own garage.