I'm living the parting out a specialty car life right now.
Long story short I bought a one-owner 89 RX-7 TII with 50k miles about a year ago after I found a rotted frame rail in the engine bay when working on the car for the original owner. Started taking the car apart to start repairing it last spring. This winter a giant pine branch fell on the car, and crushed the roof, and bent the B-pillar. I lost the drive to fix the car, and decided to part it out.
Facebook(yuck!) has been a godsend for parting this car out though. This past weekend alone I made $3k on parts selling. Now this was mostly big ticket stuff like the engine, and drive line/ECU, but I';m finding that this car is very high in demand being a Series 5 car in the right color(black) with the right drive train(turbo's=money).
It's not easy selling parts from a car, and tearing a sophisticated (for its time) car apart while trying to save everything, but it sure is lucrative. Dealing with some of the buyers is less than pleasant as well. I won't tell you what I paid for the car, but I'm up to over $5k in sales so far, and parts have been going to the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rice, and Australia. Wish I could find another deal like this one, but probably a once in a lifetime deal.
There's money in dem there spinning Dorito's!!
In reply to Mazdax605 :
That's awesome! I have been surprised by how many parts have sold and for how much. As I said in the title, "maybe profit." I was mostly hoping to get a free engine out of it, and it's gone way beyond that.
Deals are out there all the time - the difficulty is in being patient and not ending up with a dozen cars waiting to be parted. Think about it - if you had a rusty RX-7 that got hit by a tree, would you expect to get more than a few hundred bucks for it? No! But in parts it's still worth a fair amount. Most people do not have the patience and space to part out cars, and even if they do have that they don't have the desire.
mtn
MegaDork
6/26/18 1:45 p.m.
dculberson,
What were the most surprising things that sold for the most money?
In reply to mtn :
The various SMT transmission parts got me really good money. ($650 for the pump, $575 for the actuator, $250 for the TCU)
The 5-speed out of my 2001 got me amazing money - $850 - and I only had it to sell since I used the manual-retrofitted 6-speed from the 2003.
I started out hoping to fix the car. The the tree fell on it, and I was hoping to get back the price I paid for the car, and having to get it titled in my name as the seller dated the title which meant I had to get it taken care of sooner rather than later. Had to pay the title fee of $75, and MA valued it at something crazy like $6k so I had to pay sales tax on that, and not on the amount I paid which was much lower than. Now I've made just over $5k which cover the investment very nicely. Of course I'm buying a new daily driver with the windfall, and then probably selling the perfectly reliable DD that we've had since 2007. Might be a bad decision. Stay tuned.
I sold the driver's rear quarter panel (remember that on these MR2 Spyders they bolt on) and the rear bumper cover. I had hoped to get more for the bumper cover but the paint really wasn't in great shape. But it was still a pretty significant amount, really. The fun part was shipping the bumper cover. FedEx Ground wanted $220 for it since it was so big. (72" long is the killer part.) I finally decided to give Greyhound a shot and their prices are way better. Pro tip, though, pay online. You save some time and confusion but most of all you save a bunch of money. You get the experience the "ambiance" of your local Greyhound station while you're at it. The basic service is station to station so your buyer has to pick it up at their local(ish) station. They do offer to the door service in some areas, it's about $50-$60 more. But it's not available everywhere so be careful!
New totals:
Purchase price: $1,500.00
+Towing: $125.78
+eBay fees: $393.50
+Title fees: $58.50
-Parts sales: $5,462.00
=Total profit: $3,384.22
At this point I'm hoping to score another $538 in sales just so I can say I sold $6000 in parts from it. That would be sweet. I do still have the doors, engine lid, some wiring harnesses, and a few other bits worth selling. Just need to come up with time to list them.
I have a friend who does this on a very large scale and he grosses over a million a year.
Thread bump because I’m finally getting around to using the cra.....stuff I got from David.
In reply to Spoolpigeon :
OK, I know you're not, but that picture really looks like you're using an engine hoist to lift your car by the rear bumper structure. LOL
Robbie
PowerDork
7/7/18 9:59 p.m.
DWNSHFT said:
In reply to Spoolpigeon :
OK, I know you're not, but that picture really looks like you're using an engine hoist to lift your car by the rear bumper structure. LOL
Wait, are you sure he's not? And if he is, is that bad?
In reply to Spoolpigeon :
Awesome! I hope the machinist was a magician. ;-)
@Dwnshft: I'm sure that's exactly what he's doing. Keep in mind these are very light cars. With the engine and transmission out and the car at a similar stage of disassembly, I had some interference issue setting my car down (using my lift) on the engine and trans assembly that was sitting on some cribbing on the floor. I finally just picked the rear of the car up and moved it over an inch or two. The whole car is about 2200lbs and he's probably got 800lbs out of it and with it on the front tires the hoist is probably only lifting a few hundred pounds.
JamesMcD said:
I have a friend who does this on a very large scale and he grosses over a million a year.
Very interesting! I assume he's got employees - any idea how many??
In reply to DWNSHFT :
That’s totally what I did. I used he hoist to drop the engine to the ground, then lifted the car by the crash bar to slide the engine out from underneath the car. As David said, the car is pretty light, and is well within the hoists capability. This is the only way to DIY this drivetrain without a lift as it won’t come out the top.
In reply to Spoolpigeon :
Wow! I never would have thought to do that. I'd be afraid of damaging the crash bar.
Cool, though! I learned something today!
In reply to DWNSHFT :
The crash bars are disturbingly stout :D Thats a 5500lb suv taking runs at trying to straighten one out.... The come along did nothing....
Sold the engine wiring harness (for SMT cars only!) and the gas tank. Still trucking along! Many of the parts now are just "leave it listed until it sells" parts. Some people are tempted to drop their prices, but honestly I think that's a waste of time and potential money. You just need to have patience and not be afraid to let it sit on a shelf for six months. If you don't have time or space for that, then sure - drop your price. But the item will sell eventually as long as your price is right. For example, I had the flex plate from a 3uz-fe engine listed for over a year at $50. That's my bare minimum price before I start scrapping stuff. Well, it sold the other day, so I'm $50 richer on something that would have fetched <$1 in scrap. All it cost was some clutter on my eBay shelves for a year or so. (OK, to be honest, I owned it for six years, but only had it listed for one of those. ;-)
New numbers:
Purchase price: $1,500.00
+Towing: $125.78
+eBay fees: $409.50
+Title fees: $58.50
-Parts sales: $5,622.00
=Total profit: $3,528.22
hey I tried to contact you but it wouldnt let me, do you still have the door and rear fender of that MR2, drivers side
In reply to RickM :
Hey Rick! I have the doors but I sold both rear fenders. Where are you located? You can email me at my user name at gmail.com .
FINALLY the engine I purchased from David back from the machine shop. It’s been a busy day.
New numbers:
Purchase price: $1,500.00
+Towing: $125.78
+eBay fees: $409.50
+Title fees: $58.50
-Parts sales: $5,622.00
=Total profit: $3,528.22
As I read this thread and this specific post... I'm banging my head against my Desk for letting this go to the insurance company for $350 last year.. I was going to keep it and then Hurricane Harvey got in my way as i was sitting on my hands and the car got towed to AUSTIN because of all the flood cars.. and that negated any chance of me being able to get it.
Day 19 of ownership ended like your donor car's did... except my downfall was a death alignment and 6 year old tires.. at 60 MPH on the freeway in Houston.
the Original spare tire had never been touched in 14 years... i kept it for my 99 Miata that replaced it.
my insurance is stupid high now on the focus. but i made out like a bandit on the MR2.
I paid $3k for the MR2... insurance valued it at $7700 at the time of the accident... which after my deductible meant i got a cool check for $7200.
It's a long shot, but any chance you still have this heat shield? (The one that says "this one" - not my pic.)
@SpoolPigeon: Awesome!! I'm glad to see at least some of the engine parts I sold you were useful. ;-)
@Spacecadet: DANG, yeah. But sometimes you just have to let go. You still did well, and I think it's fruitless to try to optimize everything in life. I sure would've loved to have it for that price, but a check for $7200 is a nice consolation prize.
@JamesMcD: Let me check tonight. I think I do have it.
dculberson said:
@Spacecadet: DANG, yeah. But sometimes you just have to let go. You still did well, and I think it's fruitless to try to optimize everything in life. I sure would've loved to have it for that price, but a check for $7200 is a nice consolation prize.
It was a decent consolation prize indeed.
@JamesMcD: Let me check tonight. I think I do have it.
Awesome. My brother bought one of these recently, and a previous owner cut a big hole in that shield for some wonky exhaust the car used to have.
