2004 SL55 immaculate on 29k miles....

[MikeInWimbledon]

Was shocked to see that this was only £29k worth of car earlier today:

Ref 151 2004 Mercedes-Benz SL55 AMG

Bodywork and interior seemed immaculate.

What does the team think?

 

[E55BOF]

An aberration; I think a couple of bidders got carried away... You can buy far, far better cars for that sort of money.

Still, you can't argue with what somebody actually paid for it. No doubt some of the more hopeful/deluded other vendors on the market will now adjust their prices upwards, though.

It will be interesting to see whether the dozens of SL55s on the market for much more reasonable prices remain unsold; my guess is that they will.

 

[John]

Far too much money for that no matter how great a car they are.

 

[C36fan]

Far too much money for that no matter how great a car they are.

I beg to differ, really good cars like this are hard to come by and is surely a potential appreciating classic.

 

[MikeInWimbledon]

I would add that, apart from that driver's seat, I couldn't see any signs of wear on the car.

The bodywork genuinely appeared "as new." I've never seen a 10+ year old SL in such a good condition.

Gawd knows who owns such cars without using them.

 

[Will]

Looks nice, but it’s a pre-facelift SL55 without much else going for it other than the mileage? Big 10-year gap in the MOT history with only 3k miles in between? Would want to check the service history etc out myself if I was bidding

The way I see cars like these is if £10k buys a project, and £15k an entry level car with say £20k for a particular tidy example I guess you’re only paying the £9k extra for the very low mileage (and hopefully) immaculate condition.

If you’re after a peach of an SL55 I reckon that isn’t a bad premium to pay

I saw this when I first looked at the Mercedes cars on the auction entries:

Ref 27 1988 Mercedes-Benz 190E 2.3 16v Cosworth

£18k for an automatic 100k miler 190E 2.3-16. It looks in great condition but I remember 10 years ago when people scoffed at paying £5k or so for a nice one

Nice to see good examples of these cars fetching the money they deserve

 

[jdrrco]

Can't believe how cheap this was. Wish I'd been free to head to Slough earlier.

Ref 31 1986 Mercedes-Benz 500 SEL

 

[Will]

Brooklands was the auction, but yes that looks to have passed under the radar - patchy MOT history but a good buy for someone

 

[C36fan]

Brooklands was the auction, but yes that looks to have passed under the radar - patchy MOT history but a good buy for someone

cheap car , engine is worth that alone.
I'd gladly daily that.

 

[MikeInWimbledon]

If anyone else wants to while away an unforgiving Sunday afternoon, here's the rest of the Historics "Sold" results.

Apart from the very low mileage SL55, a very pretty 928 caught my eye. But there are many pretty Mercs in there:

Here are the results:

Cars

 

[Cyclone1]

As it’s an SL it has future classic potential hence maybe why it sold for a high price. Don’t think this will apply to all Merc models from the same / similar era though. The E’s are way too plentiful, likewise the C’s unless they are a BS or similar, will struggle to command strong resale as future classics, currently (may change in 10 years time). The CLS has scope, the S doubtful, SLK likely doubtful, CLK in AMG form yes, CL I think will eventually rise.

 

[c63chris]

Wow, would sell mine for that

 

[MikeInWimbledon]

Wow, would sell mine for that

Ah but is yours one owner, 29k miles, and brand new condition....?

 

[c63chris]

Ah but is yours one owner, 29k miles, and brand new condition....?

LOL no 3 owners and 48K. Same condition though

 

[oldguy57]

An aberration; I think a couple of bidders got carried away... You can buy far, far better cars for that sort of money.

Still, you can't argue with what somebody actually paid for it. No doubt some of the more hopeful/deluded other vendors on the market will now adjust their prices upwards, though.

It will be interesting to see whether the dozens of SL55s on the market for much more reasonable prices remain unsold; my guess is that they will.

Yep- way overpriced, not even an "F1" spec. Wonder if this will appear at a dealers for £35K with the usual "best existing example/unique opportunity/investment" piffle. At the sold price you are almost into SL65 territory as well. And yes SL55's at £15k- £20k will remain unsold. It's a strange world this old car business.

 

[Will]

Can’t see how it was way overpriced? It was an auction

The bidders set the sale price, not the vendor.

Presumably the winning bidder felt it worth £29k and whoever bid against them must have felt it worth almost as much too, as well as any other bidders who bid close to the hammer price? The premium for an almost as-new car isn’t that high if you want a really nice one IMHO.

I’m not saying I would have personally bought that car for that price but seems a strange viewpoint of others recently that something isn’t worth what other people have paid.

 

[MikeInWimbledon]

The auction price is always set by the second highest bidder. (The highest bidder will usually have paid more)

It’s a mistake to think that a low mileage immaculate car is the same as normally used cars.

It’ll be interesting to see if this ends up being stored or used.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[John]

I beg to differ, really good cars like this are hard to come by and is surely a potential appreciating classic.

Time will tell although there are currently 46 for sale on Autotrader so not exactly rare, and Zoros on here had a real struggle to get even heavy teens for his.

They are too complicated to become classics - similar to the E55K and CLS55K.

More's the pity though as they are all great cars.

 

[Will]

Zoros’ car had significantly higher mileage though?

This one is/was a 29k miler minter

That’s the big difference.

Enthusiasts and collectors will pay more for nice original/immaculate/low mileage cars. Average ones don’t have the same appeal.

Hence the auction sale price?

 

[alabbasi]

Prices are still on the way down for these cars. They'll continue to fall at least for another 7 years before they start creeping up. Expect to see 5000-7000 GBP ones for sale before too long.