Let's do some warm up laps

This beautiful 1972 Datsun 240Z closes later today on eBay Motors. Several bidders have already taken it up into five figures. Together, they are moving the price up towards the seller's optimistic guidance of $30,000 (Buy-It-Now). How far will it go? For a high performance street car I would use three things to triangulate an estimate; comparables, replacement cost and needs.

There are not many cars out there right now which seem particularly comparable. This race car has too much provenance (or history) to be considered an equal. And, you can see that it hasn't sold at this very high asking price, despite being featured on Bring A Trailer. So that's not very instructive.

To build this car one might start with a $10-$13K driver like this one up on Hemmings.    Suspension upgrades and roll cage might come to $10K without valuing the owner's time very much. Then the Dave Rebello engine work is at least a $15K proposition. Without considering anything else, it's easy to see why the seller set the BiN price at $30K. 

And finally you have to discount this car for its needs. Seller describes the roof as needing a clearcoat. A glass out paint job on this car would run at least $7K in the Bay Area (possibly less elsewhere). It doesn't need a glass out paintjob, but if you are the buyer that is what you are going to say you think it needs...

Taking all this into consideration, I would peg it at $22-$24k. Now we have no way of knowing if the seller's reserve is realistic until the auction runs its course. Let's all watch and see...