Advice please

[Series1 Stu]

Sorry but I don't understand why you say that a proper restoration has to cost well over £200k. I don't believe that these specialists are any better than other restorers charging considerably less on the hourly rate.

Cheque book restorations don't necessarily produce the best cars. Try selling an NFC or similarly restored car 12 months after taking possession and see how much you get for it.

Regards

[Barry]

Hi Steve, sounds like a really great Car. Have you got some photos? NFC have just retrimmed my V12 OTS seats, and door cards and done a fabulous job. Just finished putting the whole of interior back yesterday. Alan Smith, father of Daniel the manager, did them. Lovely guy. I do like NFC, but I have to query the business case of moving to that “old and dank” garage in Beaulieu. They seem to have other buildings round about for a lot of their restoration work that you never get to see! The previous unit in Lymington had a much better hi-tech professional feel about it, and you could see everything in one building. I would always recommend them though. Business is tough at the moment for selling £200k plus E-types whoever you are. Although Uryk from E-volution did sell that lovely S1 FHC at Excel last week at a smigeon on under £300k.

[stevenm]

Hi Barry. Yes I also do not understand why NFC moved to Beaulie garage but I think it had something to do with the lease and the business rates they were paying on the showroom/workshops in Lymington. The showroom in Lymington, as you say, was a really great place to display their cars and was a very high tech premises where Beaulie garage is um let's just say that it does not have quite the same visual impact to sell such high end restored e types that they are advertising. At one time they were also selling a lot of spares for e types but that seems to have dropped off as well lately. Maybe it is the sign of the times.
Yes my car is a very nice one but a potential buyer needs to view the cars they are possibly intending to buy with someone like Angus who can give an expert opinion yet only one person (from Switzerland) viewed my car and he wanted to change the body colour and intetior trim back to its original sherwood green with green interior.. He had his own mechanic fly out and carry out a thorough inspection on the car and when I spoke to him a day or so later, he told me that it had passed with flying colours. When he had his mechanics valuation report given to him, which was quite high, and he factored in the cost of a complete bare metal respray and return to the colours he wanted he finally decided the cost was probably going to be too much for his budget. He has now bought a cheaper series 1 e type and will have the colour changed on that one.
Here are a few pics of my car.

[stevenm]

A few interior pics.The modern radio has since been removed and I have an early radiomobile radio ready to be fitted to complete the period look.

[Simon P]

Your horn push would drive my sense of OCD nuts!

[stevenm]

Hmmmm. Yes. That was taken just before i had the work carried out on the car. It is straight and inline now......honest

[Barry]

Lovely Car, Steve. Shut lines look perfect, which is always the best indicator of a first class restoration. I am sure you could improve your car, but you do have to draw the line somewhere! Don’t do what I did with my S1 3.8 FHC; spent fortunes rebuilding the engine, 5 speed gearbox, and retrim all at NFC for £27k and then sold it having fallen in love with a 6.0 litre V12 OTS!! Couldn’t sell it privately and got £110k in a p-ex. How right you are, re Angus. So for anyone wanting to buy a car, he is the go to man. Now the big question; what are you going to replace the white car with??

[stevenm]

Thanks Barry. I want to replace my roadster with an early FHC which is why when I advertised the car I mentioned that I would be interested to hear from anyone that had a FHC in an exchange or P/X against mine. I thought that there might be a few FHC owners who might like a roadster but I had no one contact me about this.
This is the only reason i was selling the car.