Mecum Houston 2020 Report
I'm like three auctions behind on doing these summary reports, so here we go with last years Houston event. Mecum's annual visit to Houston usually occurs in early April, but COVID shut that down this year. Not to miss out, Mecum came back in early December to get an auction in for H-Town in the calendar year. It was held in the same venue - NRG Center - but things weren't the same.
Since NRG is in Harris County, there were ridiculous COVID protocols in place like temp checks and mandatory mask requirements. Now listen, if you're someone who's, for lack of a better description, 'overly concerned' about COVID and see these protocols as necessary, let me explain why they're idiotic: The NRG staff were taking forehead temps when you walked in and if you were over 100 you couldn't come in, but it was cold outside so everybody that was walking in from the parking lot was exposing their foreheads to extremely cold air. I asked a lady on day two what my temp was and she said "89 degrees". She said everyone was low. Think about the stupidity of that whole set up for a minute.
Anyway, the most disappointing change this time around was just the lack of inventory. Normally, the entire hall is pretty much full of cars. The picture above shows the shortage this year. Normally the entire hall would have rows of cars from end to end. I'm guessing there were about 500 cars less than usual.
Not all of the COVID changes were bad. Instead of bleachers and rows of chairs they had tables that were spread out for bidders only. I kind of liked it. You could order food and drinks on your phone and get everything delivered right to your table. Nel sat there eating rabbit food and working the whole time.
Normally I do this "Things We Didn't Buy / Things We Did Buy" section. We didn't buy anything this time. I tried, a lot. Sadly, I just couldn't get anything over the finish line without overpaying a great deal...so I didn't.
Things We Didn't Buy
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| 1974 BMW 2002 Tii |
I don't see a lot of these in Houston, but classic box Beemers are getting popular and there are folks out there starting to restore them to spectacular levels. I loved this car, but the prices are still all over the shop so it's hard to get comfortable with valuing them. I was good up to $30K on this one, but it was a no sale at $38K.
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| 1970 Mercedes 280SE |
Someone had restored three of these Mercs to unbelievable levels. I bid on this one against an internet bidder and let him take it for $33K. I think that was a bargain! Why didn't I buy it? The other two were going later and I liked the colors better. Of course, they went for over $60K each and that wasn't somewhere I wanted to be on these. This is probably the car I should have come home with.
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| 1998 Aston Martin DB7 Alfred Dunhill Editions |
I like these old DB7s. These were a special edition that really didn't matter to me, but I was interested in them all the same. Sometimes these things can be had reasonably, and if they were very reasonable I might have considered both as a "his & hers" sort of thing....because I'm stupid and I do stuff like that. Unfortunately (or fortunately as Nel likes to say) they bid up too high and the owner clearly overvalued them as they didn't sell.
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| 1983 Eagle Model 10 Motorcoach |
I had no interest in this thing, but it falls under the "you never know what you're going to see" category. This was actually Prince's tour bus for the Purple Rain Tour! It sold for around $80K I think.
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| 2007 Aston Martin V8 Vantage Cabriolet |
I came closer to buying this Aston than anything else. I liked this car because I thought I could drive it every day if I wanted and I actually fit in it quite comfortably. It came down to me and a guy sitting at the table right next to me and I finally gave up at $35K. That's about what you could find one for elsewhere so I couldn't justify continuing to bid. Sigh.
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| 1985 Chevrolet K5 Blazer |
I wasn't really that interested in this Blazer, other than that it sort of matches a Suburban that I'm restoring right now...right down to the colors - and I do stupid stuff like that! I would have gladly paid $15K or so, but it was very nice and the classic SUV market is hot. This one sold for $28K.
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| The Batmobile! |
I think Nel was secretly terrified that I would come home with this. I'm not sure what she was afraid of - how awesome would it have been to pick Samantha up from kindergarten in the Batmobile!?! In all seriousness, I liked the idea of having it and doing that. What scared me off was how low this thing was sitting. It was basically dragging the ground! What I missed, though, is that it was on air bags and would lift up on command. This thing sold for $88K and I think that was a bargain. I'm not sure I would have pulled the trigger, but I'm not sure I wouldn't have either.
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| 1990 Porsche 944 S2 Cabriolet |
It all came down to this. Literally the last car to go through the entire three day auction. I hadn't bought anything, I love Porsches and wanted another convertible, it was a No Reserve auction, the crowd was thinning...everything was in my favor. Sadly, this was a very low mileage example that caught the attention of collectors and I ended up going bid for bid with an internet buyer. It sold for $30,800. That's still not a bad deal, but I just gave up.
It wasn't a complete loss. My auction girlfriend/stalker Katie Osborne took another run at me. She never shows up when Nel is around, but if the wife stays home (or goes to work in this case) she's all over me...and by all over me I mean she spoke to me for like two minutes about this Ford Camper. Nel better not leave me unsupervised at auctions much more. I can only reject her obvious advances for so long.
