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I kind of can't believe a 68 L78 that needs a paint job and some freshening up went for $75 K!!
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Chuck asked what others had sold for, so I reported what I paid- good, bad, or otherwise! See below for further explanation:
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I must admit, you probably know more about car collecting than I ever will so if you are paying up I will be looking for a value increase in 68 L78's in the near future!!
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What I do know about COLLECTING (note: note flipping, trading, or dealing) is that the #1 cardinal rule is buy what you like first and shop by price second. Notice my comments in my post about value really boils down to whether you are looking to "flip" a car and concerned about future profit, OR, if you really LIKE the car and just want it. In my case, I loved Dave's old car, it is just a great old car with incredible docs and history and imho that is something that no restoration, McNeish certification, GM of Canada, or other type of "secondary" after-the-fact paperwork or creative measures can recreate. I love original cars, and I love their stories. I agree a 68 is the "middle child" and not as valuable as a 67 or 69 by any means. But I have a 68 Yenko Camaro which is essentially an L78 car (right?) and this red/red M22 car looks good next to it. Now when I say "crappy old paint", of course, those who know me know I am pretty picky. It was perfectly acceptable to 99% of the people I am sure. But the car had already been repainted so I wasn't worried about taking off original paint, and the car is so outstanding otherwise that I felt it deserved a quality paint job. Back to collecting: My Yenko is fun to drive but has become so valuable that it sometimes is a stressful proposition to take it out and drive in traffic. With the L78 car, I can drive it with a lot less stress and have just as much fun (if not more). Plus, the original owner put on headers and slapper bars in March of 68 so I'm leaving those on because the exhaust really opens the L78 up and I love the "Day 2" aspect of the vintage speed parts that everybody put on these things but few do after a restoration. The M22 is one of my favorites, and the original owner special ordered the car with a 3.08 rear so it has "legs" and can go down the freeway a lot better than the Yenko with 4.11's.
So don't look for values of 68 L78/ M22 cars to jump, there isn't some great movement afoot from those "in the know". As stated, if you like a car and want the car, sometimes value is unimportant when considering it. Did I pay too much? Who knows. I did state that I will likely fully exceed the TMV (true market value) with the car, but I don't care. I don't plan on selling it and the premium I paid for it will quickly be forgotten now that nice weather and cruise night season is here and I can have some fun with it. Hopefully this logic makes sense.
And Dave, YES, I agree, the car is awesome!! I too will jump through hoops of fire to take a legitimate heavily documented unrestored car over a restored car. As you know
Colin