Finding the vintage vehicle of your dreams: where and how to best carry out the search

Nowadays, between adverts or dealer sites, marketplaces or social media groups and so on, we seem to be spoiled for choice. But we need to be cautious (and also to pay attention to scam adverts!), stop and reflect on some considerations, so as to avoid unpleasant surprises.

In previous articles, we talked about the importance of: relying on professionals, understanding what you can really afford, and keeping the total budget in mind. In addition to this, to best carry out your “hunt”, especially if you intend to do it alone, we suggest you ask yourself some questions.

We propose three:

1) Where to buy the vehicle? Better in the USA or Europe?
2) Seller: private, dealer or auction?
3) How to proceed once you have identified the advert with which you would like to proceed?

In general, the most honest answer is always “it depends”. But let’s try to give you some advice that may be useful to you.

1) Various factors must be evaluated, such as…

– The availability on the market and the real local value of the car or motorbike you want: these numbers can change in a correlated way based on what you are looking for and in which territory/continent/country. It’s worth investigating and doing the math.

– The year of the vehicle: if you want to benefit from import tax breaks present in countries such as Holland and Belgium (not in Italy), one of the requirements is “to be at least 30 years of age”. Just as, if you wanted to proceed through us, the “license plates” offers that we propose are also – among other things – bound by the year shown on the Title.

– Once again, the set of “what, how, budget”. Let’s take an example: especially if your budget is “limited” and you want a car that’s younger then 30 years of age – if possible – it will be more convenient to look for it directly in Europe, to avoid all the costs of importing from USA and reduce transport costs. In our case, to be able to assist you, we always suggest aiming for the Netherlands and part of Germany, even better if it is a Dutch car, perhaps already with the NL Title. But the same could apply to fully vintage vehicles. The best solution, in our opinion, always remains one: evaluate every possibility together with specialists who can give you safe answers.

2) Seller – Private seller: it is necessary to ensure that he is available to provide all the information, images, and documents necessary to understand whether the sale and any export/import are feasible from every point of view (we remind, for example, that it’s impossible to proceed without regular Title). Just as he must be favorable to dealing with remote negotiations, often international, with all that this entails. If you are not able to fully communicate in the same language, it’s best to rely on local experts who can negotiate on your behalf. In many cases this is a good help.

Dealer: although a dealer is often more favorable disposed and accustomed to certain types of requests and sales, the above also applies. In any case, the aforementioned investigations must be carried out just as much as for private sellers: unfortunately, not all dealers are 100% reliable just because they are dealers, even if many can be trusted. Another factor to consider, the price of a vehicle will, for obvious reasons, be a “dealer” one and many will apply some fees in addition to the final price of the vehicle itself. It’s a good idea to evaluate the options you have, with respect to conditions and prices.

Auction: yes, auctions often attract. But never get caught up in the enthusiasm of the “click”! We repeat, all the checks we mentioned earlier should always be carried out, but here it is not always possible before the deadline for making an offer. Each auction site has its own rules: read them carefully because if you accept the terms without knowing them and then something seems to have gone wrong and/or there are problems, probably and depending on what you have accepted, you will not be right. Last point which concerns in particular our Italian customers and our “NL+IT” license plate offer: if you intend to take advantage of it, it is mandatory that you also request the “purchase through us via NL” service, otherwise we would not be able to provide all the documents required in Italy for local nationalization; this means that, in the case of auctions, we must be talking about a site / auction house that allows us to proceed in this direction.

3) Once you have identified the advert of the vehicle in which you are seriously interested, in our case, we can tell you from experience that – if we have not already identified it together – the preferable thing to do is to send us the link providing us with all the first useful information. This way we will be able to delve into every necessary aspect for you. If, however, you have already contacted the seller, it will be a good idea to update us on the situation in detail, forwarding us what you have, and then deciding together if it is more convenient to let us continue with the communication and negotiations, or you continue it, and we will intervene in due time. Obviously, if you rely on other professionals in the field, they will be the ones to give you guidance on the matter.

A&M Garage Team
Anna Lorenzi