Nostalgia Pricing

Originally Posted 07/13/25

I originally typed this up for my Posts page, however I wanted commenting and thought this is something I'd want to reference in the future, so copied it over here. ~~It's totally not formatted like this because I couldn't get the slideshow arrows to work correctly otherwise~~.

Moose

Munchin and Musing

Posted: 07/13/25

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Photograph of two Subaru SVXs from the front, one green ish one purple ish. They're slightly damaged, and sitting on a car lot with a bunch of other cars

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Photograph of two Subaru SVXs from the back, one green ish one purple ish. They're slightly damaged, and sitting on a car lot with a bunch of other cars

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So, Michelle and I were at a car dealership recently because she was getting into a new lease. Looking around the lot, I saw these two cars, and they looked interesting to me. They appear to be Subaru SVXs, though I don't know anything more about them. I asked the sales guy what the story was with them, as it seemed like they weren't fixed up or getting prepped to sell. He said something along the lines of "Oh, yeah, those are the car dealership owner's. He's been holding onto them for a while now. He prices them so high, that anyone that would be interested in fixing them up passes on them". The sales person went on to explain there was a Mustang on the lot the owner did something similar with - held onto it just to have it, prices it too high to sell, but he left it sitting for about 12 years (didn't fire it up, left the old gas in it, etc.) and they had to do serious repeairs to get it working again, only for it to just continue to sit on the lot.

And I see this get referenced online a lot in the used car scene. Old Farmer or just person who collects cars is holding on to cars they'll "surely fix up one day", despite being at ages where they can barely move. They hold onto the cars, pricing them so high anyone who would be interested in fixing them up doesn't buy them because it's not worth it, and then the person passes. Then, usually, the family doesn't know what to do with the cars, or know what they're worth, and so they just go to the scrapyard.

And it just makes me think... why? The entire time these cars are just sitting, collecting dust, instead of going to folks who could really enjoy the cars. And then, once the person passes, rarely does the family see any value to the cars. And then, of course, the people who wanted the cars don't get the cars either, because they get scrapped. So, instead, they just collect dust for years sitting there.

I get it to an extent - people have a dream or goal in their head, and don't want to give up on it. Surely they'll find the time, energy, or whatever to do what they want. But like... the whole thing just seems so sad to me. And just so... pointless? Basically everyone involved loses and for what?