Latest / BREAK/FIX the Motorsports & Vehicle Enthusiast Variety Show / Behind the Gavel: How GAA Classic Car Auctions Is Changing the Collector Car Game

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Behind the Gavel: How GAA Classic Car Auctions Is Changing the Collector Car Game · BREAK/FIX the Motorsports & Vehicle Enthusiast Variety Show

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BreakFix podcast is all about capturing the living history of people from
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The following episode is brought to us in part by Garage Style Magazine.
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Because after all, what doesn't belong in your garage?
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Classic car auctions are all the rage these days.
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The collector car market has been booming for the past decade or so, and
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auctions have been growing accordingly, both in grandiosity and media coverage.
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You've probably seen auctions taking place on TV or online, with the
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biggest events being concours like affairs, fetching record prices which
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make headlines for weeks to follow.
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It's a misconception that classic and collector car auctions are reserved for
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the ludicrously rich Buying cars for hundreds of thousands of dollars or more.
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Auctions offer enthusiasts the opportunity to network with like minded people and
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are a great way to learn about special interest vehicles you may not be familiar
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with, but find you have an interest in.
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And the team at GAA Classic Car Auctions offers a spectacular
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experience for both the first time or the seasoned auction goer.
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Devoted to producing the best Classic and Collector Auction Experience, folks
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like Johnny Ransom, General Manager for GAA are hands on and willing to help
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you with whatever needs might arise.
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And he's here tonight to explain to us how it all works.
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And co hosting with me tonight is Don Wieberg from Garage Style Magazine.
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So welcome to Break Fix, Johnny.
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Well, thank you.
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I appreciate the invitation.
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Johnny, before we get started talking about GAA classic cars, tell us a
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little bit about your automotive past.
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Have you always been in the car world?
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What got you into auctions?
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No, I was not always.
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And well, when I got out of school, everything in our area here in
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North Carolina was textiles.
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And also furniture.
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This is still the furniture capital of the world, High Point, North Carolina.
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And I'm many guys, they were so many furniture companies here that
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you can make really good money directly out of school benefits.
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I mean, enough average guy could buy a whole, get married.
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Have a kid.
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Send it to college.
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Be able to have two vehicles.
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I mean, you weren't gonna be a millionaire by no means, but
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you could live a good life.
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So I was working for Thomasville Furniture.
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Got out of college.
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The guy was a manager over there, and I had this young
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lady that was retired under me.
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Her name was Betty Jo Johnson, and her brother was the general
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manager of Greensboro Auto Auction.
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And she was retiring and she kissed me on the cheek one day on our way out
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after we gave her a retirement party.
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She said, I'm going to tell my brother about you.
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He said, you're a really good manager.
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This is the best thing about you.
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You know how to talk to people.
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People say stuff to you all the time.
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You never think nothing about it.
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I never thought one thing about it.
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Three months later, I got a phone call.
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It was him asking me to come into his office.
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He wanted to talk to me.
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So I had an interview with him.
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I did everything.
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I worked on a Chrysler account there, worked on a Ford account there,
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fleet operations manager there.
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I was walking control over to auction.
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I actually, let me get it back.
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My dad was into farming and so forth earlier in his lifetime.
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And I was always messing around with him, but then he became a welder.
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We always had a little bit of land where we were at, and we always
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tinkered on tractors and cars and stuff.
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I was always enthused with cars.
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It wasn't like I didn't know how to actually change the
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batteries, change spark plugs.
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In the day, you know, you still ignored switches, your carburetors, your airflow.
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I mean, these are things that you've done in the sixties and seventies.
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You know, you really, that's what kids stuff.
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They hung out with their dads and they learned so much from them about
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being able to think with these cars.
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Well, these are the cars we sell now.
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They're cooperator cars and they're totally different
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than fuel injection cars.
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And there's a whole lot of things that most people don't know.
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It's real simple to be able to figure out what makes that car go.
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If there's a problem, you don't have to be a rocket scientist in order
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or plug up a computer to figure out and tell you what's wrong.
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Most of you know what's wrong.
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So this is stuff I got into, but worked about four years in the paint
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and body and got a lot of paint and body experience messing with cars.
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That time we were doing 8, 000 cars a month, and that was
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going through paint and body.
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8, 000 cars a month going through recon.
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I mean, we were really, really booming with that many cars.
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That's how big this operation, everything was 24 hours a day there.
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So I got a lot of experience.
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And Mr.
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Green, fortunately, everything at his company.
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He never really liked to go out and bring a guy in when
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there was something opening up.
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He always liked to promote good in.
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Luckily, I was able to be able to go through a lot of different areas
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there and get a lot more experience.
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So when the GAA classic cars come about, I was the next guy in line, so to speak.
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So let's talk about one of the newest and hottest classic and collector
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car auctions on the market right now.
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Tell us about how GAA got started.
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2010, we started talking.
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We had a regular dealer auction with the largest independent dealer auction,
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which is GAA Greensboro Auto Auction.
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We run 17 lanes every Wednesday.
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And we started doing some survey.
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We had a lot of customers always wanting us to come over and
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start a classic car auction.
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And we found out real quick, we averaged between 2, 700 and 3, 500
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people actually walking in the door on Wednesdays to buy late model cars.
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They had 70 percent of them had at least one.
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Collector card.
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So, that really got our eyebrows really rose and we was like, well, we had
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a facility there that we did I line cards in, and that's called the Palace.
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We wasn't using it at the time because 2007 8 is really when they started
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this cash for clunkers and the economy was really not doing that well.
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All of our eggs was in one basket.
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That's when we was trying to think outside the basket, so to speak.
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So, that's when we came up with it.
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And so then we all jumped in a plane one day and rode down to Mecum and
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Kissimmee, and we were very impressed.
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This was like 2010 when we was down there looking around
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and said, Oh, we can do this.
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This is no different than what we do week in and week out.
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So we started in 2012, we had our first auction, 350 cars, opened
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up Kissimets, and we had those Kissimets done within 60 days.
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We had 90 percent of the auction field within 60 days.
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It was like, this is ridiculous.
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You know, most people struggle to get cars.
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From that day forward, every sale, it's like everybody learned something and
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something to be able to make it better, you know, to be able to have our facility.
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Almost six and a half acres on a one roof.
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All the cars is amazing climate control.
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And then, you know, the cool thing about it is you go to any other auction, you're
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in there, you drop the car off and then you got 48 hours or so to get the car out.
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Cause you got a rodeo or something coming in behind you.
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We don't have a, we got a luxury.
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You call me up and say, Hey, I'm going to sign this car with you.
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Can I ship it today?
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Absolutely.
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It's in a secure building.
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There's nothing going to happen to it.
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We don't have a bunch of people running around there messing with the cars.
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I bet you we got 290 cars sitting in our building right
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now for the November 3rd sale.
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And our customers really like that.
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I mean, I have people from Texas to Detroit that actually
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buys cars on the East Coast and just ship them directly to us.
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And I mean, these are some major players also, and it's worked out for
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them to be able to have another outlet to be able to have a different way of
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being able to buy cars to sell cars.
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We have been able to generate from within our facility there a lot of good cars.
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So it's been a double whammy for us to be able to generate cars.
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We're being very fortunate.
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We have a little bit of edge on most people at all.
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You were talking about auction companies that go around, you know, they go
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around the country, they set up events, some of them even go around the world.
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And set up events and you guys keep it right there at home.
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You've got your six acres under one roof at the palace.
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How many guests can that accommodate?
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Oh, my, you can imagine six and a half acres under one roof.
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And there's a lot of room.
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We have seating for almost 600 people in our arena.
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When you come to our auction, or if you ever looked at it online,
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you'll see we've packed the 600.
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Plus we have people standing up.
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There's some people come in and they even bring their chairs with them and they
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just sit near their cars or whatever.
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It's just like a car show.
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If you ever came to auction, you're going to bring your car to auction.
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It ain't that you're going to put it on Friday 1 51 and go and sit up there.
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You're never going to sell your car, so you better go stand by side your car.
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Somebody's going to want to know your information.
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And that's how you sell your car.
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By being next to your car to answer.
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It don't matter.
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This guy that you think can't rub two nickels together, probably
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one of the most wealthiest people you ever met in your life.
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And it's very important to be cordial with people.
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If I'm understanding correctly, Johnny, you actually encourage your sellers.
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To stand with their car and talk to potential buyers?
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Yeah, absolutely.
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Okay, is that different from other auction houses?
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Yeah, in some cases.
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But, you know, when I go to other auction houses, you can always see the serious
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sellers because most times they're there.
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You can tell the ones that's really serious about selling their cars.
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You see the guys that stick around their cars to sell, that's your better car.
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They're the ones that take a lot more pride about selling the car,
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want you to know about the car than just going and putting the car on
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a number and hope it sells itself.
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That's just not how you sell the car.
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You know, you go and spend some time with your car.
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You got your car or with multiple cars, be by your cars, encourage,
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be able to talk to people.
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I'm telling you that one fuzzy feeling means a lot to people
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when you're purchasing a car.
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Everybody knows that you don't feel good about when you walk into a new
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dealership or used car lot or whatever.
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You don't feel that.
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A real warm and fuzzy feeling about it.
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You're going to go the other way.
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Or do you feel like somebody just don't care?
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You know, a lot of times you'll have 48 hours to sell your car,
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be in there a couple of days.
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So you need to take advantage of that time.
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Our crew all the time encouraged the guys when they were consigning cars.
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Hey.
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Spend some time on your cars when you get here, just to make
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sure they look the best they can.
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Make sure you spend some time mirroring because people are
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going to come and ask questions.
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I think it helps tremendously.
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Our sales rate has been very high here for the last two years, and I
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know the pandemic had a lot to do with it, just like anything else
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with the car market right now.
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Even our last sale we had in July, we still had really good numbers.
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We still sold a lot of 89 percent if I'm not mistaken, but still it shows the ones.
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By being with your car, being able to talk to people, the ones that's going
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to take the time to come and actually be there, it's absolutely amazing.
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You can accommodate all those people.
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Are there a lot of things to do for friends and family that might
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be, uh, you know, quote unquote, dragged along to the auction?
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You know, hey, dad's going to the auction.
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Oh, God, here we go.
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Are there other diversions that they can join in?
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Or is it pretty much, no, we're going to go look at cars with dad?
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Well, at this point, it's.
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We're going to go look at cars with dad, but we just got
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done with the new expansion.
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Our goal is that the memorabilia aspect of the auction is so hot right now.
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I don't know if you guys have been keeping up with that
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also, but memorabilia is just.
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route, in my opinion, it's worse than any collector card has ever
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been on the market right now.
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I mean, it's insane.
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So we have built this facility.
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We got in the back and we're installing it as we speak.
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A jumbotron, 50 foot wide, 18 foot tall.
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It's mammoth, mammoth jumbotron.
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And he's taking those screens and going to put them in the back and that
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new building, hopefully in February, we're going to start doing memorabilia.
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Starting around 8.
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30 every morning to about 11 o'clock, the same time as the
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regular auctions going on.
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So we're going to try to double dip.
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We're going to try to start selling several hundred pieces
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of memorabilia each sale.
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Are you saying you're going to host a memorabilia sale at the same
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time, simultaneously with the cars?
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Absolutely.
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Wow.
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Okay.
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That's kind of mind blowing.
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Absolutely.
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You know, the people that dabbles in the memorabilia is the same people that buys
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these cars and 90 percent of the people.
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This is the same scenario that we've done before.
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We done the auction part for the cars.
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We started doing a little bit of surveying and stuff for memorabilia and 70.
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It was 71 percent of the people that actually come to auction.
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Have some kind of memorabilia in their house or they got a man cave
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or wherever they do with their cars, even in their regular garages, they
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all want this stuff around their cars.
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So, I mean, it's a win win for you.
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That's our next big step.
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We're going toward the memorabilia.
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I would not be surprised within two years that we will have a
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memorabilia sale every month.
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That would be incredible.
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Yeah, that's what we're trying to do.
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The way he built this facility, we got a separate parking lot.
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We got a separate entrance to it.
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Be able to do that without even messing with the cards whatsoever.
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So that will be the next big thing for us with the memorabilia.
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With all the cars you guys auction, and believe me, I've scoured your website.
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There are several cars coming up in November that I'm really
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champing at the bit for.
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I don't see a specialty.
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You guys pretty much sell it all.
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Is there sort of a specialty that you like to say you gravitate to?
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I can honestly tell you if I'm sitting there and I'm looking at a Volkswagen,
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I got a Chevelle, and I got a 4x4 pickup truck, and it's got decent
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miles on it, and it's got a 2 inch lift on it, and it's an automatic
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air conditioned power steering truck.
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That truck and that Chevelle is going over here in this stack to the right,
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that Volkswagen is going to the left.
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I'm going to take the truck and I'm going to take the Chevelle.
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Cause we really, really knock it out of the park with muscle cars and trucks.
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That's what's special.
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Everybody knows we get really good money.
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We're in our muscle cars and we get really good money with our trucks.
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We do good with our foreign cars, you know, with our Ferraris and
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Porsches or stuff like that.
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And the reason why a lot of people don't realize that we don't have a ton of them.
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We'll have a little bit here on.
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Friday and a little bit here on Saturday.
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And we always sell them.
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We've been very fortunate.
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We always get good enough money to get it.
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So on your website, you've got a few Ferraris, you know, you don't just
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take a Ferrari to somebody to sell.
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If they don't know what they're doing.
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Well, I have a guy in Greensboro that's a Ferrari dealer and he's got to collect.
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And he's a good friend of mine.
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He's got several hundred cars in his collection and he always gets me for.
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Every sale, give me Ferraris, Porsches, he always sends me
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four or five cars, every sale.
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And plus he takes some of the trade ins and sends them over there to me.
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They might have just a little bit more miles than he wants to put on his lot.
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We always have them.
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That's the beauty of what we do.
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We'll have the 30s cars, the pre war cars, we'll have a few of those.
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We have some European cars, I mean, we got the Ferraris, we have some
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Mercedes, we saw a G Wagon last sale, brand new 2021 G Wagon, it didn't
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have a 2, 000 miles on it, I mean, we do a little bit of everything.
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When it comes to selling, especially at an auction, the auctioneer's
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personality, the auctioneer's barking ability, if you will, has a lot
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to do with the audience reaction.
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Do you have any famous auctioneers that you guys work with?
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We don't really have what you call famous auctioneers.
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We got a lot of people that's played and dabbled with some of the big boys, so to
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speak, like the people that actually work for Barrett Jackson and so forth like
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that in the past, but you know, we've got 17 lanes on Wednesday and we got 17
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lanes with auctioneers and ring guys.
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We have a pick of the litter, so to speak, but still.
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It's a lot different from going to your regular auction on Wednesday that
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you've got to buy that car because that's how you make your living.
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You got to have inventory on your lot to someone that comes over
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here to a classic car auction that don't have to buy a thing.
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I have people that come in from California.
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Their best friend lived in Pittsburgh and he's got another friend that
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lived in Orlando and they just come to the auction when we have
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auctions so they can hang out.
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All three of them.
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But they all dabble in cars.
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They always get a couple of cars so they can flip them or whatever,
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but they come and hang out.
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They have a great time.
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They love cars and they come spend a whole weekend in Greensboro, North Carolina.
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And the car guys are going to be around cars and the car guys love cars.
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They're going to be there no matter what.
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Amen to that, Johnny.
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And I gotta tell you something.
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I gotta confess something.
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I've never been to an auction before.
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This episode is actually really important to me because I want to
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learn more about the experience as a first time auction goer.
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Why don't you help educate me and our listeners as well as to what
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some of the expectations might be for attending an event like a GAA auction.
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What are some do's and don'ts for first time auction goers?
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Are there any fees?
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Do we have to pay to come?
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Just check it out and see what's going on.
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Most auctions, they have a gate fee to be able to get $20 a day, $30
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a day, or in the sense of Baird, Jackson, Scottsdale, you're paying
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a hundred dollars a day to get in.
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Ours is a little different.
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We don't have a $20 day ticket or whatever.
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Anybody could come to the auction, but we just want you to be a registered bidder.
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Now, we started that process right when the pandemic hit.
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We didn't know how we was gonna do this thing.
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But we knew we couldn't sell a 20 ticket.
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You got to remember, you go back and look, there was not that many options
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going on across the United States.
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There was only a handful.
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It ain't no telling where they might be.
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We were one of the few that owned our facility.
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That was the best thing we've ever done.
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We own our facility.
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We can monitor the people.
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We could take X amount of people.
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We didn't let the public in.
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You could come in as long as you was a bidder.
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And we was like, man, we might be home with something here.
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And even the dealers and the buyers and the sellers that come in love that.
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Then having just 10 or 12, 000 people in the room, just slammed
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up, slamming your door, sitting on your cars, taking their drinks and.
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Putting them on your car while they're checking their phone or whatever.
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I mean, just all the crazy little things we've been very
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fortunate to be able to do that.
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And I think that was been one of the reasons our success
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was really, really so great.
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95 percent sales for 2020 and 93 percent sales.
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I'm talking about every sale for 2021.
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That's insane.
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It was just not, I mean, crazy, but it was people that had regular car
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dealerships that couldn't get inventory.
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They were buying classic cars.
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They had mouths to feed.
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They had people that was waiting on them.
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They was needing cars out there.
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They needed to sell something.
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Hey, they were coming to buy classic cars, putting them on their lot.
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So are you implying that because of the chip shortage during
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COVID that dealerships turned to, let's say, these carbureted cars?
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They did.
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I mean, Mr.
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Green's got a Ford store down there for 50 years.
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He's got a Lincoln store down there for 25 years.
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And every one of them had classic cars on them and we sold
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them all and they kept them.
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And now even today, I got guys and they can maintain every sale
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there by three to four vehicles.
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They got Chevrolet dealerships, Ford dealerships, buy some really
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nice Ford trucks or whatever, and put them in the showroom.
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And they had no problem selling them.
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It's just like another day.
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You talked about the gate fee.
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It could be 20 bucks, depending where you go.
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It could be a hundred bucks on the other end of the scale.
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So I got this fantasy from watching TV and what an auction is like, right?
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You got this guy with a ping pong paddle on his hand with a number on it.
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Angry faces, everybody's lifting it up, you know, trying to get
19:32
in there and get their bids in.
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So is that really how it works?
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Oh, absolutely not.
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Absolutely not.
19:38
You better be ready when your car, if you're going to bid on
19:41
one, you just better be ready.
19:43
You need to pay attention and pay attention to your surroundings.
19:46
Also, it will take you from zero to a hundred real quick if you're not careful.
19:52
I personally tell everybody, listen, if you're interested in a car, if you
19:56
don't hear that car says the reserves off for a first timer, don't bid on it.
20:01
Don't bid on it until you hear the reserves off.
20:03
When the reserves off, jump right on in because that's going to take
20:06
it down to just a few people instead of 10 or 15 people playing in on it.
20:10
And you don't need to drive that price up any higher.
20:13
They're going to do it on their own.
20:14
You hear the reserves off.
20:16
Jump right on in.
20:17
If you don't hit a reserve off and it says no sale, we got what we
20:20
call the deal doctor and you can go over there and negotiate a deal.
20:24
That's how we have cars for sale after they roll off the block.
20:27
Becoming a registered bidder, is that the same as pre registration?
20:31
I see it on some sites, register to buy, you know, things like that.
20:33
Does that get you on the list?
20:35
Does that inform you that I'm interested in that particular vehicle?
20:39
How does that whole system work?
20:40
Well, you can be a pre registered.
20:42
It's 150 bucks up to the week of the sale.
20:44
The week of the sale, it jumps to 200.
20:46
So they encourage you to pre register early.
20:50
So you can save a few bucks.
20:52
And also if you're going to come, you want to come early and you want
20:55
to come early enough that you can do your inspection yourself with the car.
20:59
You know, you want to look underneath the car.
21:00
You want to check the car out.
21:01
You want to see if there's any documentation.
21:04
They say they still had the window sticker.
21:05
You like to go and see the window sticker.
21:07
Everything that you read on that car that says about the car and
21:11
what the car comes with, you want to actually physically see it.
21:14
If it says a window sticker, bill sheets, protecto play, you want to go look at it.
21:18
You want to see it.
21:19
You don't want to just take their word for it.
21:21
Not to say that that ever happens, but I'm just saying you want to see if you
21:24
want to be able to be educated yourself about what you fix in a purchase.
21:28
Now let's just say you're going to be a online bidder.
21:31
So you could go ahead and be an online bidder.
21:33
You can get pre registered for that also.
21:36
We do proxy bid.
21:37
But also, I suggest in all my girls, anybody calls and says they are
21:41
interested in being an online bidder or a phone bidder, we have on site
21:46
people that will do inspections for you.
21:48
They're independent, they don't work for the auction, and they'll work for you.
21:52
They're licensed and bonded.
21:53
Everything they tell you will be the gospel about that car.
21:56
Most of the time, they will actually give you ranges about what those
21:59
parts go for before you see it.
22:01
They will do all your legwork for you.
22:03
So you know that you're not overpaying for it.
22:06
For about 300 bucks, you got someone that's going to number
22:08
one, check your car out.
22:10
Number two, make sure that your car that you're buying is a quality piece.
22:14
And number three, they're going to encourage you where to be at on the money.
22:17
So if I heard you right, what you're telling me is.
22:20
The guy with the ping pong paddles sitting in his chair.
22:23
You got this dude with the phone up to his ear and a faceless voice on the other
22:27
side of that and people online all bidding simultaneously on the same vehicle.
22:32
Yes, sir.
22:33
Yes, sir.
22:33
A heck of a thing to experience.
22:35
So let's go back to the sale.
22:37
You're there the first time buyer.
22:38
You go, man, I really wanted that Ferrari 308.
22:41
That one Ferrari that was in the list and you bought it.
22:44
Now is the expectation that I show up with a duffel bag full of cash?
22:48
I mean, how do I buy this car?
22:49
Is it like buying from a dealership?
22:51
Johnny, he's watched a lot of Miami Vice.
22:54
I could tell.
22:55
I could tell.
22:56
Ferraris and bags of cash.
22:59
It's the 80s, baby.
23:00
Hey, you'll be surprised at the amount of people that actually
23:03
comes to the auction with cash.
23:05
We have a little dark room with security people.
23:07
Trust me, when you go in there, it happens.
23:10
Every sale, you just wouldn't believe it.
23:12
I had an old guy come in one time from Texas, and he bought,
23:16
I bet you, seven or eight cars.
23:18
He said, I need to pay for this thing.
23:19
I said, well, you go up there and write a check.
23:21
He said, I don't write checks.
23:23
I said, you don't write checks?
23:24
He said, no.
23:25
He says, I pay cash.
23:26
I thought he was kidding.
23:27
You know how people talk.
23:28
You do this, they say stuff all the time.
23:29
I pay cash.
23:30
Okay.
23:31
But he had a motorhome, went across the street.
23:34
We got 17 motorhome hookups, full hookups across the street.
23:37
And they're free, by the way.
23:38
He come back to the auction.
23:40
He had two walmart plastic bags full of cash and he went in
23:45
there and dumped them on my desk.
23:47
I said, oh my God, I said, get this out of here now.
23:52
I was scared to death and he was laughing the whole time.
23:55
He said, I told you, I think I said, yes, you did.
23:57
Yes, you did.
23:58
You did tell me you pay cash, but no, the real way is you can bring a check
24:03
or you go to the bank and get what they call guaranteed funds with a bank
24:08
letter and you can wire the money.
24:10
We'll give you a bill of sale.
24:11
And you can contact your bank and we'll give you wired instructions
24:14
and wire money over on Mondays.
24:16
Now, do you guys do financing as well?
24:18
Because I know there is classic car financing as well.
24:21
Yes, we have JJ Best on site.
24:23
They're there the whole weekend, but they will do some financing for you also.
24:27
When you purchase something, how did GAA ensure the title transfers paperwork?
24:32
All the formalities are tended to.
24:33
You got to remember too now, and I keep referring back to our
24:36
regular auction across the street.
24:38
So you got to remember we're selling 2000, 3000 cards a week.
24:42
So all those cards have titles that we deal with.
24:45
So all those people that work at Greensboro auto auction, when we have our
24:48
regular sale, we call it pump and dump.
24:50
We pumped people over, dump them in our auction.
24:53
And every one of our people in that works for us, they work for the
24:57
North Carolina DMV at one time.
24:59
That's how they were hired.
25:00
They used to work for the North Carolina DMV.
25:02
So they're very highly experienced.
25:04
When you sell your car, I'm going to ask you to send me some pictures of your car.
25:09
I'm going to ask you to send us a copy.
25:11
of your title front and back, a good clean copy.
25:15
I'm going to also ask for you to give me a picture of the VIN on the car.
25:19
We immediately, as soon as it hits, I got a person to start all day every day.
25:24
They take a title, they check that number, and they take a copy of
25:27
the VIN, picture of the VIN, and they make sure the two matches.
25:30
If there's an issue before you ship the car, we've already
25:33
contacted you and told you.
25:35
Hey, there was an issue as a digit off on your title, blah, blah, blah.
25:39
We ran a Carfax, we ran an auto check.
25:41
We ran a Navitas report.
25:43
It says in 1970, this car was stolen.
25:47
It's in, it's got a stolen history.
25:50
1972, this car was says it was issued a claim for total loss,
25:55
damaged and got a damaged title here.
25:58
It says it was a total loss and now it's got nothing on this title.
26:02
So this car supposedly supposed to have a salvage history.
26:05
You know, all that stuff we check, we do all that stuff behind the scenes
26:08
where nobody knows before we sell that car, there's a lot of legwork.
26:12
It goes into it.
26:13
It ain't just, Hey, I'm gonna take my car to the auction.
26:15
I'm going to sell the car.
26:17
We got to guarantee all this stuff.
26:18
That was kind of where the question came from telling Eric the other day or the
26:22
other week or something about a story.
26:23
It was an auction house and it was one of our subscribers.
26:26
He bought a car at auction, enjoyed the car for a year, year and a half.
26:30
Took it to an auction to sell it.
26:32
He was tired of it.
26:33
He wanted to get something else.
26:34
The auction company tells him, you know, your paperwork's
26:36
all messed up on this car.
26:38
We can't sell this car the way it is.
26:39
Who sold you this car in the first place?
26:41
And he says, well, you guys did.
26:42
One of those situations of here we are dealing with professional
26:46
big auction companies.
26:47
You think everything's going to be fine.
26:48
Everything's going to be golden.
26:50
Then you hear stories like this.
26:51
And believe me, there's multitudes of them.
26:53
I'm sure you know about it working in the industry.
26:55
Oh yeah.
26:55
Oh yeah.
26:56
So to hear you guys saying you're in the background, you're doing, you know, all
26:59
this due diligence, but are there any sort of guarantees that people can have?
27:03
Like they know for sure?
27:04
On our bill of sales, when you sign it, it says, we guarantee you a good
27:08
time for any reason that you take that car and you get it and you take it to
27:12
your DMV and you cannot get a title.
27:15
All you have to you already signed a contract and granted,
27:19
we guarantee you a good title.
27:21
Okay, so GAA is behind every sale all the way?
27:24
All the way, all the way.
27:26
We got to be able to give you a good, and we get, and it's in
27:29
writing on our bills and sales.
27:30
We guarantee you a good title.
27:33
Going back to my duffel bag of cash scenario here, When someone inevitably
27:37
buy something at the auction, or they're the winner of the bidding,
27:40
there's got to be fees and other things that get compiled on top of that.
27:44
So I want to explore that a little bit for the listeners, so they understand
27:48
the total cost of purchase when you buy something at auction in addition to.
27:54
Auction house fees.
27:55
I'm assuming people have to pay their state, federal sales
27:58
taxes, all those kinds of things.
28:00
Not North Carolina.
28:01
In some states you do.
28:02
I mean, like, I used to go to Auburn, Indiana.
28:05
And if you weren't a dealer, and you just average Joe, like you and I went up there
28:09
and purchased your car, they would make you pay those state taxes right then.
28:13
I know when the Mecham has that auction up there at Indy every year, a lot of
28:17
those people don't realize that either.
28:19
They got to pay taxes on that car right then.
28:22
If you average Joe, if you're a dealer, you don't have to.
28:25
But in North Carolina, we'll hand you a title.
28:28
We don't have to do that.
28:29
At all.
28:29
As the buyer, I'm responsible for doing all the paperwork with my local
28:33
DMV, especially if I'm out of state.
28:35
And then I would assume state inspections are the same thing, right?
28:38
That's correct.
28:39
Now, every state don't do state inspections.
28:41
North Carolina does.
28:42
When you buy one, if you've got to have a state title, when you go there, they
28:45
will give you paperwork and they'll actually give you your title DMV.
28:53
And the titles that are issued to the buyer, are the owner's
28:57
original titles or are the cars all retitled in North Carolina?
29:00
No, no.
29:01
They're the owner's original title and they signed them over to you
29:05
or I, if we purchase 'em, they are actually signed into your name.
29:08
Right.
29:08
Then going back to those percentages, there's different
29:11
ways that auctions are handled.
29:12
I'm of the eBay generation, so I get it.
29:14
There's a fee for listing and there's a fee for selling
29:17
and all that kind of thing.
29:18
There's also the real estate model where the buyer and this.
29:21
seller.
29:21
Both percentages taken from the sale itself by the house.
29:25
How do your percentages work when you're buying a vehicle?
29:28
Well, we do 8%.
29:30
If you're purchasing a vehicle, if it's no salt across the block, that's
29:33
when you go to the deal doctor, your percentage will be much less.
29:37
Because the negotiated percent then on how much you're going to pay
29:41
when you go up there and make the negotiation on the car, it could be 5%.
29:45
It could be 6%, but it will be less than 8 percent expect to pay
29:49
somewhere between five and eight on top of whatever the final value of
29:53
the car is as the fee for buying.
29:55
Yeah, that's correct.
29:56
So we talked about the buying experience.
29:59
What about the flip side, Johnny?
30:00
What about selling the car?
30:02
You've told us that it's a good idea to stand with the car and
30:04
talk to people who are coming by and want to know more about it.
30:07
Walk us through a selling process.
30:09
What is needed to list and sell an item with GAA?
30:11
I want to sell my Mustang.
30:13
What do I do?
30:13
All right.
30:14
So you immediately go online to daaclassiccars.
30:17
com.
30:17
There's two ways that you could sign your car, click right there
30:21
and it's called a digital way.
30:22
Step one, what's your name?
30:24
Step two, your address.
30:25
Step three, what make, model, the car, and then it go on and on.
30:30
You can upload your pictures there and do everything digitally right there.
30:34
You don't have to print no paperwork off.
30:35
You don't have to do anything whatsoever.
30:37
And the second way is there's a printable form.
30:40
There's still people old school that likes a printable form.
30:43
You take that form off, look at it, fill it out.
30:46
You can email it back in to info at GAAclassiccars.
30:49
com along with the pictures, picture of the VIN, copy of
30:53
the title, front and back.
30:54
Very important.
30:55
As soon as it lands on our desk, within 24 hours, you will
30:59
get a telephone call from us.
31:00
Hey, we have received your information.
31:02
We will let you know within a few days what we can do and get your numbers.
31:07
So then we will return your calls.
31:08
Hey, you asked for Saturday number prime time.
31:12
Well, We do everything at GAA from the lowest, cheapest car to the most
31:17
expensive car as the day goes on.
31:19
So if you wanted that spot, your car ain't for 25, 000 and you
31:23
wanted to be in a prime time spot on Saturday, that's not going to happen.
31:26
We're not going to sell a 25, 000 car in between the prime time of our show.
31:31
We're going to actually place you accordingly to what we have
31:34
available at the time to send it in.
31:36
And most of the time we come to a happy medium with all of our customers.
31:39
And once we explain that to them, they understand thoroughly
31:42
about how we place the cars.
31:44
Now placing the cars, that probably has a direct correlation on the
31:48
sell through rates, doesn't it?
31:49
Oh, absolutely.
31:50
Let's just say you send in that Volkswagen, really nice Volkswagen,
31:53
but it's a 1970 Volkswagen and you want 55, 000 for it.
31:58
Well, you want to have a conversation with me.
32:00
Hey, uh, listen, can you explain to me about your car?
32:05
Tell me a little bit about your car.
32:06
And then after you tell me about your car, and I'm going to say, how
32:10
did you come up with that 55, 000?
32:12
So I'm never sold one here for that amount of money.
32:14
Can you explain to me?
32:15
Well, it was my mama's.
32:17
I love my mama and she was worth a lot of money.
32:20
Don't you know my mama?
32:21
No, I don't know your mom.
32:22
Just crazy stuff like that.
32:24
So then, I have to generally, without insulting them, be able to say, hey,
32:28
in the last year, this is how much these cards have been going for.
32:32
If you're not willing to keep it within this range right here, I don't
32:36
want to waste your time or mine.
32:37
I get to make money three times a year, and it's based on what cards I take.
32:42
And that's called grinding them at the beginning, instead of waiting to the end.
32:46
You grind them before they get there.
32:47
I say 55, 60 percent of the people get a phone call and we talk about pricing,
32:52
but most auction houses don't do that.
32:54
I want to talk to them.
32:55
I want to plant that seed in their mind about how much our
32:58
car is really going to break.
32:59
If you plan that before they get there, they know that.
33:02
And so if it don't meet their expectations, they've already been told.
33:05
So then now you've got that chance to be able to, uh, grinder, be able to get
33:09
them to lift that reserve even easier.
33:12
Going into the pricing structure of Mama's VW 55, 000.
33:16
When somebody wants to set a reserve on a car, is that kind of what
33:19
we're talking about right there?
33:20
Do most people want to put a reserve on it?
33:23
Yes, a lot of people want to put the reserve on it, but for the past five
33:26
years, we have anything 15, 000 can blow.
33:29
We've run no reserve, but we don't take you far.
33:31
Oh, okay.
33:32
You've got a little bit of a standard on that.
33:34
Yeah.
33:35
Well, and what happened was when we got into the business, we had
33:38
all these people sending all these cars in because we didn't know no
33:42
better and we were taking them.
33:44
We had all these people sitting there and he does get in there for 55, 000.
33:48
We get it up there and he wouldn't sell the car and the car didn't bring but
33:51
14, 000 and he wouldn't sell the car.
33:54
It was crazy.
33:54
Well, number one, we shouldn't have touched that car.
33:56
We should have tried to get a car that we could have sold.
33:59
There's no way you could have sold that car.
34:01
He got one in 55, 000 knowing it wasn't going to break with 15.
34:04
And then, you know, it got to the point that four weeks out, that's
34:07
when people really got to thinking, man, I got this 1970 Mach 1 right
34:12
here, and I want to sell it.
34:13
Can I get in the sale?
34:14
No, I don't want no spots, man.
34:17
I just didn't have no spots.
34:18
And so now we've learned that.
34:21
We had to slow it down.
34:22
So in order to slow it down, we had to say 15, 000 a blow.
34:26
From Monday to Monday, we put all the cars in a basket and we sit down and we
34:30
get our computers and we look at every car and we go back and we try to put a
34:35
price on every car before we even start.
34:37
Going in and say, we want the car, if this car is good enough for us, so to speak.
34:41
And we have a price that we look at and like I said, 50 to 55 percent of them
34:45
gets a phone call and we're talking about price structuring before they get there.
34:49
But I mean if it's way out of kilter, we don't even consider it.
34:52
But as long as we get them reeled in to where they need to be, I really think
34:56
that's part of our success of our auction.
35:00
Being able to communicate with the people, being able to talk to people, being
35:03
able to plant that seed with the person.
35:05
before the sale actually starts.
35:08
So that brought up a really interesting question in that does everything have to
35:12
run and drive that goes to the auction?
35:14
Yes, we do.
35:15
Now there's some auctions, you know, no big deal.
35:17
We don't want that.
35:18
We want what we call frontline ready stuff.
35:21
We don't want that.
35:22
It's just too much stuff can happen when you get a car that don't run, drive,
35:25
no brakes and all this other stuff.
35:27
It's just not worth the time for us.
35:29
Johnny, what if you got a whole collection of cars, would you
35:32
handle a collection of cars?
35:34
We do it all the time.
35:35
I got one coming up next year, a really good customer.
35:39
His name was Jerry Smith.
35:40
He passed away three or four months ago, unfortunately.
35:43
And we just got the contract signed.
35:44
He's got 250 cars.
35:46
And a thousand pieces of memorabilia.
35:47
So we're going to have a special sale for him, March 30th, 31st and April 1st.
35:52
We're going to have a February sale.
35:54
And then four weeks later, we're going to have this sale.
35:56
Going back to the cars have to run and drive scenario in a collection
35:59
like that one, 200, 250 cars.
36:01
If there's a couple that are a little, uh, handicapped, so to say.
36:05
Is that okay?
36:06
Or do you just want to put those off to the side and not deal with them?
36:09
Luckily it's far enough in advance of the car.
36:11
She's got issues.
36:12
We got time now to take care of those issues.
36:14
We actually got people down there, but they got car handlers and they're going
36:17
through those cars right now to make sure all the cars run, drive, press fuel.
36:21
There's no issues.
36:22
They're taking care of that right now.
36:23
So GAA actually services, they'll send somebody to the collection.
36:28
To make sure all the cars are up in Noah, most of the time,
36:31
there's a person that handles the cars to stat large of collection.
36:35
They got a full time mechanic there.
36:37
They got people that's constantly messing with those cars.
36:40
So we're being in correspondence with them.
36:42
I have, and they're down there right now, as we're speaking, going through these
36:46
cars and making sure they're running, they're driving, they're everything,
36:50
getting stuff in order as we speak.
36:52
Now, for a collection like that, does it make sense to do an on site auction at
36:56
the collection's house, or is it better just to bring them back to Greensboro?
37:00
We're going to actually bring everything back to Greensboro, and the reason why
37:04
is the actual little town he lives in, they don't have enough of motel rooms,
37:08
they don't have enough of parking or anything to be able to do it on site.
37:11
We could do it on site if we needed to, but we've never had
37:14
to, so we got 25 tractor and trailers for 25 rollbacks there.
37:18
For our regular auction.
37:19
So we can go get the car.
37:21
But I'm assuming there's a good percentage of cars that just don't sell.
37:24
They can't find new owners.
37:26
I think you call that the still for sale category.
37:28
What do y'all do with those?
37:30
At the end of each sale, there's anybody that is a registered bidder at the time.
37:34
And some people that ain't registered bidder.
37:36
So people just in our base of speed.
37:38
We sent out a text at the end of the night that what the bid goes,
37:41
what we'll call bid goes all.
37:43
So they know the cars are still for sale.
37:45
When the sale was over, we had all from that Sunday, two weeks later, I
37:49
think I sold 14 cars after the sale.
37:52
I was, I was the deal.
37:53
Dr.
37:54
Dan.
37:54
So after everything closed, I turned into the deal.
37:57
You've touched on this a little bit, the Volkswagen, et cetera.
38:00
Does GAA take basic consignments?
38:03
In other words, the consignment process still for sale.
38:05
In other words, let's say I want to sell my cars.
38:08
I don't want to go to the auction, Johnny.
38:09
I don't want to go through that.
38:10
Can I just consign it with GAA and you can put it in the still for sale corral?
38:15
No, we'll run it and I'll have you on the telephone.
38:18
I'll do it all the time.
38:19
Okay.
38:19
I've got people that sends me cars every sale.
38:21
I've never walked in that building.
38:23
Got it.
38:23
Okay.
38:24
So everything's going to go through the auction.
38:25
Yeah.
38:25
We'll go through the auction and I'll have you on the telephone.
38:28
And a lot of times they could be watching it on their iPad or
38:31
laptop or regular desk monitor.
38:33
And they can watch while I have them on the telephone.
38:36
So they can witness everything that's going on also.
38:38
So Don brings up a really good point.
38:40
If everything goes through auction, like we talked about before, there's seller
38:44
and buyer fees involved in that process.
38:47
Depending on what you have, if you have something basic, it's
38:49
going to go for what it goes for.
38:50
But if you got something quasi interesting, some of the
38:53
bidding can get out of control.
38:55
We see it all the time, even on the online auctions, like bring a
38:57
trailer and places like that where you're like, it went for that much.
39:01
What are you crazy?
39:02
So with prices being so high, why would somebody auction the car rather than do
39:07
a private sale or go through a broker?
39:09
Is there an advantage to going through the auction?
39:12
I agree and that's why I think that bring a trailer has done what they have
39:16
done, their claw and tell their base, they have already proven their sale
39:20
that you know, hey, we could sell these cars just like any other auction house
39:24
in the United States and even better.
39:26
On some aspects, especially low mileage cars, they have gilded
39:30
all of those mileage cars too.
39:32
And so a lot of people like that, but there's still that commodity band
39:36
that people go and that excitement going to the auction and no offense.
39:40
I mean, I love my auction.
39:41
I think it's fantastic and we still sell cars, but there's a couple of
39:45
options that going to Scottsdale every year in January is phenomenal for me.
39:50
I mean, There's so many people and so many options going on every day.
39:56
I started one side of Scottsdale and end up on the other side.
40:00
I try to get all the options every day.
40:02
It's like a marathon for me.
40:04
Same thing when I go to Monterey.
40:06
Oh my God.
40:07
Sonny, it's like, it's breathtaking what goes on out there.
40:10
Amelia Island.
40:11
Same way.
40:12
I mean, these are events that goes on if you're car lovers.
40:15
I mean, it's just like, you can't get enough of it and how nice everything
40:19
really is and be able to see some of the rare, so the rare cars, cars that
40:24
you'll never be able to see you lay your eyes on, but you got to bear it.
40:27
You got 21, 000 registered bidders every day in one room.
40:32
One room.
40:33
Now, I mean, you get a lot of people to go and bring a trailer, but you
40:36
don't have 21, 000 bidders of one room.
40:38
I'm not taking away from Kissimmee either.
40:40
I like going to Kissimmee also.
40:42
I think what Dana Mecham done is absolutely extraordinary.
40:46
He is one of the pioneers of our business also, and they get some of the
40:51
best numbers, matching, bill sheets.
40:54
They get some of the best cars around.
40:56
And I mean, they know how to do it.
40:58
They do a fantastic job on what they do.
41:02
I've often heard people say that part of the auction experience, as you described,
41:07
it is, you know, that energy in the room and all those people and all that.
41:10
But I've also heard it's a hassle free experience.
41:13
So how have you guys streamlined the whole buyer seller interaction process?
41:18
Most of the people that come to the auction, to be honest with
41:20
you, are people that's been in the auction world or been before.
41:24
You only get that handful of people that's never been.
41:27
And the ones that's never been and he's kind of lost, you darn sure make sure
41:31
you put your arm around them and you take care of them and you don't leave
41:34
them hanging out there because you do not want them to have a bad experience just
41:38
because you have an I don't care attitude.
41:41
You don't want to do that.
41:42
You want them to have the best.
41:43
And I'll tell you what, we have made so many new family So to speak with
41:48
these people that you go in, I got a lady, I got seven cars coming.
41:51
Her husband died.
41:52
Her husband came to Austin all the time.
41:54
He's got seven cars.
41:55
She's never walked in our building.
41:57
You know what?
41:57
I went out there.
41:58
I took all of her pictures.
41:59
I did all of her paperwork.
42:01
I walked her through it.
42:02
I'm picking up her cars for her.
42:04
She's coming to the auction.
42:05
We have a style box up there.
42:07
I'm gonna put her up there.
42:08
We're gonna take care of her.
42:09
Everything's gonna be fine.
42:10
It's just what you gotta do.
42:11
It's really a good thing too.
42:13
I mean, I really appreciate it too at the end of the day.
42:15
There's a lot of new formats coming around.
42:18
You know, bring a trailer.
42:19
Hemmings has gone online.
42:21
I think people have finally realized, hey, Thanks to technology,
42:24
this can be kind of easy.
42:25
What are some of the benefits of selling online?
42:28
Are there any, or does it all revolve around, Hey, let's go be there.
42:32
What, what are your thoughts on that?
42:34
Well, I talked to a guy today down in Florida.
42:36
His name's Jonathan from bullet motor sports, and we were talking
42:40
about selling some cars and he'd been selling some cars and bring a trailer.
42:43
Now he's still coming to my auction.
42:46
He comes and buys a truckload of cars, every sale.
42:48
And then he does his retail stuff.
42:50
What he does now, he really, really market his cars.
42:54
He really, really does a lot of stuff on all your social
42:57
media stuff, videos of the cars.
42:59
I mean, he just takes it to a new level.
43:01
But he still sells a lot of cars on bringing trailer right now, and
43:05
so he is being really good for him.
43:07
So it's another outlet.
43:08
We have our dates and, and everybody that's in the auction
43:12
business know what our dates are.
43:14
Let's just say Mecu.
43:15
Everybody knows what Mecu dates are and everybody knows what Barrett dates are.
43:18
And r e m and Broad Arrow, these are the guys who, who try to not to step on their
43:23
toes and be going up against these guys at the same time because it's not healthy.
43:27
Cause you want to be able to draw all the buyers.
43:29
You can, do you think those formats are the future or it's just another outlet?
43:33
But do you think there's going to be more growth in that area?
43:36
The, the online selling, buying experience?
43:39
I think it's another outlet for selling for dealers.
43:42
Some collectors also using that outlet.
43:45
So different than like RK motors in Charlotte, where you can take your
43:48
car and design it with them and they will sell you a car for you.
43:51
Streetside classics.
43:52
One of them, it's not an auction house, but there's another way to sell your car.
43:57
But if you were individual, most dealers don't take their
44:00
cars in or do stuff like that.
44:02
But for a dealer is another outlet to be able to flip cars, to be able to sell
44:07
more cars, to be able to buy more cars.
44:09
They only have X amount of money anyway to keep generating and keep selling where
44:14
if this month's running a little slow, you know, you've been selling 20 cars
44:18
and you only got 12 down and you want to.
44:20
What am I going to do with these cars?
44:21
How can I sell them?
44:22
All right.
44:23
So all that said, what's the future at GAA?
44:26
You're building a new building and back for memorabilia.
44:30
You've got three auctions a year that I know of you're doing a specialty auction
44:34
next year, so that takes it up to four.
44:36
There's always room for improvement.
44:37
We've always thrived to be on hands and a lot of personal
44:42
one on one contact with people.
44:44
Anyone having any kind of problem, we try to jump right in immediately, take care
44:48
of any kind of problems they have, which I can't say we have a whole lot of problems.
44:53
At this point, you know, we've put on a lot of options since 2012.
44:56
And so we're getting a lot better than what we normally have.
44:59
And I mean, the secrets to it all, and I tell anyone, and I didn't know in 2012
45:04
compared to now, it's all about the car.
45:07
If you got the cars, they come.
45:08
You can have 10, 000 cars, but if they're not what someone wants, it's enticed
45:14
him enough to get on that plane from California to fly out here, buy that
45:18
car, then you're not doing your job.
45:20
Then again, it comes into marketing and so forth from that point to be able
45:23
to get that out there to everybody.
45:25
So, you know, we've been doing some stuff here with Mab television.
45:30
I haven't some stuff recording and been playing later.
45:33
We are tentatively looking forward to going hopefully live in 2023.
45:38
That's our next big step, taking it to the big stage, so to speak.
45:42
Just like everybody else we've come in contact with, every other option
45:46
I've come in contact with them.
45:47
And I got some friends I've made with the Mecham group, with the Bear Jackal
45:51
group, and been able to ask questions where most people couldn't, you know,
45:55
they never started out with the big NBC sports or velocity or whatever,
46:01
you know, or Motor Trend, excuse me.
46:03
They already started small, so hopefully that's what we're going
46:06
to do, just like we've done it fast.
46:08
One step at a time, but it's coming.
46:10
It's coming really big.
46:12
I think the memorabilia is going to be there right across the street right now.
46:16
There's another building they've done and graded.
46:18
It's going to be beside the new memorabilia building.
46:21
Hopefully, he says it'll be done by July the 4th.
46:23
I'm hoping that's going to be what we call the event center where we
46:27
can grow more sponsors and more vendors just like you were talking.
46:32
Hey, bring your wife, bring your kids.
46:35
There's more stuff for you to be able to do.
46:37
Hey, I might want to go over here and buy me a Rolex.
46:39
There might be a vendor over there doing that.
46:41
Been able to sell jewelry or that they could go do a little shopping or so to
46:45
speak, instead of just looking at cars.
46:46
And then the husband can go look at the cars and buy a car, whatever
46:49
they want to do to make it more well rounded, so to speak, so you can be more
46:53
family atmosphere for a total package.
46:56
That's the new future.
46:57
Also, I'm hoping that this event center that we could do more vendors and be
47:01
able to hold more cars and display the cars a lot better than the way we
47:05
display them, which is not the wrong way we do them, but it could be a
47:08
little bit more dressy or flashier.
47:11
That'd be terrific.
47:12
Yeah, it will be.
47:13
GAA, you've got an auction coming up November 3, 4, and 5.
47:17
How many cars are we looking to expect at that sale?
47:22
750.
47:23
That's a lot of cars.
47:24
Yes, sir.
47:24
Now, is there a large selection of two wheel vehicles coming up?
47:28
I saw some of those on the website.
47:29
There was a whole bunch of motorcycles, minibikes, etc.
47:33
Is that from a private collection or does GAA always have a lot of
47:37
motorcycles and bikes for sale?
47:39
We always, I got a group of guys that don't do nothing but dabble
47:43
in the motorbikes and stuff, and they always provide those for me.
47:46
They do real well with them.
47:48
And that's another thing like I was telling you about the memorabilia stuff.
47:51
Those Honda 70s and 90s and stuff.
47:54
They're insane right now.
47:55
They're, they bring a lot of money.
47:57
Yeah.
47:57
They've gone crazy.
47:58
Yeah.
47:58
A lot of people relate to those like, you know, I had one of those and I want one
48:03
back, you know, I won't buy them back.
48:05
It's funny when you bring that up, because I've got a buddy.
48:07
We used to restore those.
48:08
I knew nothing about motorcycles and he used to drag those things home from the
48:12
junkyard and he'd get five or six of them.
48:14
He'd put one bike together and make one great bike.
48:16
They were gorgeous.
48:17
So yeah, you're, you're hitting the nail on the head with that one with me.
48:20
I see their bikes and I think, Oh man, back in the olden days, you know.
48:24
Oh yeah.
48:24
And listen, it's 3, 504 grand and being the rare color ones, you know,
48:28
you can get up to 7, 500 to 10, 000.
48:32
Yeah.
48:33
That's new.
48:33
That's nice.
48:34
It's been redone to be able to have that and have that in your garage out
48:38
there around your cars or whatever.
48:39
Most of these guys are buying them up for the November sale, November
48:42
three, four, and five, are there any truly significant cars coming
48:46
up that you remember for that sale?
48:48
Restomods right now, a lot of the new.
48:52
Guys that's buying these cars, you know, they're not really
48:55
into the carburetor cars.
48:56
They're all into these LS motor cars.
48:59
So we got quite a bit of Aristo mods.
49:01
I got a couple of really nice Nomads and some Corvettes.
49:04
It's really, really super nice.
49:06
It's going to really rock the house, so to speak.
49:08
I got a Copo coming and I got a LS6 is coming.
49:12
And both of those cars will be certified through Jeremy Nates.
49:15
I got a little bit of everything.
49:16
Like you said, I got some Ferraris.
49:18
Got some Porsches all the way down to 35 DeSotos, air cooled,
49:23
unbelievable, beautiful 30s cars.
49:26
I got a little bit of everything for everybody.
49:28
Obviously, we're talking about classic cars, muscle cars, and trucks.
49:31
Those are the ones that really sell at auction.
49:33
And you said the word restomod, and that got my attention.
49:36
And there's been a trend lately of taking these classic cars, these
49:39
muscle cars, and these trucks, and turning them into EVs by retrofitting
49:44
in Tesla power plants and others.
49:46
So I wanted to get your take on this.
49:48
Evolution, as we like to call it around here, and how that
49:51
might change the auction world.
49:53
I got an electric truck.
49:54
First time I ever sold one.
49:56
Going to try to sell one.
49:57
Maybe a Rivian.
49:58
Whatever.
49:59
I'm not really up on them, but I got one.
50:01
Okay?
50:01
The guy called me, and when he called me, I immediately was typing in and watching
50:05
them see what they were going online.
50:07
And then also, I told him, hold on a second, let me make a few phone calls.
50:10
I called a couple of my buddies.
50:11
There's like, Johnny, you can't get them.
50:13
There's a waiting list like you wouldn't believe.
50:14
Crazy not to take it.
50:16
That's all I needed here.
50:18
Caught him back.
50:18
I hooked him right on in.
50:20
I said, yeah, I gotta have it.
50:22
So I got one.
50:23
I want everybody to watch.
50:25
Let's see what it does.
50:26
I want to see how much it brings.
50:28
Well, you know, I'm kind of torn because, you know, the Lightning
50:31
trucks, they're over the top right now.
50:33
I'm expecting that truck to do real well too, because they don't have no
50:36
time, no miles on it whatsoever, right?
50:38
I mean, I know everything is trying to go for green new deal.
50:44
Everything's trying to change.
50:46
I just don't know, man.
50:48
I really, I don't think in my world and most people I talked to, did I
50:52
hang out with, and this email collector card, they got white hair, dude.
50:56
And they're not buying it.
50:57
Okay?
50:58
They're just not buying it.
50:59
They love to hear that rumble.
51:00
They like that power.
51:01
They're not buying it whatsoever.
51:03
Johnny, don't worry.
51:03
In another 20 years, we'll be auctioning off that vintage Tesla Model S.
51:08
You don't see them like this anymore.
51:10
They've still got the original battery pack.
51:12
Check this thing out.
51:13
Let's plug it in, you know?
51:14
That's right.
51:15
I hear that,
51:19
Johnny, I gotta ask you, any shout outs, promotions, or anything else you'd like
51:23
to share that we didn't cover thus far?
51:25
Yes, I'd like to have a shout out to our good friend Reliable Carriers.
51:29
They're one of our biggest sponsors.
51:31
Really good friends of ours for the TAA team.
51:34
Dale Wilson, really good.
51:35
Work with you any kind of way.
51:37
He'll haul your car anywhere in the United States and, uh, also liquid performance.
51:42
They have all of our cleaning supplies and stuff and their technology on cleaning
51:48
and auto detailing stuff is phenomenal.
51:51
And also I want to thank Hagerty Insurance, they're
51:53
one of our sponsors also.
51:54
They do a ton of stuff with us.
51:56
There's another company out there called Navispak.
51:58
They do all of our shipping, all of our memorabilia and so forth.
52:01
And I want to have a big shout out to them also.
52:04
And JJ Best for the financing that they do for all of our financing needs.
52:09
They really help us, really help us out a lot.
52:11
Six acres under one roof in Greensboro, North Carolina.
52:15
G a a classic car auctions keeps their guests comfortable in a fully
52:19
climate controlled environment.
52:21
No sunburns, no hats blowing off, no rain.
52:24
Just an enjoyable time.
52:26
Cruising their website, www.gaaclassiccars.com.
52:32
We'll show there is something for everyone at these events ranging
52:35
from vintage and exotics to modern classics from all genres.
52:40
With bidding options ranging from in person to online and telephone, buying a
52:44
vehicle or piece of memorabilia is simple.
52:47
The first time and seasoned auction goer benefits from a professional
52:51
staff helping you enjoy the entire experience from beginning to end.
52:55
You can follow the GAA team on social at GAAClassicCars.
53:02
on Facebook, Instagram and I got to tell you, I can't thank you enough
53:08
for coming on and explaining to me, especially how the auction world works.
53:12
And you know, now I know exactly what to do.
53:15
You're going to see me there at a GAA auction in a white suit, my collar pop,
53:19
dark shades on a Jordache duffel bag.
53:23
And my ping pong pallet ready to bid on the next vehicle coming across that line.
53:31
I love it.
53:32
I can't wait.
53:33
I can't wait.
53:34
We're going to put you up front.
53:37
Well, again, thank you so much for coming on and telling us all about this.
53:41
You guys are wonderful.
53:42
I appreciate it so much.
53:43
And thank you for having me on tonight.
53:45
It's been an awesome time.
53:47
I really enjoyed it.
53:53
The following episode is brought to us.
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