For sale price variations

[forbsie09]

I generally browse the cars for sale sites just to see whats what, I've been doing it for decades, I used to buy autotrader all the time just to give my mind a treat.
Anyway, I'm having a nose through Volvo 850's for sale, and I note some huge price variations, eg, on autotrader right now are 4, 850's, theres a very nice looking 1995 850 T5 R estate in Gul yellow with 143,000 miles - asking price £25,000 and theres an equally nice 1996 850R estate in red with 148,000 miles for £8,999, then theres a 1996 850R Estate Japanese import with 35,000 miles for £9,995 and finally a very nice 1995 850 T5 saloon in Dark Olive with 173,000 miles for £5,500 !
So, whats peoples opinion on the huge price variation for the yellow one ?

[DaveNP]

There's always some variation in old car prices depending on things like condition, spec and history, and 850Rs and T5s seem to be moving into the collectible bracket now too. It used to seem to be that Saffron was the desirable colour but perhaps that aquired a boy racer image and the possibly more mature collector now seems to want the more restrained Gul yellow.
But whilst reading car mags is an admirable hobby so is Kite Flying, and to mix up my idioms I think some people are very much 'flying a kite' when they price older, possibly collectible, cars on places like Autotrader and Ebay, if they get a result good luck to them, if they don't well they haven't lost anything or wasted too much effort.

[green van man]

None of them are worth more than someone will pay for them.
Glasses guide was always the insurance industry guide to market value when it came to payouts.

If no one is prepared to pay the asking price, it will not sell, no matter what the vendor thinks it's worth.

Paul.

[Thekilt]

Selling prices for many older cars is rediculous at the moment. There is a thread in the 240 for sale section regarding pricing for the 240 range on Ebay. Some sellers have ben trying to price their cars at rediculous money for months and never have any takers. And even cars that would probably go for scrap that need welding, no MOT etc are going north of £1k.
Its not just volvos obviously, BMW E30s, mercedes W124, etc all are going up and up. I was looking at an E30 estate about 3 years ago and wish i went for it then as the prices has doubled if not trippled since depending on engine.
And its not just cars, we have found recently around us on the south coast, house prices are going silly. Any bit of land or any house which "Could" be renovated and made larger and make more money is up for silly amounts. For example, a 3 bed semi detached around us is between £300-£350k. Yet there is a very small 2 bed bungalow and just because it has slightly larger garden and potential to redevelop into something larger they are asking £360k for it! its all for the developers and is pushing us out looking at getting a larger/detatched home.