Car Auctions Are Coming To Arizona

- Mark C Bach

Each January the car auction companies flock to various Phoenix area sites to hold their classic car sales/auctions.

The grand daddy of them all is Barrett-Jackson’s auction held in Scottsdale and featured live and on tape on Speed with nearly 40 hours of coverage next weekend. This will be the 38th annual auction for them which they call – The World’s Greatest Collector Car Events” TM. And they probably are right! This year the auction offers a stunning black T-Bird, the first one off the factory floor. Plus Craig Jackson will assist GM in auctioning off for charity the first 2010 Camaro, outfitted as the winning bidder desires. Readers might remember that last year at Barrett Jackson, the first production Corvette ZR-1 sold for $1,000,000. GM is even feeling the pinch and will be selling some cars there from their extensive collection.

Russo Steele will be holding four days of car auctions further north in Scottsdale and ESPN cameras will tape the auction action for later broadcast. The contrast here is that only actual bidders are allowed into the auction tent and cars can be sold with a reserve. This means if the current owner wants to sell the car for at least “$x” amount, they can keep an unannounced reserve on the car and hope it fetches at least that amount.

Silver Car Auctions will be on the east edge of the metropolitan area at Fort McDowell for four days as well. Mitch Silver and his auctions helped establish Hot August Nights in Reno and is boastful that their slate of cars is more for the average buyer – meaning more reasonably priced.

Boutique auctions also occur next week with RM and Gooding in town as well for separate one day sales.

In two weeks Kruse Auctions comes into town and sweeps up the remnants, boasting of nearly 1,000 cars to auction. Sometimes I think they must be counting the car’s wheels to come up with their car counts but they still have a great selection.

The bottom line is there will be plenty of cars in Arizona for the next two weeks and lots of money passing hands. Will there be million dollar cars crossing the auction block? You can count on it.

Stay tuned for more coverage as the auctions proceed.

Copyright Mark C Bach 2009