TCG Stories | The Common Gear

Background Docs - What They Are and How They Work

By: toolbox, 07/30/2022

"Background Docs" is the content type to support the vehicle you have uploaded into your garage. Adding photos and non-photo files to Background Docs allows you to document the history of the vehicle's background. The best way to think about it is this - This is your "Online Manila Folder", or the physical documents that exist in binders, folders, file cabinets, or boxes in your attic or basement.

Uploading your Background Docs into TCG allows you to safely house all of your documents in one convenient place, and also allows you the flexibility to share them privately with prospective buyers, and appraisal or insurance company, or as a reference if you ever need to dig out a specific piece of information associated with your vehicle.

Privacy and Flexibility in Sharing

By default, the Background Docs are only visible by you on the site. You can choose to share them at various levels of granularity, and you can refer to the "Access Control" settings that accompany each post:

Please refer to the "Access Control" document to fully understand how this functionality works.

Records Stay with the Vehicle

Let's say you love your vehicle, but it's time to move it to the next caretaker. One of the awesome features of this site is that the records will stay with the vehicle - They are not dependent on the user. If you are moving the vehicle to a new owner, here's how simple it is to migrate the vehicle:

Send a note to "admin@thecommongear.com", with a screenshot of the vehicle that you are selling.
Let the new user know that they need to set up an account at The Common Gear.
Include the new user's username in the note sent to Admin.
That's it.

Once the vehicle is in the new owner's garage, they are free to upload their own Background Docs, as this is the starting point of their ownership journey.

RealTime Racing brings back the classics

By: Jeff, 07/21/2022

RealTime Racing, a Honda/Acura racing team owned by Peter Cunningham, has always had a warm place in my heart. Cunningham himself was in the paddock at Lime Rock on Memorial Day weekend eons ago, and not only was his outfit giving out huge, 24x36 posters of their winning NSX, but Peter was cheerfully autographing for the long line of attendees. Memorial Day weekend is Lime Rock's kick-off to the summer racing season, so attendance was robust.

Cunningham has made a name for himself racing an NSX; Acura Integra Type R; Acura TSX; and Honda Civic Si. He's done quite well with them, too, as RealTime Racing is the most successful team ever in the World Challenge series. RealTime has amassed 101 race victories on its way to 15 Drivers' and 14 Manufacturers' Championships, and done so with cars that still look much like the ones you'd find at your local dealership.

They've also made a point of saving the original team cars or tracking down the ones that were sold. Not only that, they put these cars - veritable antiques by competition standards - and repeated their original successes. Over the weekend, RealTime reported via Facebook that Cunningham piloted one of the original TSX cars to victory in the WeatherTech International Challenge at Road America on July 17. Cunningham shared the Group 8 podium with two Porsche 911s, which is as much a credit to him as it is the platform provided by Honda.

Not many people place value on history these days; it's great to see Cunningham and RealTime Racing remembering what got them to where they are today.

$100K loans for $80K cars

By: Jeff, 07/07/2022

I don't consider myself a huge Doug DeMuro fan but I do like that he's putting himself out there as an ambassador for his brand. He does it in a meaningful way, not just talking about the results that Cars & Bids has collected but about the overall economy and how it intersects with the collector car marketplace.

A recent Facebook post explained that he is still personally involved in setting reserves, and how this relates to making sure Cars & Bids makes money by ensuring as many submitted vehicles sell as possible. He relayed how many of the current submissions are somewhat shocked that the reserve prices are as low as they are, which DeMuro cites as necessary owing to the new realities of the enthusiast car marketplace - in other words, things are cooling just a bit.

There's one line in his recent post (photo above) that blew my mind: the seller who claims he needs to set a $100K reserve to pay off his $100K loan. Wait - people take out loans for these cars? Every day, I see some exotic rolling down the street, or a suburban housewife in a brand-new Grand Wagoneer or X7, and I'm wondering why I'm still driving a 2011 BMW 3-Series wagon. Well, it's because I hate car payments - but with this latest revelation from Doug, perhaps I'm in the minority.

I'd love to hear some comments on this, as this latest insight from Doug really blew my mind. Are any of your as surprised as I am?

The Brian O'Connor of Holyoke

By: Jeff, 06/28/2022

One of the more under-the-radar stories that came out over the past year was the revelation that a dingy former fire station in the down-on-its-luck Western Massachusetts town of Holyoke housed a massive stash of a Fast and the Furious fanboy's wet dream stored inside. Yes, a multitude of MKIV Supras, E46 BMW M3s, Honda S2000s, and many more were all sitting on racks among the luxurious confines of a former municipal facility converted to the fashionable hideout of a massive hustler of the devil's lettuce.

The story is absolutely bananas, with no one really knowing what was inside the old station house until one Cory Taylor was stopped by police and found to have a respectable 138 pounds of Mary-Jane in his van. Mr. Taylor posted a measly $2,000 in bail money, skipped his next hearing, and was later found dead in an abandoned warehouse amongst circumstances that are still listed as "suspicious" months later. Note that the police are not exactly spending a lot of time finding his killer if there was one.

The collection included no fewer than 13 MKIV Supras, including one with just under 23,000 original miles on the clock. There was also a '93 with just over 8,000 miles on the odometer. With the rest of the collection consisting of BMW M3s, Honda S2000s, Mitsubishi Evolutions, and a Nissan 350Z, he really did just buy what was featured predominantly in the F&F movies. It's like he was the cheaper, criminally-active version of Paul Walker, but with far fewer E36 M3 LTWs in his stash.

I recently traded a few messages with one of the buyers of several of the Supras that went up for auction after the assets of this ill-gotten collection were seized. He tells me that they grabbed a non-running black Supra and two of the pristine white Supras that came up for grabs. Wisely, they also jumped on two of the E46 cars for the rare color codes, which included a super desirable Phoenix Yellow car and another featuring an Imola Red exterior over Impulse Black leather. Both M3s are six-speed cars and the Phoenix Yellow example is stunning.

The lesson here? If your property abuts an abandoned police precinct that occasionally has lights on inside, maybe peek in the windows from time to time.

The perils of a cheap Delica

By: Jeff, 06/26/2022

I had finally resolved with myself that I was going to hoard some cash and get serious about the cars I truly want: my Cosworth 190E and my '89 Isuzu Trooper RS. Downsize, sell off cars you don't love, fix the rust on the Cossie and the Trooper, and drive them. That's the mission, no deviation from course.

Then I go on Facebook and see some guy trying to unload a Mitsubishi Delica 4x4 with "rust issues" that of course means nothing to someone living in the snow belt of New England but look like joy-killing cancer to someone living south of the Mason-Dixon. Yes, this is one of those vehicles I have had an on-again, off-again desire to own, but I know it'll be back into the rabbit hole of importing parts and waiting weeks for a repair.

....but as far as Delicas go, this one is cheap - $13,000 - and there's perhaps some more room to bargain if you make the rust out to be something abhorrent that you can't stomach the thought of living with.

What needs to happen is the LX450 should be (quickly) refreshed and used for an inaugural camping trip on the beach before Labor Day so I can vanquish these demons immediately and finish two projects that have been on the proverbial back-burner since 2018. Not that I've been successful in that mission to date.

We should all be hoarding 80s enthusiast cars

By: Jeff, 06/21/2022

You don't have to look too far to see that anyone who has been snatching up modern enthusiast cars at auction and sticking them in a field or giant warehouse is pretty goddamned brilliant. In a few years, when cars like the Porsche 944 and first-generation Toyota Celica are near unobtainable and even harder to find in good shape, a former parts car may, in fact, be deemed worthy of restoring.

Every now and again, I flag eBay sellers who have seen the winds shifting and begun stockpiling enthusiast vehicles that are still dirt cheap to buy off of Copart but can immediately yield big-time value in terms of the parts they contain. For years, J&J Auto Wrecking out of Ohio has been the clear leader in this arena, seemingly equipped with a sixth sense about which cars and trucks to buy while they're cheap. They definitely saw the trend towards Ford Excursions and H2 Hummers getting a second shot at life and began yanking those things off of auction lots left and right. Then it was the Impala SS, another car that was dirt cheap to buy when found in a state of neglect. The list goes on, and I actually grabbed a minty Recaro interior out of a rusty Mercedes-Benz Cosworth they had (which was ironically in better shape than my own car.

Now, there's another player on the field, with the name goldat out of Houston, Texas. I just came across this outfit as their eBay page shows several first-generation Celicas, an Alfa Romeo Milano Verde, Porsche 944 Turbo, a second-generation Toyota MR2, and an early Volvo 242 Turbo coupe, among many others. Thinking about how much they likely paid for these cars and the treasure-trove of parts within each one makes me wish I had grabbed some acreage at some point long ago and started hoarding like these shops have done.

The Great Race started right in my own backyard

By: Jeff, 06/19/2022

The Great Race is one of the last major cross-country events catering largely to pre-WWII cars. Typically running from West to East but occasionally going the other direction, this weeks-long speed-controlled event is one of the last of its kind, as it even outlaws GPS and other helpful devices to help you get from point A to point B. It's described as, "....a test of a driver/navigator team's ability to follow precise course instructions and the car's (and team's) ability to endure on a cross-country trip. The course instructions require the competing teams to drive at or below the posted speed limits at all times."

So, it's not a speed competition, but it is an event designed to test your navigational skills and ability to follow directions, all while managing the unpredictable nature of a pre-war car. That being said, the rules have softened in recent years, now allowing for any classic car up to 1974 to participate. These leaves the door open for lots of desirable muscle cars, and the photos from this year's kick-off - which happened right in my own backyard of Warwick, RI - reveal plenty of Shebly Mustangs and Pontiac GTOs in the mix.

I wish I had known about this with more advance warning, as 10,000 car fans swarmed Rocky Point Park and even Governor McKee came down to wave the proverbial green flag. Hagerty is a sponsor, as is Hemmings, Coker Tires, and McCollister's Auto Transport, a very respectable list of corporate supporters. The teams left Warwick on Saturday morning, en route to Connecticut with plenty of stops planned along the way, including Wayne Carini's F40 Motorsports.

To drive a pre-war car anywhere is likely a watershed moment for most automotive enthusiasts, but to take one from Rhode Island to Fargo, North Dakota, deserves a lifetime achievement award.

Here's what happened with my three cars for sale

By: Jeff, 06/18/2022

This week - for the first time ever - I had three vehicles up for sale. My 1991 Saab 900 Turbo SE convertible; my 1990 Audi V8 Quattro; and a 1988 Alfa Romeo Milano Verde, a non-running project car. Long and short of it? Two sales and one no-sale. Here's what went down:

Saab 900 SE: With three minutes left, it was sitting at $9,000. Over the course of three minutes, it went slightly nuts and bidding ended at $23,750. The winning bidder, a woman from Massachusetts, won the car and quickly fell apart over several phone calls. She wanted the car but clearly was surprised at what it took to win it. I never heard from her in the hours after the auction, a very, very bad sign for any seller, and my phone call that night did nothing to inspire further confidence. She cried. She cried some more. She asked for more time. She refused to send a deposit of any sustenance. She wanted me to bring the car to her. The whole thing reeked. Thankfully, the runner-up bidder contacted me the next morning expressing his interest should the first bidder flake out. Within three hours, the winning bidder had conceded she didn't have the means to store the car (which is something you should know before you enter a single, Goddamn bid) and the second bidder had wired funds within two hours of my confirming with him the car was his for the taking. A win, but one that was hard-fought.

Audi Quattro V8: This one stung a bit. There was seemingly a good amount of interest in this obscure luxury sedan early on, easily outpacing where my Euro-spec E21 was a few years back. However, the mad rush of bidding at the end never happened and the auction stalled out at $7,400. In some respects, I wish this car had sold, as it was the perfect car for Bring A Trailer: a real-deal survivor with very little in the way of flaws and in completely original condition. That's the audience for a car like that, and it will be a slightly harder sell (I think, who knows) without an educated audience that knows how few of these Autobahn cruisers are left in this sort of condition. I am in conversations with the high bidder and if we can land on a compromise number, I will likely sell it just to have the space back in the garage.

Alfa Romeo Milano Verde: This was the surprise of the week, as the Milano was a non-running project that hadn't run in at least two to three years. The sale was very quick, with a deposit received within 48 hours of listing it here on The Common Gear. The car was a good one, as it was completely stock and still had its original Recaro interior in very good condition. I sold it with a fairly generous assortment of spare parts, but that not only helped to seal the deal but also gave me some much-needed space back in the garage and got rid of parts I will no longer need. I will miss this car as I really wanted to own an Alfa with that gorgeous Busso V6 under the hood but I will need to find one that doesn't need nearly as much love given I have limited local resources for Italian car restoration. Perhaps I will buy this one back down the road when it is a runner once again.

So, there you have it. Bring A Trailer still works well when it does work, but it's by no means a guarantee of a sale. They do very little to support you in your goal of closing the transaction out successfully, which does strip away some of the magic that many of us seem to assume is part of the BaT equation. However, with the resources that The Common Gear brings to bear, I feel far more comfortable losing an auction these days knowing that my work and time invested in a given car will still be easy for the next owner to find, understand, and appreciate. I'm confident we'll find a new owner for the gorgeous Audi V8 soon.

Isle of Man TT returns in dramatic fashion

By: Jeff, 06/15/2022

The Isle of Man TT went on a two-year hiatus like so many other spectator-driven events following the arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic. This event - this spectacle of unreal proportions - has captivated attendees for decades and thrust the tiny island community into a spotlight of discomforting dynamics.

Sadly, its return to primetime in 2022 was marred by five deaths and multiple serious injuries. The fact that death is a part of the TT has been quietly accepted over the years, but in the bizarro world we find ourselves in where feelings count double what they used to, the social media chorus to ban the TT has become quite vocal.

However you look at it, it's tragic what happened. But if you ask the drivers if they know what they signed up for - that is, they're aware that death is likely and the only way to escape it is to be exactly as talented as you proclaim to be and then some - they will resoundingly tell you yes. The Isle of Man TT is one of those few events left where you can dance with death of your free will, content knowing that whatever the outcome is, you'll have done something that many of us - nay, 99 percent of us - would never have the gumption to do.(Read more about this year's event here at motorsport.com)

Rust Cohle, the deadpan detective from the first season of True Detective, says: "The world needs bad men. We keep the other bad men from the door." In the same vein, we also need those individuals who yearn to live in the extremes, so that we may see what's possible when you go to the edge and return to tell the story. To take that away leaves us constantly falling short of knowing how to survive on the other side.

Rest in peace to those who perished, who died a far more valiant death than the legions of us who face our final days hooked up to a machine in a dirty, state-run nursing home.

Restoring a rare 993 found in a river

By: Jeff, 06/10/2022

Every now and again, I'm reminded that my two biggest restoration projects - the Mercedes Cosworth and the Isuzu Trooper RS - are far from the most extreme anyone has ever attempted.

They are massive by my standards, yes, but not all compared to what some enthusiasts have done. I stumbled across the Instagram account for a user named limoncellaprojekt, who apparently found an exceedingly rare Porsche 993-chassis 911 that was one of a handful of paint-to-sample cars when it was new. After a series of bad events and bad weather, the rare 911 was swept away into a river, where the owner barely escaped and the car then sat for five years.

Fast forward to the present day and the current owner - after negotiating the purchase of the mangled carcass after the river receded and the car became visible - has undertaken a massive restoration project to repair the heavily damaged body, rebuild the waterlogged engine, and restore the completely disgusting interior. It's an absolutely insane attempt at rebirth, but as his interview with Hagerty confirms, some projects aren't always about the bottom line:

"Paolo is under no illusions about the absurdity of his project. The process has involved multiple trips to Germany and at this juncture remains far from complete. As he explained in the Rennlist thread, this is not a project about financial gain, but rather something he enjoys just for the love of it."

Read more here: https://www.hagerty.com/media/maintenance-and-tech/this-river-find-porsche-911-restoration-is-the-definition-of-project-insanity/

The Cool IG, YT, Web Embeds

Bring A Trailer won't keep you from being scammed

By: Jeff, 03/05/2025

Brief

Over the last few months, Hagerty has re-published an article warning classic and vintage car owners about the propensity for being taken as total suckers by unscrupulous dealers and consigners. At first, I thought - how on Earth could so many people, who were presumably of some means, be taken advantage of so easily?

One of the biggest scandals in recent months is the implosion of CPR Classics, a highly-regarded Porsche restoration and consignment service that apparently just started straight-up taking people's cars under the pretense of paying them (hilarious!), selling the cars without titles, pocketing the cash, and then just not answering their phones. And very few of the scam victims even bothered to drive over to the shop and see whether their $150,000 911 still existed. Pardon my vulgarity, but WTF?

And if you really want to get into a rabbit hole about how incestuous the industry is about protecting bad actors and hiding the fact that some fairly intelligent people have been scammed, you should try and click on this link to a 1972 911S that BaT listed on behalf of CPR before being exposed as marketing a car that didn't exist and CPR had no right to sell. If you click that link, does BaT ask you to log in? And then when you do, does the URL take you no where? Yeah, me too - you can get more details here on the Early 911S Registry, which thankfully, hasn't been shut down by BaT. It still appears on Classic.com, but again, BaT has obviously scrubbed the link and gone to great lengths to make sure you don't realize just how little due diligence they actually do.

With friends like that at BaT, how is anyone really safe when you let outside companies who have dealers interests at heart run the show?

How should you buy a vintage car sight-unseen

As someone who has bought numerous cars sight-unseen from sellers who I just generally trusted, it caused some self-reflection. Basically, I realized I have an informal checklist that is on autopilot in these situations. The steps include:

1.) I'd like multiple angles of photos beyond what was included in your listing.

2.) I want to talk on the phone, at length, about key history details and potential issues.

3.) I want to dig through any records you have of the car before I commit.

Now, here's the thing: as a seller, this can feel like a burden. But I always commit to sending a deposit before any of this commences as an act of good faith and for ensuring the seller gets something for their time if I walk. That's only fair. This approach has yet to cause any heartburn on the part of people I'm considering buying a car from, and if I get two out of three - usually multiple phone calls and some photos of the specific areas I asked for (service records are a bonus) - I'm content to move forward.

According to Hagerty, some people were wiring thousands and thousands of dollars without doing any of this, and being snookered by photos that the scammer simply grabbed from an eBay or Bring A Trailer listing. I never realized it was that easy!

Why a records-driven approach is better for buyers - and sellers

Of course, this is why we provide the solution we do, which is a records-driven approach to car selling. Users can document their work and receipts for as long as they own the car, and then create a for sale listing that sucks all of those records into one easily shareable ad. If an owner is tracking their investment and overall curation of a car, it demonstrates a track record of ownership that is near impossible to fake. And since The Common Gear provides full access control where your records are only visible to the people you agree to share the listing with, it greatly reduces the potential for fakery (as opposed to every Bring a Trailer listing that is still visible years after the car has sold.)

When you buy a car, it's a commitment on both sides. And while we have all bought the occasional project with zero paper trail for peanuts because, well, who doesn't love a basketcase, that's a very different proposition than spending $20, $30, or $100,000 of your own hard-earned cash on a supposedly well-loved car.

If we all demand more when we decide to buy an enthusiast vehicle, the ability for scam artists to take advantage of people in this hobby will become far less appealing.

Beware of the online auction halo effect

By: Jeff, 01/04/2025

Brief

Back in the day, you wanted to buy a Porsche from guys named Max Hoffman or Al Holbert. They were known in the community for different reasons; Hoffman was an early Porsche booster who influenced factory decisions from New York, while Holbert was a grassroots racer who rose through the ranks of both the motorsports community and the car business, with his dealership receiving allocations of some of the most sought-after new Porsche models. Literally, car purchasing decisions were made based on the proximity to guys who had close relationships with the factory.

That afterglow was powerful. It got to a point that people saw it a badge of honor to say they owned a Holbert car. To this day, a Holbert license plate frame will net you several hundred bucks on eBay. However, putting too much faith in a vendor or an enthusiast icon can overshadow what is a rotten car at its core. That recently happened with a Range Rover Classic that sold for $25,000 on Bring A Trailer but popped up on the private market after the sale fell through on BaT.

First of all, the sale didn't proceed because a shill bidder ran up multiple auctions and flaked on more than one. That's a story for another day. The seller, a private party that sells a few times each year on BaT, was connected to a private buyer via someone who I can only assume is a casual broker (there are lots of these popping up in the online auction era.) The broker negotiated a sale for the final bid price for the 1995 Range Rover County Classic SWB of $25,000 and the deal closed seemingly after the no-sale on BaT.

As the screenshots that accompany this article show, the Rover was delivered with numerous issues, not the least of which was an apparent head gasket failure that caused the truck to run hot once it reached highway speed. Apparently, the seller didn't allow the PPI to include on-the-road driving, only a cold start and whatever operational speed was used to move it in and out of a service station bay. Obviously, this should have been a red flag - but for all but the most pessimistic buyers, the BaT effect can instill confidence that is grounded in nothing other than the prolonged existence of the platform.

"It's been around for years and everyone gets a great price - that must mean I'm getting a great car!" Wrong. The platform has always existed to benefit the seller with all liabilities placed on the buyer. Some of you may be saying, "Well, duh - it doesn't matter how you buy a risky enthusiast vehicles, it's your responsibility to assess its condition" - and I would say you're correct. However, when you buy via a forum or a craigslist ad, there's an awareness that you're on your own. It's up to you to trust your gut and your internal moral compass whether the seller is a decent human being. If you're a novice at this or perhaps typically insulated from vehicle purchases, the comment section on BaT can feel like all the validation you need.

A few things about this particular truck: one, if you watch the videos, it's pretty obvious the seller is going out of his way to keep the temperature gauge out of view. Every driving video has the frame stopping in the middle of the cluster with the fuel gauge visible, but you can't see the temperature gauge on the left side. Also, there was a bit of foreshadowing via a comment that asked why the overflow tank was empty; the seller responded with a nothingburger answer about the fact that he uses Evans brand coolant. Some potential warning signs, for sure, but if you don't have a sixth sense about things like a seller not allowing for an actual test drive during a PPI, those clues will fly over your head. It reminds me of one of my favorite scenes from The Wire, when Commissioner Burrell reminds his cohorts how ruthless the streets can be: "It's Baltimore, gentlemen. The gods will not save you."

By the same token, a BaT auction does not sterilize your purchase. It can go wrong a thousand different ways. And as the unfortunate buyer of this Range Rover found out when he asked his broker to propose a solution with the seller of a $5,000 refund and he'll go away (well short of the $10,000 -$15,000 in estimated repair costs), the seller responded that he had no money and the proceeds were already spent.

It's enough to make one wish that we still did our deals with the likes of Hoffman and Holbert.

The Common Gear joins the Guys with Rides podcast

By: Jeff, 12/22/2024

Brief

Recently, The Common Gear co-founder Jeff Lavery joined his friend Rudy Samsel of Guys with Rides to talk about the state of the collector car market, with a specific focus on the so-called claims of "money laundering" that continue to surround certain cars on auction sites. Check out the latest edition here.

The "No Reserve" bloodbath continues unabated

By: Jeff, 10/14/2024

Brief

At some point, you just can't help people. I know I crow about sellers of enthusiast vehicles being unfairly forced into selling at no reserve, but that's really not much different than believing a fat person was forced to get all their nutrition from Dairy Queen.

You have the right to say no; it's just that you're impatient, or otherwise under the impression that you need to sell your vehicle as quickly as possible, damning the consequences that it may involve in the process. That's the strangest thing about people who complain about the results of their no reserve auction: you literally don't have to sell your car that way.

There's an odd sense of compulsion that develops among some sellers whereby they decide to roll the dice on a car they absolutely know to be worth more than what the auction house is telling them. I sold my 1995 Audi S6 over the summer for what was probably a very good price, but I still feel content I got a fair deal - especially when you consider how little time I spent actually selling it. I left maybe $1,200 on the table, but it sold in a little over 12 hours. So, let's assume that the addition $1,200 would have required another five days of live selling, talking with buyers, dealing with tire kickers, etc., etc., and you multiple 120 additional hours times my professional hourly rate - well, you're talking about way more than $1,200.

Yes, there's a definite value to selling something quickly, but I also know based on how the Audi presented (bad paint) I would have gotten raked over the coals by the armchair quarterbacks on an internet auction versus a guy showing up and seeing how solid the car was mechanically. At the end of the day, I still managed the transaction myself, on my terms, and likely made more money than a glitzy internet auction would have.

There's a combination of issues happening: sellers assume that managing the sale themselves will require more time than they think, and they believe the auction houses will get a better price, and faster, than if they did it themselves. There are no guarantees for either of those conditions.

Put simply, they are being lazy. You don't want to be this guy who got absolutely FLEECED on Hemmings because, I guess, he wanted the car gone before winter. But in looking at the video, he's got quite a bit of space and the Chrysler could have absolutely stayed there a few weeks while he dealt with some in-person meetings. Multiple commenters posted that they would have been interested if they knew the car was for sale. Even if just one of those was legit, he could have likely gotten a better price for his car than agreeing to the Hemmings terms, which again - and I can't state this enough - no one is forcing you to sell your car this way.

Our platform allows you to be as detailed or as brief as you want, but the smart play is to upload your records or photos documenting maintenance work to drive higher buyer confidence, and justify a higher asking price. Craigslist is gone, Marketplace is a dumpster fire, and The Common Gear is here to help you sell your enthusiast vehicle on your own terms.

Pierre Hedary and the BaT problem

By: Jeff, 12/01/2023

Brief

First of all, this is not a Bring a Trailer "hate post." Not at all. What it is serves more as a reminder that the bigger an entity gets, the greater the distance becomes between its intended mission and the people it claims to serve. Pierre Hedary, a noted Mercedes-Benz expert and shop owner, has politely pointed out recently that he's received an influx of customer cars bought on BaT with significant, undisclosed mechanical issues, and for that, he's been called out by the internet flash mob.

You should watch his latest video here; as usual, Pierre is extremely measured in his response, and does very little (if anything) to fan inflammatory flames. The most hilarious feedback he's received since his original video questioning the BaT effect (Why Bring A Trailer Cars are a Terrible Idea) is that he's some sort of closeted liberal, which of course, is the knee-jerk response by anyone who feels personally attacked that their open checkbook lifestyle is risky at best ("Oooh, you dare question my purchasing power, you must be a poor liberal schmuck - please), but beyond that, it's incredible how insecure folks get when someone dares question whether BaT has any integrity whatsoever about the vehicles they sell.

Listen: buying vintage cars and trucks is inherently risky behavior. Things can go wrong in a big way and you can be upside down in a hurry. That's the roll of the dice we all live with. The problem that Pierre points to is a very simple disconnect between the BaT brand and the buying experience that many real-world folks are having. BaT has, intentionally or otherwise, built a reputation that indicates they have the ability to connect buyers with the best cars and most professional sellers. If you buy on BaT, you avoid the supposed refuse that haws their wares on craigslist and Marketplace.

The reality is, this simply isn't true. Are there good cars on BaT? Yes. Are there good cars on craigslist? Yes. Are their total shitboxes in both places? Yes to that as well - but if you say it about BaT, be prepared for the pitchforks.

Many of the loyalists to BaT are the same kinds of folks who would chastise people of a certain political stripe for ardently following an elected official without asking enough questions. The irony is they don't practice what they preach as it relates to buying and selling cars, so many of them are hypocritical at best. To date, I have sold three cars on BaT and have never bought a single one of the eight vehicles I own on their platform. With few exceptions, I have been pleasantly surprised by every vehicle I own, but that's because I'm buying the seller, not the car - and that is a dynamic that's near impossible to create on BaT, where both the seller and the company leadership refuse to stand behind their products once the hammer is down and the wire transfer is complete.

How to use The Common Gear to track maintenance

By: Jeff, 05/19/2023

Brief

Hey everyone - we're excited to share with you the first in a series of instructional videos on how to use The Common Gear to store digitized records of the maintenance and improvements you're making to your collector and vintage-grade cars and trucks.

One of our primary test users, Lars, has a 1988 BMW 325is he's been logging updates of since he bought the car last summer. From road trips to oil changes, he captures vital details about his car's history that will be useful for his own tracking purposes, or if he decides to sell the car later on.

Check out the video below for quick overview of how he uses The Common Gear for his own maintenance tracking, and watch this space for more quick instructional videos on how to put The Common Gear to work for you.