I caught the end of an old Wheeler Dealers the other day where they repaired a Mini City and ruined decorated it with a total carbon fibre wrap.

 

Obviously this made me think of Minis past, so for a laugh I looked at a Mini owners club and had a quick glance at the For Sale section. Bloody hell! You can't seem to find a Mini in anything like decent condition for less that £5K!! Even part restored, non runners seem to be going for silly money.

 

Have the old Minis really reached the classic phase where you need to have really deep pockets to acquire one?

Friend recently wanted another mini and found the same as you, ended up with an Austin 1300 with the wonderful hydroelastic suspension system. Car has character though...

Mini Cooper's have been for the last 30 years or more, so it's not surprising that they've dragged regular Mini prices up behind them.

 

Bearing in mind that a brand new primed body shell can be bought for £6.5K, so that even a total pile of rust can be brought back to life (http://www.bmh-ltd.com/minishell.htm)

http://briskoda.net/forums/topic/270227-classic-mini-advice

Just don't show off about it

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3148359/Classic-car-enthusiast-spent-three-years-building-Mini-scratch-vandals-torched-just-hours-took-test-drive.html

Prices of good original mini's have been strong for a while now,my mini pick up has gone up in value roughly £500 a year over the last 3 years ive had it,i had a independent insurance valuation carried out recently & was very happy with the figure that they valued it at (hopefully i never have to claim though). 

My first real car was a 1275 Mini Cooper S .

Lots of engine mods and Immense fun to drive.

It cost me £650 in 1971......It would be about £20,000+  today.

I had a I969 Mini Cooper S 1303 resprayed in brown with a Gold roof and Gold Minilites

Loved it, but rust was killing it and the gearbox failing resulted in a premature sale

I had a mate with one of the very last old style Coopers.

 

It was BRG and fully loaded with cream leather etc.

 

Bet he wished he'd kept it.

A lot of 'classics' from 1950/60/70's seem to have increased in value recently. I had a valuation for my Spitfire done and it had increased £2k in 12 months. Dealers are asking silly money for some cars, but many are sold for far less than the asking price.

 

Andy