Cool winds in the desert
On Sunday afternoon, Jan. 19, the books were closed on Arizona Auction Week with the final hammers falling at both Russo & Steele and Barrett-Jackson’s Scottsdale events. The record books were filled with a number of new entries, but many car people were left scratching their heads while trying to figure out the true state of the collector vehicle market. Old Cars had correspondents at each of the eight sales to record what was happening and try to make sense of things.
The first auction out the gate was the Motorsports Auction Group, better known as MAG. This auction house has hosted several successful sales during the Hot August Nights celebration and merged with the former Silver Auctions of Arizona operation during 2019. The Peoria Sports Complex on the west side of the Valley of the Sun had worked well for Silver Auctions. Many considered this sale as an entry-level event where lower-priced vehicles were available and seven-figure letters of credit were not needed. It was a friendly atmosphere and many familiar faces were seen throughout the three days of bidding action with the auction team headed by Jeff Stokes.
Sales were on the light side with just 111 of the 328 vehicles offered on the block trading hands for a 33.7.9% sell-through rate and a total of just over $1.7 million. The high sale was a 1968 Shelby GT500KR fastback, hammered sold at $155,000.
Kicking off on Monday the 13th and going for seven solid days was the 49th edition of Barrett-Jackson’s flagship sale. The huge venue at Westworld in northeast Scottsdale was packed from the first gavel to the last with the largest docket ever. In all, 1,909 vehicles crossed the block with all but one declared sold for what appears to be an all-time high of $137.1 million recorded. The total number of cars offered was up more than 90 over last year, and the final dollar figure for vehicle sales was more than $10,700,000 ahead of 2019. In addition to the vast offering of vehicles, more than 1000 lots of automobilia kicked off each day’s bidding session and added additional money to the totals above.
Taking the high bids for the 2020 Barrett-Jackson Scottsdale sale were two charity vehicles: the first regular-production, customer-delivered 2020 Chevrolet Corvette, serial number 00001, for a whopping $3 million followed by the first 2021 Lexus LC500 convertible, hammered at $2 million.
On Wednesday, Jan. 15, hosted its fifth, a one-off concept car that was called sold at $675,000.
