This question has been burning in the back of my mind forever.  It seems like everyone on ebay is selling a car for $9k after "putting $15k into it".

I've only sold cars at a loss.  Unique Performance tanked because they tried to retail hot rods.  Is there anyone out there who can build a car and turn it out for profit?  Or break even?  

It can be done, but in today's economy it's tough. People aren't spending money like they were five years ago on cars (look at how prices have fallen at Barrett-Jackson for one), so it's not the best time in the world to be in the car building business.

Unique tanked not because they were trying to retail hot rods, but the very shady business practices they were using are what doomed Unique.

It's easier to turn a profit with buidling modern cars like Mustangs because you don't have the restoration aspects of a car build like you do with older cars. Temple Performance is a company doing this. The Ring Brothers are another builder who's doing ok right now too.  

Unique Performance "tanked" because they produced too many poor quality builds, took deposits on more orders than they could handle, and disappointed too many deep-pocketed customers.


Of course the way to make a small fortune hot rodding is to start out with a large fortune.

The people making money in hot rodding are:

1. Highly skilled professionals who build/restore cars to order for others and who satisfy their customers.  

2. Visonary innovators who have developed a national or regional reputation for outstanding design, attention to detail, and quality workmanship.

3. SOME People who sell parts and services that cannot be easily duplicated by the big mail-order houses or sold as bulk comodities over the internet.

4. Scam artists who fence stolen and/or worn-out/broken junk or sell cheap knockoffs from China.

5. Huge corporations and mail-order operations which target the broad speed parts market in volume.

6. People who inherit or "luck" into rare "barn finds" and stashes of vintage tin/parts/"Rods" for zero or little money invested.

7. People who sell information (e.g. Marti Report, Hemmings Motor News, Auto Trader, Galen Govier, free-lance magazine writers).

8. Sometimes, manufacturers who sell mass-market "rods" and parts with warranties.


If you're not in one of these eight categories, you're probably not making much money "hot rodding."

Building a "Hot Rod" to suit yourself then trying to sell it later is not building a car to order.  While you might accidentially hit the perfect combination of design, performance and equipment that makes someone else want to write a big, big check (even after you've probably beat on it and shown it for a while), the most likely result is an often haphazard collection of common, used speed parts with a questionable amount of life left in them, assembled in a manner having limited appeal, and that will be the "starting point" for someone else's "dream."  

And there's the trust factor.

How does a potential buyer know that a hot rod's body isn't packed with Bondo (unique performance style) or other short-cuts?  What guarantees that the engine isn't just a low-performance economy rebuild (or worse, a quickie hone-n-rering refresh) with a lot of bling bolted on the outside? Even if the parts are all good, how does a buyer know that the tolerances are correct and that appropriate care has been taken in assembly, tuning  and break-in?

Thus, everybody wants a bargain on somebody else's old, used "hot rod."  It's simply supply and demand at work. The discount is reflective of the amount of risk the buyer is assuming and the seller's need for a quick liquidation.

Of course, if you've built a high-quality car that's not too weird or too dated or too ordinary, but with mass appeal, and you market it nationally and well,  and you are willing to wait months or even years for a reasonable price, then maybe you won't lose money.   Most "quick-turn" home and semi-pro builders simply don't have this sort of patience.

http://speedzzter.blogspot.com  

Thanks for the thorough response.  My aim is to enjoy my car but build it with a lot of bolt-ons to keep things relatively unaltered.  Where I can, I will build things to look like a restoration but perform like a custom build, with the mindset that restorations fetch better sales.  

wow i had no idea unique performance went under, when did this happen?  

http://uniqueperformancescam.com/   here is some more info i found on the unique incident  

In some of the places I've worked, I've seen a lot of sub-assemblies purchased as a whole from other vendors in order to transfer the liability for expertise.  For instance, if Company X builds cars they let Company Y build the engine.  Company Y will hopefully have a brand and quality that gives the buyer some piece of mind.  Or Company Y can afford the lawsuit if they slip up.

I'm thinking that new bodies from Dynacorn, engines from Shafiroff or GM, and interior components from Classic Industries would be a good starting point for a professional builder.  Or a partnership with Goodmark.