Great 88 found

[Guest 1990WVReatta]

Hi every one, I just wanted to report an odd encounter. I work for the USPS in a distribution center and my shift usually ends at 1am. Well tonight i got off work at my normal time 1am. And as im leaveing i glance over at the local walmart and to my surprise i see a reatta pulling in!!! which is Very RARE in w.v. mine was the only one ive seen. So i quickly whip my car around and pull up to the guy and say nice car and we start talking and i tell him about the BCA and reatta division and the forum and such..... long story short its a 1988 silver coupe with grey interior 16 way seats btw;) has 145000 miles on her. The vin is

<TABLE style="WIDTH: 91pt; BORDER-COLLAPSE: collapse" border=0 cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width=121><COLGROUP><COL style="WIDTH: 58pt; mso-width-source: userset; mso-width-alt: 2816" width=77><COL style="WIDTH: 33pt; mso-width-source: userset; mso-width-alt: 1609" width=44><TBODY><TR style="HEIGHT: 11.25pt" height=15><TD style="BORDER-BOTTOM: #f0f0f0; BORDER-LEFT: #f0f0f0; BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent; WIDTH: 58pt; HEIGHT: 11.25pt; BORDER-TOP: #f0f0f0; BORDER-RIGHT: #f0f0f0" class=xl65 height=15 width=77>1G4EC11C4JB</TD><TD style="BORDER-BOTTOM: #f0f0f0; BORDER-LEFT: #f0f0f0; BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent; WIDTH: 33pt; BORDER-TOP: #f0f0f0; BORDER-RIGHT: #f0f0f0" class=xl65 width=44>902566 </TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE> Ive included pic below And im ashamed to say mines the muddy one (stupid w.v. mud :mad:!!!)

[NCReatta]

TWO silver Reatta owners both up at 1:00 AM?? Is there something I'm missing? is there a 1AM Reatta Rendezvous at every town in the US?

Hahaha, glad you found someone else that was as sick as you are. My heart still skips a beat when I see another Reatta.

[Guest 1990WVReatta]

Haha, yeah Walmart seems to really have everything lol but yeah it was funny the first and only reatta in w.v. Other than mine ends up less than 10 miles from my house!

[Guest Richard D]

This thread makes me wonder, how many Reattae are still on the road, not counting parts cars. Any thoughts?

[Guest steveskyhawk]

I don't know how many are left but I have noticed that scrapped Reattas are showing up in the wrecking yards at an increased frequency. Good news is my parts inventory is growing larger and more complete. Bad news is that with every scrapped car that is one less customer for those same parts. I have stripped 4 cars in the last 4 weeks. It is unusual but I found 2 cars in one day. I often think why are they here in the wrecking yard with about 3 weeks to go before they are crushed? Most cars are rust free and have little if any body damage. The one common denominator is they all look very neglected. All very dirty inside and out and under the hood. The 90 I stripped yesterday had a toggle switch hanging out of the dash where the headlight switch should have been.

Observation: Insurance adjusters take into consideration the overall condition of the car when deciding to total a car or not. It would be impossible to argue the "collectability" attribute of the cars I've seen scrapped due to the obvious neglect. My advice is that if you drive your car daily keep it clean and in repair. Even if it is hit it will still be clean and in repair and you may be able to convince the adjuster to save it. FWIW

[Jim]

I bought an '89 Reatta parts car in Atlanta last September and on it are the same wheels you have on your car.

[Barney Eaton]

I sent an update back in November of the registered Reattas to April and Ron to publish in the Reatta newsletter. So far they have not had space to print what I sent.

R.L. Polk track all kinds of information and they attend the SEMA show in Las Vegas. Several years back I ask them if they could tell me how many Reatta were registered. The fellow in the booth types in some information and there on the screen was the info.

Since that time, I have been able to get the same info in more depth each year.

Last November there were 13,363 registered in the US, that is 61% of the original 21,751 made.

Please note that this does not count any Reattas that are stached away and unregistered.

For comparison, in 2008 there were 14,763 (67%) registered.

The highest percentage are the 1990 convertibles with 77% and the lowest 1988 coupes at 51.8%

The above tells us that Reattas are being scrapped, destroyed, or just not registered. Would you want to know if a car was scrapped?

One comment on the scrapped cars on the database. I started adding the scrapped or in salvage yard note to the cars on the database when people started sending me the information. I must rely on input from Reatta people that see these cars. The thought was that someday Reattas could become collectable enough that people might start taking cars from salvage yards and piecing them back together to make a "restored" Reatta. This has happened to many old cars over time but I thought if we had the info, why not make a note on the database. Some people feel this devalues the car if it were to appear for sale. Would you think twice about buying a car that was know to be in a salvage yard at one time, would you want to know? On the other hand if you were selling one you probably would not want that information known. So I guess it all depends on your view.......as a buyer or seller.

Edited March 14, 2011 by Barney Eaton (see edit history)

[padgett]

Dunno about any other state but in Florida if a car is junked, the title is marked "salvage" and must be either COD (certificate of destruction) in which case it is not simple to get retitled or "salvage rebuildabe" which is possible but in each case it is marked on the title and illegal to be sold without notification.

Unfortunately a COD title cost about $7 the last time I looked and any other is 10x that so most totalled cars get a COD when sold even if the damage is minor.