For sale: 1988 Reatta

[1988 Buick Reatta]

1988 Buick Reatta Coupe. Black, with tan leather interior. All amenities. Senior owned, one owner. 16K original miles.  All original except for battery and tires. Pristine condition. Garage kept. No rust. rides like a dream.  Moving, downsizing - must sell. Serious inquiries only. Make an offer. Will post pictures in near future.  If interested, please call Joe at 717-676-1295.

Edited May 7, 2019 by 1988 Buick Reatta
forgot to include mileage (see edit history)

[Barney Eaton]

Any chance the vin number is  in the 901060 to 901120 range?

1988 production did not start until January 1988 and that is one reason they only made 4708 that year.

242 of those were black with tan 16 way seats,   and 172 were black with the standard seats.

Wonder what the seller thinks it is worth.

[B Jake Moran]

Forum requirements are for a price and I don't see a location.  I would call, but if the price is over my budget, then there is an uncomfortable situation there.  As a new forum poster, perhaps Joe will not return.

 

Barney - your reference to 1988 production not starting until January - do you mean specifically Black and Tan as a combination because I believe my 1988 Red / Tan was made in October 1987. 

 

Black and Tan is a naturally good combination in a Reatta.  I hate to part my Black and Tan one out.  Owned a S60 Black and Tan, and sold. 

[Barney Eaton]

We do not know when the first serialized cars were made......as a new model, they obviously made prototypes and had to do road and crash testing with cars that were "like" production cars.

We also do not know exactly why production (or official production) did not start until January 1988.....it could be a combination of things, like the carriers for the bodies were not ready,  maybe there was a manpower

issue.....Reatta Craft Centre workers had to come from somewhere and we also don't know how they were chosen.   Many unanswered questions.

What we do know is the original plan was for a stripped down model,  cloth seats, no ABS, steel wheels with wire hubcaps and they actually built some cars that way.   The 1988 database tells us of the first 36 serialized cars built 20 had

cloth interior.   Five more were made between #37 and #98 ......so about that time Mertz who came on as Buick General Manager and the planning people changed directions and built the cars almost completely loaded.

At that time everything but the 16 way seat option became standard.   We are not sure how may of the early cars made it to the public, but we do know some, if not all of the cars with cloth interior ended up with leather.

Buick heavily advertised the car to the extent that all the 1988 Reattas were on allotment to dealers and because only 4,708 serialized cars were made there was a demand for the cars which carried over into the 1989 model year.

1990 was a different story......that was the highest production year and it appears that Buick over produced the damand as there were so may 1990 Reattas at dealers production of 1991 cars did not start until the last week of November 1990. 

[B Jake Moran]

Thanks for clarifying. 

[B Jake Moran]

VIN is  1G448C11C22JB901819

 

Not an S60 .   Very nice seller.  He will update with some more information soon.  Neither he or I know what the asking price should be but this is a time capsule car.  

Edited May 12, 2019 by B Jake Moran (see edit history)

[Y-JobFan]

That could have been one of the most collectible coupes out there had it been a SS with that mileage 

[Barney Eaton]

I think Reattas are becoming more collectable because of the number of cars remaining.

Last spring I was able to get the number of registered Reattas from RLPolk and that number is down to roughly 7,000 or 1/3 of the number originally built.

Don't have at my fingertips the numbers over the years but about 5 years ago, they started taking a dive (registered numbers going down)

We also see less activity on the forum,  in my opinion that is because the daily drivers are going away.   The newest Reattas are now 28 years old and not getting any younger.

You can purchase a 50K Reatta in todays market for $5 and up.........where else can you get a premium car with 50k miles for that price?

Keep the car you now have or look for a nicer lower mileage Reatta and get it now before some car magazine published an article telling how great a buy they.