What to do with all our stuff?

Story by Bill Warner, Founder & Chairman Emeritus of The Amelia

If you’re like me, you have amassed tons of automotive “stuff.” Like yours, my stuff is great stuff. Everyone else’s is just stuff.

This point was driven home when I moved from the old concours building to my new shop here in Jacksonville. You really don’t realize how much stuff you have until you have to move it. After two moving vans and 17 carloads, I’m still unpacking stuff nearly a year later.

Today I worry about what’s going to happen to my stuff when I reach room temperature. My children (three) don’t want the stuff, and I certainly don’t want to throw anything out.

The stuff gives me pleasure, but I have to be realistic about my mortality. Jerry Lettieri deals in great stuff on the internet with an auction he started 30 years ago, and he’s a great source on how to handle stuff.

Jerry classifies us all as either collectors or accumulators. I think I’m both. In conversation, he also notes that young people today aren’t following with the same interests. That makes sense: There is a younger car culture out there and they want different stuff.

My pal Luigi Chinetti (of NART fame) agrees that this is a great conundrum and that we may be aging out of stuff younger people find interesting–same with cars of the ’50s and earlier.

So the question begs to be asked: What’s to do? I have lost several car friends in the past year, and their wives have donated their stuff to me to sell on the internet or auction for Spina Bifida of Jacksonville, a charity that helps children and adults born with the condition.

That’s all good, but the logistics of making a website, selling and shipping creates another set of problems I need to address. Jerry does a great job on his website, and that is the option I face. He also advises that one should have an appraiser or a knowledgeable auction house appraise the stuff for the estate. It would also help if the owner, while alive, sets an estimated value on the high-end collectibles.

Now I must catalogue and separate my great stuff from my not-so-great stuff–for example, factory concept models (good) and tons of car magazines (not so good). Add in over 60 years of negatives and transparencies I shot for Sports Car Graphic and Road & Track, and the problem compounds exponentially. Add to that several thousand books, models, posters and autographed paraphernalia–a misspent youth at best.

[Petromobila | Another way to play in the collector car hobby]

I have inventoried my cars with text suitable for an auction catalog along with my costs and perceived values. Additionally, I have made arrangements with RM Sotheby’s to handle the sale of my cars after my permanent departure. It’s the stuff I have to address.

I don’t want to sound morose, but we all have to plan on the inevitable. At the same time, though, we should enjoy what we’ve worked for and earned all our lives. In the end, it’s all about timing. I want the last red cent I’ve got to fall into the bucket I kick.