Car Catcher: Pagoda Top Mercedes-Benz With a Stick

My wife Margie has wanted one of these for decades. Should have jumped in when they were more reasonable. Still one of the safest, most reliable, smooth, comfortable classics you can buy. And they will never go down in value.

I do love Pagodas. And I, too, waited too long. (But that's the story of my life. Can't seem to pull the trigger). Strangely, I saw a '70 or '71 280 automatic sell for around $37K at the McCormick Auction in Palm Springs last November. It was a bizarre transaction. The entire bidding took place in less than three minutes. The auctioneer knew the bidder (not unusual), but I, and a lot of other stunned people near me, we're expecting the bidding to go to at least $75-80K. We were all surprised that the hammer dropped so quickly, and at that price. We all looked at each other and said "what the hell just happened?"  It was truly the best buy of the weekend.

I looked at a 230SL many years back.  It was sitting beside the road on my commute with a For Sale sign, and I finally decided to stop and look.  Asking $2500.  No, I didn't forget a "0", this was the mid '70's.  Outside it looked good and the interior was  mostly decent.  With the hard top on, the driver had a great view of the surroundings, almost like with the top down.  Unfortunately the driver also had a great view of the ground directly beneath his feet.  There had to be a serious leak somewhere, and who knows how much rust additional damage there was, so it was a PASS. 

They also had a 190SL, soft top only, same price, same great view of the ground.  Double PASS