GAA Classic Car Auctions

• One of the newest and hottest classic and collector car auctions on the market right now. How did GAA get started? Tell us about its history.
• You have an all-indoor venue known as “The Palace.”   With 6-acres under one roof, how many cars can GAA accommodate? How many guests? Are there things to do for friends & Family that might be “dragged along” to an auction?
• Is there a genre of vehicle GAA specializes in?  Muscle cars, exotics, classics, foreign/domestic? 
• Any famous “auctioneers” on the GAA team?
• What are things that the first-timer should know before attending an event? What are some do’s and don’t for a first time Auction goer? Expectations?
• Walk us through the selling process? What is needed to list and sell an item with GAA?
• One of the “drawbacks” we’ve heard that causes people to shy away from Auctions comes when the bidding gets out of control and then you have to pay a 5-10% auction house premium. With prices so high, why would someone go to an auction to get a car? What is the advantage of an auction over a private or brokered sale?
• In recent years especially, we’ve seen a lot of new auction companies pop up online, selling cars via the internet.  What are the benefits of this format? What are the drawbacks?
• What do you see as the hot trend right now in sales? Where do you think the market is going?  What do you see as the next big thing?

and much, much more!

Crew Chief Brad: [00:00:00] BreakFix podcast is all about capturing the living history of people from all over the autosphere, from wrench turners and racers to artists, authors, designers, and everything in between. Our goal is to inspire a new generation of petrolheads that wonder. How did they get that job or become that person?

The road to success is paved by all of us, because everyone has a story.

Crew Chief Eric: The following episode is brought to us in part by Garage Style Magazine. Since 2007, Garage Style Magazine has been the definitive source for car collectors, continually delivering information about automobilia, petroleana, and more.

To learn more about the annual publication and its new website, be sure to follow them on social media at Garage Style Magazine or log on to www. garagestylemagazine. com. Because after all, what doesn’t belong in your garage?

Classic car auctions are all [00:01:00] the rage these days. The collector car market has been booming for the past decade or so, and auctions have been growing accordingly, both in grandiosity and media coverage. You’ve probably seen auctions taking place on TV or online, with the biggest events being concours like affairs, fetching record prices which make headlines for weeks to follow.

Don Weberg: It’s a misconception that classic and collector car auctions are reserved for the ludicrously rich Buying cars for hundreds of thousands of dollars or more. Auctions offer enthusiasts the opportunity to network with like minded people and are a great way to learn about special interest vehicles you may not be familiar with, but find you have an interest in.

Crew Chief Eric: And the team at GAA Classic Car Auctions offers a spectacular experience for both the first time or the seasoned auction goer. Devoted to producing the best Classic and Collector Auction Experience, folks like Johnny Ransom, General Manager for GAA are hands on and willing to help you with whatever needs might arise.

And he’s [00:02:00] here tonight to explain to us how it all works. And co hosting with me tonight is Don Wieberg from Garage Style Magazine. So welcome to Break Fix, Johnny.

Johnny Ransom: Well, thank you. I appreciate the invitation.

Crew Chief Eric: Johnny, before we get started talking about GAA classic cars, tell us a little bit about your automotive past.

Have you always been in the car world? What got you into auctions?

Johnny Ransom: No, I was not always. And well, when I got out of school, everything in our area here in North Carolina was textiles. And also furniture. This is still the furniture capital of the world, High Point, North Carolina. And I’m many guys, they were so many furniture companies here that you can make really good money directly out of school benefits.

I mean, enough average guy could buy a whole, get married. Have a kid. Send it to college. Be able to have two vehicles. I mean, you weren’t gonna be a millionaire by no means, but you could live a good life. So I was working for Thomasville Furniture. Got out of college. The guy was a manager [00:03:00] over there, and I had this young lady that was retired under me.

Her name was Betty Jo Johnson, and her brother was the general manager of Greensboro Auto Auction. And she was retiring and she kissed me on the cheek one day on our way out after we gave her a retirement party. She said, I’m going to tell my brother about you. He said, you’re a really good manager. This is the best thing about you.

You know how to talk to people. People say stuff to you all the time. You never think nothing about it. I never thought one thing about it. Three months later, I got a phone call. It was him asking me to come into his office. He wanted to talk to me. So I had an interview with him. I did everything. I worked on a Chrysler account there, worked on a Ford account there, fleet operations manager there.

I was walking control over to auction. I actually, let me get it back. My dad was into farming and so forth earlier in his lifetime. And I was always messing around with him, but then he became a welder. We always had a little bit of land where we were at, and we always tinkered on tractors and cars and stuff.

I was always enthused with cars. It wasn’t like I didn’t know how to actually change the batteries, change spark plugs. In the day, you [00:04:00] know, you still ignored switches, your carburetors, your airflow. I mean, these are things that you’ve done in the sixties and seventies. You know, you really, that’s what kids stuff.

They hung out with their dads and they learned so much from them about being able to think with these cars. Well, these are the cars we sell now. They’re cooperator cars and they’re totally different than fuel injection cars. And there’s a whole lot of things that most people don’t know. It’s real simple to be able to figure out what makes that car go.

If there’s a problem, you don’t have to be a rocket scientist in order or plug up a computer to figure out and tell you what’s wrong. Most of you know what’s wrong. So this is stuff I got into, but worked about four years in the paint and body and got a lot of paint and body experience messing with cars.

That time we were doing 8, 000 cars a month, and that was going through paint and body. 8, 000 cars a month going through recon. I mean, we were really, really booming with that many cars. That’s how big this operation, everything was 24 hours a day there. So I got a lot of experience. And Mr. Green, fortunately, everything at his company.

He never really liked to go out and [00:05:00] bring a guy in when there was something opening up. He always liked to promote good in. Luckily, I was able to be able to go through a lot of different areas there and get a lot more experience. So when the GAA classic cars come about, I was the next guy in line, so to speak.

Crew Chief Eric: So let’s talk about one of the newest and hottest classic and collector car auctions on the market right now. Tell us about how GAA got started.

Johnny Ransom: 2010, we started talking. We had a regular dealer auction with the largest independent dealer auction, which is GAA Greensboro Auto Auction. We run 17 lanes every Wednesday.

And we started doing some survey. We had a lot of customers always wanting us to come over and start a classic car auction. And we found out real quick, we averaged between 2, 700 and 3, 500 people actually walking in the door on Wednesdays to buy late model cars. They had 70 percent of them had at least one.

Collector card. So, that really got our eyebrows really rose and we was like, well, we had a facility there that we did I line [00:06:00] cards in, and that’s called the Palace. We wasn’t using it at the time because 2007 8 is really when they started this cash for clunkers and the economy was really not doing that well.

All of our eggs was in one basket. That’s when we was trying to think outside the basket, so to speak. So, that’s when we came up with it. And so then we all jumped in a plane one day and rode down to Mecum and Kissimmee, and we were very impressed. This was like 2010 when we was down there looking around and said, Oh, we can do this.

This is no different than what we do week in and week out. So we started in 2012, we had our first auction, 350 cars, opened up Kissimets, and we had those Kissimets done within 60 days. We had 90 percent of the auction field within 60 days. It was like, this is ridiculous. You know, most people struggle to get cars.

From that day forward, every sale, it’s like everybody learned something and something to be able to make it better, you know, to be able to have our facility. [00:07:00] Almost six and a half acres on a one roof. All the cars is amazing climate control. And then, you know, the cool thing about it is you go to any other auction, you’re in there, you drop the car off and then you got 48 hours or so to get the car out.

Cause you got a rodeo or something coming in behind you. We don’t have a, we got a luxury. You call me up and say, Hey, I’m going to sign this car with you. Can I ship it today? Absolutely. It’s in a secure building. There’s nothing going to happen to it. We don’t have a bunch of people running around there messing with the cars.

I bet you we got 290 cars sitting in our building right now for the November 3rd sale. And our customers really like that. I mean, I have people from Texas to Detroit that actually buys cars on the East Coast and just ship them directly to us. And I mean, these are some major players also, and it’s worked out for them to be able to have another outlet to be able to have a different way of being able to buy cars to sell cars.

We have been able to generate from within our facility there a lot of good cars. [00:08:00] So it’s been a double whammy for us to be able to generate cars. We’re being very fortunate. We have a little bit of edge on most people at

Don Weberg: all. You were talking about auction companies that go around, you know, they go around the country, they set up events, some of them even go around the world.

And set up events and you guys keep it right there at home. You’ve got your six acres under one roof at the palace. How many guests can that accommodate?

Johnny Ransom: Oh, my, you can imagine six and a half acres under one roof. And there’s a lot of room. We have seating for almost 600 people in our arena. When you come to our auction, or if you ever looked at it online, you’ll see we’ve packed the 600.

Plus we have people standing up. There’s some people come in and they even bring their chairs with them and they just sit near their cars or whatever. It’s just like a car show. If you ever came to auction, you’re going to bring your car to auction. It ain’t that you’re going to put it on Friday 1 51 and go and sit up there.

You’re never going to sell your car, so you better go stand by side your car. Somebody’s going to want to know your [00:09:00] information. And that’s how you sell your car. By being next to your car to answer. It don’t matter. This guy that you think can’t rub two nickels together, probably one of the most wealthiest people you ever met in your life.

And it’s very important to be cordial with people.

Don Weberg: If I’m understanding correctly, Johnny, you actually encourage your sellers. To stand with their car and talk to potential buyers?

Johnny Ransom: Yeah, absolutely.

Don Weberg: Okay, is that different from other auction houses?

Johnny Ransom: Yeah, in some cases. But, you know, when I go to other auction houses, you can always see the serious sellers because most times they’re there.

You can tell the ones that’s really serious about selling their cars. You see the guys that stick around their cars to sell, that’s your better car. They’re the ones that take a lot more pride about selling the car, want you to know about the car than just going and putting the car on a number and hope it sells itself.

That’s just not how you sell the car. You know, you go and spend some time with your car. You got your car or with multiple cars, be by your cars, encourage, be able to talk to people. I’m telling you that one fuzzy feeling means a [00:10:00] lot to people when you’re purchasing a car. Everybody knows that you don’t feel good about when you walk into a new dealership or used car lot or whatever.

You don’t feel that. A real warm and fuzzy feeling about it. You’re going to go the other way. Or do you feel like somebody just don’t care? You know, a lot of times you’ll have 48 hours to sell your car, be in there a couple of days. So you need to take advantage of that time. Our crew all the time encouraged the guys when they were consigning cars.

Hey. Spend some time on your cars when you get here, just to make sure they look the best they can. Make sure you spend some time mirroring because people are going to come and ask questions. I think it helps tremendously. Our sales rate has been very high here for the last two years, and I know the pandemic had a lot to do with it, just like anything else with the car market right now.

Even our last sale we had in July, we still had really good numbers. We still sold a lot of 89 percent if I’m not mistaken, but still it shows the ones. By being with your car, being able to talk to people, the ones that’s going to take the time to come and [00:11:00] actually be there, it’s absolutely amazing.

Don Weberg: You can accommodate all those people.

Are there a lot of things to do for friends and family that might be, uh, you know, quote unquote, dragged along to the auction? You know, hey, dad’s going to the auction. Oh, God, here we go. Are there other diversions that they can join in? Or is it pretty much, no, we’re going to go look at cars with dad?

Johnny Ransom: Well, at this point, it’s.

We’re going to go look at cars with dad, but we just got done with the new expansion. Our goal is that the memorabilia aspect of the auction is so hot right now. I don’t know if you guys have been keeping up with that also, but memorabilia is just. route, in my opinion, it’s worse than any collector card has ever been on the market right now.

I mean, it’s insane. So we have built this facility. We got in the back and we’re installing it as we speak. A jumbotron, 50 foot wide, 18 foot tall. It’s mammoth, mammoth [00:12:00] jumbotron. And he’s taking those screens and going to put them in the back and that new building, hopefully in February, we’re going to start doing memorabilia.

Starting around 8. 30 every morning to about 11 o’clock, the same time as the regular auctions going on. So we’re going to try to double dip. We’re going to try to start selling several hundred pieces of memorabilia each sale.

Don Weberg: Are you saying you’re going to host a memorabilia sale at the same time, simultaneously with the cars?

Johnny Ransom: Absolutely.

Don Weberg: Wow. Okay. That’s kind of mind blowing.

Johnny Ransom: Absolutely. You know, the people that dabbles in the memorabilia is the same people that buys these cars and 90 percent of the people. This is the same scenario that we’ve done before. We done the auction part for the cars. We started doing a little bit of surveying and stuff for memorabilia and 70.

It was 71 percent of the people that actually come to auction. Have some kind of memorabilia in their house or they got a man cave or wherever they do with their cars, even in their regular garages, they all want this stuff around [00:13:00] their cars. So, I mean, it’s a win win for you. That’s our next big step.

We’re going toward the memorabilia. I would not be surprised within two years that we will have a memorabilia sale every month.

Don Weberg: That would be incredible.

Johnny Ransom: Yeah, that’s what we’re trying to do. The way he built this facility, we got a separate parking lot. We got a separate entrance to it. Be able to do that without even messing with the cards whatsoever.

So that will be the next big thing for us with the memorabilia.

Don Weberg: With all the cars you guys auction, and believe me, I’ve scoured your website. There are several cars coming up in November that I’m really champing at the bit for. I don’t see a specialty. You guys pretty much sell it all. Is there sort of a specialty that you like to say you gravitate to?

Johnny Ransom: I can honestly tell you if I’m sitting there and I’m looking at a Volkswagen, I got a Chevelle, and I got a 4×4 pickup truck, and it’s got decent miles on it, and it’s got a 2 inch lift on it, and it’s an automatic air conditioned power steering truck. That truck and that Chevelle is going over here in this stack to the [00:14:00] right, that Volkswagen is going to the left.

I’m going to take the truck and I’m going to take the Chevelle. Cause we really, really knock it out of the park with muscle cars and trucks. That’s what’s special. Everybody knows we get really good money. We’re in our muscle cars and we get really good money with our trucks. We do good with our foreign cars, you know, with our Ferraris and Porsches or stuff like that.

And the reason why a lot of people don’t realize that we don’t have a ton of them. We’ll have a little bit here on. Friday and a little bit here on Saturday. And we always sell them. We’ve been very fortunate. We always get good enough money to get it. So

Don Weberg: on your website, you’ve got a few Ferraris, you know, you don’t just take a Ferrari to somebody to sell.

If they don’t know what they’re doing.

Johnny Ransom: Well, I have a guy in Greensboro that’s a Ferrari dealer and he’s got to collect. And he’s a good friend of mine. He’s got several hundred cars in his collection and he always gets me for. Every sale, give me Ferraris, Porsches, he always sends me four or five cars, every sale.

And plus he takes some of the trade ins and sends them over there to me. They might have just a little bit more miles than he wants to put on his lot. We always [00:15:00] have them. That’s the beauty of what we do. We’ll have the 30s cars, the pre war cars, we’ll have a few of those. We have some European cars, I mean, we got the Ferraris, we have some Mercedes, we saw a G Wagon last sale, brand new 2021 G Wagon, it didn’t have a 2, 000 miles on it, I mean, we do a little bit of everything.

When

Don Weberg: it

Johnny Ransom: comes

Don Weberg: to selling, especially at an auction, the auctioneer’s personality, the auctioneer’s barking ability, if you will, has a lot to do with the audience reaction. Do you have any famous auctioneers that you guys work with?

Johnny Ransom: We don’t really have what you call famous auctioneers. We got a lot of people that’s played and dabbled with some of the big boys, so to speak, like the people that actually work for Barrett Jackson and so forth like that in the past, but you know, we’ve got 17 lanes on Wednesday and we got 17 lanes with auctioneers and ring guys.

We have a pick of the litter, so to speak, but still. It’s a lot different from going to your regular auction on Wednesday that you’ve got to buy that car because that’s how you make your living. You got to have inventory on [00:16:00] your lot to someone that comes over here to a classic car auction that don’t have to buy a thing.

I have people that come in from California. Their best friend lived in Pittsburgh and he’s got another friend that lived in Orlando and they just come to the auction when we have auctions so they can hang out. All three of them. But they all dabble in cars. They always get a couple of cars so they can flip them or whatever, but they come and hang out.

They have a great time. They love cars and they come spend a whole weekend in Greensboro, North Carolina. And the car guys are going to be around cars and the car guys love cars. They’re going to be there no matter

Crew Chief Eric: what. Amen to that, Johnny. And I gotta tell you something. I gotta confess something. I’ve never been to an auction before.

This episode is actually really important to me because I want to learn more about the experience as a first time auction goer. Why don’t you help educate me and our listeners as well as to what some of the expectations might be for attending an event like a GAA auction. What are some do’s and don’ts for first time auction goers?

Are there any fees? Do we have to pay to come? Just check it out and see what’s going on.

Johnny Ransom: [00:17:00] Most auctions, they have a gate fee to be able to get $20 a day, $30 a day, or in the sense of Baird, Jackson, Scottsdale, you’re paying a hundred dollars a day to get in. Ours is a little different. We don’t have a $20 day ticket or whatever.

Anybody could come to the auction, but we just want you to be a registered bidder. Now, we started that process right when the pandemic hit. We didn’t know how we was gonna do this thing. But we knew we couldn’t sell a 20 ticket. You got to remember, you go back and look, there was not that many options going on across the United States.

There was only a handful. It ain’t no telling where they might be. We were one of the few that owned our facility. That was the best thing we’ve ever done. We own our facility. We can monitor the people. We could take X amount of people. We didn’t let the public in. You could come in as long as you was a bidder.

And we was like, man, we might be home with something here. And even the dealers and the buyers and the sellers that come in love that. Then having just 10 or 12, 000 people in the room, just [00:18:00] slammed up, slamming your door, sitting on your cars, taking their drinks and. Putting them on your car while they’re checking their phone or whatever.

I mean, just all the crazy little things we’ve been very fortunate to be able to do that. And I think that was been one of the reasons our success was really, really so great. 95 percent sales for 2020 and 93 percent sales. I’m talking about every sale for 2021.

Don Weberg: That’s insane.

Johnny Ransom: It was just not, I mean, crazy, but it was people that had regular car dealerships that couldn’t get inventory.

They were buying classic cars. They had mouths to feed. They had people that was waiting on them. They was needing cars out there. They needed to sell something. Hey, they were coming to buy classic cars, putting them on their lot.

Crew Chief Eric: So are you implying that because of the chip shortage during COVID that dealerships turned to, let’s say, these carbureted cars?

Johnny Ransom: They did. I mean, Mr. Green’s got a Ford store down there for 50 years. He’s got a Lincoln store down there for 25 years. And every one of them had classic cars on them and we sold them all and they [00:19:00] kept them. And now even today, I got guys and they can maintain every sale there by three to four vehicles.

They got Chevrolet dealerships, Ford dealerships, buy some really nice Ford trucks or whatever, and put them in the showroom. And they had no problem selling them. It’s just like another day.

Crew Chief Eric: You talked about the gate fee. It could be 20 bucks, depending where you go. It could be a hundred bucks on the other end of the scale.

So I got this fantasy from watching TV and what an auction is like, right? You got this guy with a ping pong paddle on his hand with a number on it. Angry faces, everybody’s lifting it up, you know, trying to get in there and get their bids in. So is that really how it works? Oh, absolutely not. Absolutely not.

Johnny Ransom: You better be ready when your car, if you’re going to bid on one, you just better be ready. You need to pay attention and pay attention to your surroundings. Also, it will take you from zero to a hundred real quick if you’re not careful. I personally tell everybody, listen, if you’re interested in a car, if you don’t hear that car says the reserves off for a first [00:20:00] timer, don’t bid on it.

Don’t bid on it until you hear the reserves off. When the reserves off, jump right on in because that’s going to take it down to just a few people instead of 10 or 15 people playing in on it. And you don’t need to drive that price up any higher. They’re going to do it on their own. You hear the reserves off.

Jump right on in. If you don’t hit a reserve off and it says no sale, we got what we call the deal doctor and you can go over there and negotiate a deal. That’s how we have cars for sale after they roll off the block.

Crew Chief Eric: Becoming a registered bidder, is that the same as pre registration? I see it on some sites, register to buy, you know, things like that.

Does that get you on the list? Does that inform you that I’m interested in that particular vehicle? How does that whole system work?

Johnny Ransom: Well, you can be a pre registered. It’s 150 bucks up to the week of the sale. The week of the sale, it jumps to 200. So they encourage you to pre register early. So you can save a few bucks.

And also if you’re going to come, you want to come early and you want to come early enough that you can do your inspection yourself with the car. You know, you want to look [00:21:00] underneath the car. You want to check the car out. You want to see if there’s any documentation. They say they still had the window sticker.

You like to go and see the window sticker. Everything that you read on that car that says about the car and what the car comes with, you want to actually physically see it. If it says a window sticker, bill sheets, protecto play, you want to go look at it. You want to see it. You don’t want to just take their word for it.

Not to say that that ever happens, but I’m just saying you want to see if you want to be able to be educated yourself about what you fix in a purchase. Now let’s just say you’re going to be a online bidder. So you could go ahead and be an online bidder. You can get pre registered for that also. We do proxy bid.

But also, I suggest in all my girls, anybody calls and says they are interested in being an online bidder or a phone bidder, we have on site people that will do inspections for you. They’re independent, they don’t work for the auction, and they’ll work for you. They’re licensed and bonded. Everything they tell you will be the gospel about that car.

Most of the time, they will actually give you ranges about what those [00:22:00] parts go for before you see it. They will do all your legwork for you. So you know that you’re not overpaying for it. For about 300 bucks, you got someone that’s going to number one, check your car out. Number two, make sure that your car that you’re buying is a quality piece.

And number three, they’re going to encourage you where to be

Crew Chief Eric: at on the

Johnny Ransom: money.

Crew Chief Eric: So if I heard you right, what you’re telling me is. The guy with the ping pong paddles sitting in his chair. You got this dude with the phone up to his ear and a faceless voice on the other side of that and people online all bidding simultaneously on the same vehicle.

Johnny Ransom: Yes, sir. Yes, sir.

Crew Chief Eric: A heck of a thing to experience. So let’s go back to the sale. You’re there the first time buyer. You go, man, I really wanted that Ferrari 308. That one Ferrari that was in the list and you bought it. Now is the expectation that I show up with a duffel bag full of cash? I mean, how do I buy this car?

Is it like buying from a dealership?

Don Weberg: Johnny, he’s watched a lot of Miami Vice. I could tell.

Crew Chief Eric: I could tell.

Don Weberg: Ferraris and bags of cash.

Johnny Ransom: It’s the 80s, [00:23:00] baby. Hey, you’ll be surprised at the amount of people that actually comes to the auction with cash. We have a little dark room with security people. Trust me, when you go in there, it happens.

Every sale, you just wouldn’t believe it. I had an old guy come in one time from Texas, and he bought, I bet you, seven or eight cars. He said, I need to pay for this thing. I said, well, you go up there and write a check. He said, I don’t write checks. I said, you don’t write checks? He said, no. He says, I pay cash.

I thought he was kidding. You know how people talk. You do this, they say stuff all the time. I pay cash. Okay. But he had a motorhome, went across the street. We got 17 motorhome hookups, full hookups across the street. And they’re free, by the way. He come back to the auction. He had two walmart plastic bags full of cash and he went in there and dumped them on my desk.

I said, oh my God, I said, get this out of here now. I was scared to death and he was laughing the whole time. He said, I told you, I think I said, yes, you did. Yes, you did. You did tell me you pay [00:24:00] cash, but no, the real way is you can bring a check or you go to the bank and get what they call guaranteed funds with a bank letter and you can wire the money.

We’ll give you a bill of sale. And you can contact your bank and we’ll give you wired instructions and wire money over on Mondays.

Crew Chief Eric: Now, do you guys do financing as well? Because I know there is classic car financing as well.

Johnny Ransom: Yes, we have JJ Best on site. They’re there the whole weekend, but they will do some financing for you also.

Don Weberg: When you purchase something, how did GAA ensure the title transfers paperwork? All the formalities are tended to.

Johnny Ransom: You got to remember too now, and I keep referring back to our regular auction across the street. So you got to remember we’re selling 2000, 3000 cards a week. So all those cards have titles that we deal with.

So all those people that work at Greensboro auto auction, when we have our regular sale, we call it pump and dump. We pumped people over, dump them in our auction. And every one of our people in that works for us, they work for the North Carolina DMV at one time. That’s how they [00:25:00] were hired. They used to work for the North Carolina DMV.

So they’re very highly experienced. When you sell your car, I’m going to ask you to send me some pictures of your car. I’m going to ask you to send us a copy. of your title front and back, a good clean copy. I’m going to also ask for you to give me a picture of the VIN on the car. We immediately, as soon as it hits, I got a person to start all day every day.

They take a title, they check that number, and they take a copy of the VIN, picture of the VIN, and they make sure the two matches. If there’s an issue before you ship the car, we’ve already contacted you and told you. Hey, there was an issue as a digit off on your title, blah, blah, blah. We ran a Carfax, we ran an auto check.

We ran a Navitas report. It says in 1970, this car was stolen. It’s in, it’s got a stolen history. 1972, this car was says it was issued a claim for total loss, damaged and got a damaged title here. It says it was a total loss [00:26:00] and now it’s got nothing on this title. So this car supposedly supposed to have a salvage history.

You know, all that stuff we check, we do all that stuff behind the scenes where nobody knows before we sell that car, there’s a lot of legwork. It goes into it. It ain’t just, Hey, I’m gonna take my car to the auction. I’m going to sell the car. We got to guarantee all this stuff.

Don Weberg: That was kind of where the question came from telling Eric the other day or the other week or something about a story.

It was an auction house and it was one of our subscribers. He bought a car at auction, enjoyed the car for a year, year and a half. Took it to an auction to sell it. He was tired of it. He wanted to get something else. The auction company tells him, you know, your paperwork’s all messed up on this car. We can’t sell this car the way it is.

Who sold you this car in the first place? And he says, well, you guys did. One of those situations of here we are dealing with professional big auction companies. You think everything’s going to be fine. Everything’s going to be golden. Then you hear stories like this. And believe me, there’s multitudes of them.

I’m sure you know about it working in the industry. Oh yeah.

Johnny Ransom: Oh yeah.

Don Weberg: So to hear you guys saying you’re in the background, you’re doing, you know, all this [00:27:00] due diligence, but are there any sort of guarantees that people can have? Like they know for sure?

Johnny Ransom: On our bill of sales, when you sign it, it says, we guarantee you a good time for any reason that you take that car and you get it and you take it to your DMV and you cannot get a title.

All you have to you already signed a contract and granted, we guarantee you a good title.

Don Weberg: Okay, so GAA is behind every sale all the

Johnny Ransom: way? All the way, all the way. We got to be able to give you a good, and we get, and it’s in writing on our bills and sales. We guarantee you a good title.

Crew Chief Eric: Going back to my duffel bag of cash scenario here, When someone inevitably buy something at the auction, or they’re the winner of the bidding, there’s got to be fees and other things that get compiled on top of that.

So I want to explore that a little bit for the listeners, so they understand the total cost of purchase when you buy something at auction in addition to. Auction house fees. I’m assuming people have to pay their state, federal sales taxes, all those kinds of [00:28:00] things. Not

Johnny Ransom: North Carolina. In some states you do.

I mean, like, I used to go to Auburn, Indiana. And if you weren’t a dealer, and you just average Joe, like you and I went up there and purchased your car, they would make you pay those state taxes right then. I know when the Mecham has that auction up there at Indy every year, a lot of those people don’t realize that either.

They got to pay taxes on that car right then. If you average Joe, if you’re a dealer, you don’t have to. But in North Carolina, we’ll hand you a title. We don’t have to do that. At all.

Crew Chief Eric: As the buyer, I’m responsible for doing all the paperwork with my local DMV, especially if I’m out of state. And then I would assume state inspections are the same thing, right?

Johnny Ransom: That’s correct. Now, every state don’t do state inspections. North Carolina does. When you buy one, if you’ve got to have a state title, when you go there, they will give you paperwork and they’ll actually give you your title DMV.

Crew Chief Eric: And the titles that are issued to the buyer, are the owner’s original titles or are the cars all retitled in [00:29:00] North Carolina?

Johnny Ransom: No, no. They’re the owner’s original title and they signed them over to you or I, if we purchase ’em, they are actually signed into your name. Right. Then

Crew Chief Eric: going back to those percentages, there’s different ways that auctions are handled.

I’m of the eBay generation, so I get it. There’s a fee for listing and there’s a fee for selling and all that kind of thing. There’s also the real estate model where the buyer and this. seller. Both percentages taken from the sale itself by the house. How do your percentages work when you’re buying a vehicle?

Johnny Ransom: Well, we do 8%. If you’re purchasing a vehicle, if it’s no salt across the block, that’s when you go to the deal doctor, your percentage will be much less. Because the negotiated percent then on how much you’re going to pay when you go up there and make the negotiation on the car, it could be 5%. It could be 6%, but it will be less than 8 percent

Crew Chief Eric: expect to pay somewhere between five and eight on top of whatever the final value of the car is as the fee for buying.

Johnny Ransom: Yeah, that’s correct.

Don Weberg: So we talked about the buying experience. What about the flip [00:30:00] side, Johnny? What about selling the car? You’ve told us that it’s a good idea to stand with the car and talk to people who are coming by and want to know more about it. Walk us through a selling process. What is needed to list and sell an item with GAA?

I want to sell my Mustang. What do I do?

Johnny Ransom: All right. So you immediately go online to daaclassiccars. com. There’s two ways that you could sign your car, click right there and it’s called a digital way. Step one, what’s your name? Step two, your address. Step three, what make, model, the car, and then it go on and on.

You can upload your pictures there and do everything digitally right there. You don’t have to print no paperwork off. You don’t have to do anything whatsoever. And the second way is there’s a printable form. There’s still people old school that likes a printable form. You take that form off, look at it, fill it out.

You can email it back in to info at GAAclassiccars. com along with the pictures, picture of the VIN, copy of the title, front and back. Very important. As soon as it lands on our desk, within 24 hours, you will get a [00:31:00] telephone call from us. Hey, we have received your information. We will let you know within a few days what we can do and get your numbers.

So then we will return your calls. Hey, you asked for Saturday number prime time. Well, We do everything at GAA from the lowest, cheapest car to the most expensive car as the day goes on. So if you wanted that spot, your car ain’t for 25, 000 and you wanted to be in a prime time spot on Saturday, that’s not going to happen.

We’re not going to sell a 25, 000 car in between the prime time of our show. We’re going to actually place you accordingly to what we have available at the time to send it in. And most of the time we come to a happy medium with all of our customers. And once we explain that to them, they understand thoroughly about how we place the cars.

Don Weberg: Now placing the cars, that probably has a direct correlation on the sell through rates, doesn’t it?

Johnny Ransom: Oh, absolutely. Let’s just say you send in that Volkswagen, really nice Volkswagen, but it’s a 1970 Volkswagen and you want 55, 000 for it. Well, you want to have a conversation [00:32:00] with me. Hey, uh, listen, can you explain to me about your car?

Tell me a little bit about your car. And then after you tell me about your car, and I’m going to say, how did you come up with that 55, 000? So I’m never sold one here for that amount of money. Can you explain to me? Well, it was my mama’s. I love my mama and she was worth a lot of money. Don’t you know my mama?

No, I don’t know your mom. Just crazy stuff like that. So then, I have to generally, without insulting them, be able to say, hey, in the last year, this is how much these cards have been going for. If you’re not willing to keep it within this range right here, I don’t want to waste your time or mine. I get to make money three times a year, and it’s based on what cards I take.

And that’s called grinding them at the beginning, instead of waiting to the end. You grind them before they get there. I say 55, 60 percent of the people get a phone call and we talk about pricing, but most auction houses don’t do that. I want to talk to them. I want to plant that seed in their mind about how much our car is really going to break.

If you [00:33:00] plan that before they get there, they know that. And so if it don’t meet their expectations, they’ve already been told. So then now you’ve got that chance to be able to, uh, grinder, be able to get them to lift that reserve even easier.

Don Weberg: Going into the pricing structure of Mama’s VW 55, 000. When somebody wants to set a reserve on a car, is that kind of what we’re talking about right there?

Do most people want to put a reserve on it?

Johnny Ransom: Yes, a lot of people want to put the reserve on it, but for the past five years, we have anything 15, 000 can blow. We’ve run no reserve, but we don’t take you far.

Don Weberg: Oh, okay. You’ve got a little bit of a standard on that. Yeah.

Johnny Ransom: Well, and what happened was when we got into the business, we had all these people sending all these cars in because we didn’t know no better and we were taking them.

We had all these people sitting there and he does get in there for 55, 000. We get it up there and he wouldn’t sell the car and the car didn’t bring but 14, 000 and he wouldn’t sell the car. It was crazy. Well, number one, we shouldn’t have touched that car. We should have tried to get a car that we could have sold.

There’s [00:34:00] no way you could have sold that car. He got one in 55, 000 knowing it wasn’t going to break with 15. And then, you know, it got to the point that four weeks out, that’s when people really got to thinking, man, I got this 1970 Mach 1 right here, and I want to sell it. Can I get in the sale? No, I don’t want no spots, man.

I just didn’t have no spots. And so now we’ve learned that. We had to slow it down. So in order to slow it down, we had to say 15, 000 a blow. From Monday to Monday, we put all the cars in a basket and we sit down and we get our computers and we look at every car and we go back and we try to put a price on every car before we even start.

Going in and say, we want the car, if this car is good enough for us, so to speak. And we have a price that we look at and like I said, 50 to 55 percent of them gets a phone call and we’re talking about price structuring before they get there. But I mean if it’s way out of kilter, we don’t even consider it.

But as long as we get them reeled in to where they need to be, I really think that’s part of our success of our [00:35:00] auction. Being able to communicate with the people, being able to talk to people, being able to plant that seed with the person. before the sale actually starts.

Crew Chief Eric: So that brought up a really interesting question in that does everything have to run and drive that goes to the auction?

Johnny Ransom: Yes, we do. Now there’s some auctions, you know, no big deal. We don’t want that. We want what we call frontline ready stuff. We don’t want that. It’s just too much stuff can happen when you get a car that don’t run, drive, no brakes and all this other stuff. It’s just not worth the time for us.

Don Weberg: Johnny, what if you got a whole collection of cars, would you handle a collection of cars?

Johnny Ransom: We do it all the time. I got one coming up next year, a really good customer. His name was Jerry Smith. He passed away three or four months ago, unfortunately. And we just got the contract signed. He’s got 250 cars. And a thousand pieces of memorabilia. So we’re going to have a special sale for him, March 30th, 31st and April 1st.

We’re going to have a February sale. And then four weeks later, we’re going to have this sale.

Don Weberg: Going back to the cars have to run and drive scenario in a collection like [00:36:00] that one, 200, 250 cars. If there’s a couple that are a little, uh, handicapped, so to say. Is that okay? Or do you just want to put those off to the side and not deal with them?

Johnny Ransom: Luckily it’s far enough in advance of the car. She’s got issues. We got time now to take care of those issues. We actually got people down there, but they got car handlers and they’re going through those cars right now to make sure all the cars run, drive, press fuel. There’s no issues. They’re taking care of that right now.

Don Weberg: So GAA actually services, they’ll send somebody to the collection. To make sure all the cars are up in Noah,

Johnny Ransom: most of the time, there’s a person that handles the cars to stat large of collection. They got a full time mechanic there. They got people that’s constantly messing with those cars. So we’re being in correspondence with them.

I have, and they’re down there right now, as we’re speaking, going through these cars and making sure they’re running, they’re driving, they’re everything, getting stuff in order as we speak.

Don Weberg: Now, for a collection like that, does it make sense to do an on site auction at the collection’s house, or is it better just to bring them back to [00:37:00] Greensboro?

Johnny Ransom: We’re going to actually bring everything back to Greensboro, and the reason why is the actual little town he lives in, they don’t have enough of motel rooms, they don’t have enough of parking or anything to be able to do it on site. We could do it on site if we needed to, but we’ve never had to, so we got 25 tractor and trailers for 25 rollbacks there.

For our regular auction. So we can go get the car.

Don Weberg: But I’m assuming there’s a good percentage of cars that just don’t sell. They can’t find new owners. I think you call that the still for sale category. What do y’all do with those?

Johnny Ransom: At the end of each sale, there’s anybody that is a registered bidder at the time.

And some people that ain’t registered bidder. So people just in our base of speed. We sent out a text at the end of the night that what the bid goes, what we’ll call bid goes all. So they know the cars are still for sale. When the sale was over, we had all from that Sunday, two weeks later, I think I sold 14 cars after the sale.

I was, I was the deal. Dr. Dan. So after everything closed, I turned into the deal.

Don Weberg: You’ve touched on this a little bit, the Volkswagen, et [00:38:00] cetera. Does GAA take basic consignments? In other words, the consignment process still for sale. In other words, let’s say I want to sell my cars. I don’t want to go to the auction, Johnny.

I don’t want to go through that. Can I just consign it with GAA and you can put it in the still for sale corral?

Johnny Ransom: No, we’ll run it and I’ll have you on the telephone. I’ll do it all the time.

Don Weberg: Okay.

Johnny Ransom: I’ve got people that sends me cars every sale. I’ve never walked in that building.

Don Weberg: Got it. Okay. So everything’s going to go through the auction.

Johnny Ransom: Yeah. We’ll go through the auction and I’ll have you on the telephone. And a lot of times they could be watching it on their iPad or laptop or regular desk monitor. And they can watch while I have them on the telephone. So they can witness everything that’s going on also.

Crew Chief Eric: So Don brings up a really good point.

If everything goes through auction, like we talked about before, there’s seller and buyer fees involved in that process. Depending on what you have, if you have something basic, it’s going to go for what it goes for. But if you got something quasi interesting, some of the bidding can get out of control. We see it all the time, even on the online auctions, like bring a trailer and places like that where you’re like, it went [00:39:00] for that much.

What are you crazy? So with prices being so high, why would somebody auction the car rather than do a private sale or go through a broker? Is there an advantage to going through the auction?

Johnny Ransom: I agree and that’s why I think that bring a trailer has done what they have done, their claw and tell their base, they have already proven their sale that you know, hey, we could sell these cars just like any other auction house in the United States and even better.

On some aspects, especially low mileage cars, they have gilded all of those mileage cars too. And so a lot of people like that, but there’s still that commodity band that people go and that excitement going to the auction and no offense. I mean, I love my auction. I think it’s fantastic and we still sell cars, but there’s a couple of options that going to Scottsdale every year in January is phenomenal for me.

I mean, There’s so many people and so many options going on every day. I started one side of Scottsdale and end up on the [00:40:00] other side. I try to get all the options every day. It’s like a marathon for me. Same thing when I go to Monterey. Oh my God. Sonny, it’s like, it’s breathtaking what goes on out there.

Amelia Island. Same way. I mean, these are events that goes on if you’re car lovers. I mean, it’s just like, you can’t get enough of it and how nice everything really is and be able to see some of the rare, so the rare cars, cars that you’ll never be able to see you lay your eyes on, but you got to bear it.

You got 21, 000 registered bidders every day in one room. One room. Now, I mean, you get a lot of people to go and bring a trailer, but you don’t have 21, 000 bidders of one room. I’m not taking away from Kissimmee either. I like going to Kissimmee also. I think what Dana Mecham done is absolutely extraordinary.

He is one of the pioneers of our business also, and they get some of the best numbers, matching, bill sheets. They get some of the best cars around. And I mean, they know how to do it. They do a [00:41:00] fantastic job on what they do.

Crew Chief Eric: I’ve often heard people say that part of the auction experience, as you described, it is, you know, that energy in the room and all those people and all that.

But I’ve also heard it’s a hassle free experience. So how have you guys streamlined the whole buyer seller interaction process?

Johnny Ransom: Most of the people that come to the auction, to be honest with you, are people that’s been in the auction world or been before. You only get that handful of people that’s never been.

And the ones that’s never been and he’s kind of lost, you darn sure make sure you put your arm around them and you take care of them and you don’t leave them hanging out there because you do not want them to have a bad experience just because you have an I don’t care attitude. You don’t want to do that.

You want them to have the best. And I’ll tell you what, we have made so many new family So to speak with these people that you go in, I got a lady, I got seven cars coming. Her husband died. Her husband came to Austin all the time. He’s got seven cars. She’s never walked in our building. You know what? I went out there.

I took all of her pictures. I did [00:42:00] all of her paperwork. I walked her through it. I’m picking up her cars for her. She’s coming to the auction. We have a style box up there. I’m gonna put her up there. We’re gonna take care of her. Everything’s gonna be fine. It’s just what you gotta do. It’s really a good thing too.

I mean, I really appreciate it too at the end of the day.

Don Weberg: There’s a lot of new formats coming around. You know, bring a trailer. Hemmings has gone online. I think people have finally realized, hey, Thanks to technology, this can be kind of easy. What are some of the benefits of selling online? Are there any, or does it all revolve around, Hey, let’s go be there.

What, what are your thoughts on that?

Johnny Ransom: Well, I talked to a guy today down in Florida. His name’s Jonathan from bullet motor sports, and we were talking about selling some cars and he’d been selling some cars and bring a trailer. Now he’s still coming to my auction. He comes and buys a truckload of cars, every sale.

And then he does his retail stuff. What he does now, he really, really market his cars. He really, really does a lot of stuff on all your social media stuff, videos of the cars. I mean, [00:43:00] he just takes it to a new level. But he still sells a lot of cars on bringing trailer right now, and so he is being really good for him.

So it’s another outlet. We have our dates and, and everybody that’s in the auction business know what our dates are. Let’s just say Mecu. Everybody knows what Mecu dates are and everybody knows what Barrett dates are. And r e m and Broad Arrow, these are the guys who, who try to not to step on their toes and be going up against these guys at the same time because it’s not healthy.

Cause you want to be able to draw all the buyers. You can,

Don Weberg: do you think those formats are the future or it’s just another outlet? But do you think there’s going to be more growth in that area? The, the online selling, buying experience?

Johnny Ransom: I think it’s another outlet for selling for dealers. Some collectors also using that outlet.

So different than like RK motors in Charlotte, where you can take your car and design it with them and they will sell you a car for you. Streetside classics. One of them, it’s not an auction house, but there’s another way to sell your car. But if you were individual, most dealers [00:44:00] don’t take their cars in or do stuff like that.

But for a dealer is another outlet to be able to flip cars, to be able to sell more cars, to be able to buy more cars. They only have X amount of money anyway to keep generating and keep selling where if this month’s running a little slow, you know, you’ve been selling 20 cars and you only got 12 down and you want to.

What am I going to do with these cars? How can I sell them? All right. So

Don Weberg: all that said, what’s the future at GAA? You’re building a new building and back for memorabilia. You’ve got three auctions a year that I know of you’re doing a specialty auction next year, so that takes it up to four.

Johnny Ransom: There’s always room for improvement.

We’ve always thrived to be on hands and a lot of personal one on one contact with people. Anyone having any kind of problem, we try to jump right in immediately, take care of any kind of problems they have, which I can’t say we have a whole lot of problems. At this point, you know, we’ve put on a lot of options since 2012.

And so we’re getting a lot better than what we normally have. And I mean, [00:45:00] the secrets to it all, and I tell anyone, and I didn’t know in 2012 compared to now, it’s all about the car. If you got the cars, they come. You can have 10, 000 cars, but if they’re not what someone wants, it’s enticed him enough to get on that plane from California to fly out here, buy that car, then you’re not doing your job.

Then again, it comes into marketing and so forth from that point to be able to get that out there to everybody. So, you know, we’ve been doing some stuff here with Mab television. I haven’t some stuff recording and been playing later. We are tentatively looking forward to going hopefully live in 2023.

That’s our next big step, taking it to the big stage, so to speak. Just like everybody else we’ve come in contact with, every other option I’ve come in contact with them. And I got some friends I’ve made with the Mecham group, with the Bear Jackal group, and been able to ask questions where most people couldn’t, you know, they never started out with the big NBC sports or [00:46:00] velocity or whatever, you know, or Motor Trend, excuse me.

They already started small, so hopefully that’s what we’re going to do, just like we’ve done it fast. One step at a time, but it’s coming. It’s coming really big. I think the memorabilia is going to be there right across the street right now. There’s another building they’ve done and graded. It’s going to be beside the new memorabilia building.

Hopefully, he says it’ll be done by July the 4th. I’m hoping that’s going to be what we call the event center where we can grow more sponsors and more vendors just like you were talking. Hey, bring your wife, bring your kids. There’s more stuff for you to be able to do. Hey, I might want to go over here and buy me a Rolex.

There might be a vendor over there doing that. Been able to sell jewelry or that they could go do a little shopping or so to speak, instead of just looking at cars. And then the husband can go look at the cars and buy a car, whatever they want to do to make it more well rounded, so to speak, so you can be more family atmosphere for a total package.

That’s the new future. Also, I’m hoping that this event center that we [00:47:00] could do more vendors and be able to hold more cars and display the cars a lot better than the way we display them, which is not the wrong way we do them, but it could be a little bit more dressy or flashier. That’d be terrific. Yeah, it will be.

Don Weberg: GAA, you’ve got an auction coming up November 3, 4, and 5. How many cars are we looking to expect at that sale? 750. That’s a lot of cars.

Johnny Ransom: Yes, sir.

Don Weberg: Now, is there a large selection of two wheel vehicles coming up? I saw some of those on the website. There was a whole bunch of motorcycles, minibikes, etc. Is that from a private collection or does GAA always have a lot of motorcycles and bikes for sale?

Johnny Ransom: We always, I got a group of guys that don’t do nothing but dabble in the motorbikes and stuff, and they always provide those for me. They do real well with them. And that’s another thing like I was telling you about the memorabilia stuff. Those Honda 70s and 90s and stuff. They’re insane right now.

They’re, they bring a lot of money. Yeah. They’ve gone crazy. Yeah. A lot of people [00:48:00] relate to those like, you know, I had one of those and I want one back, you know, I won’t buy them back.

Don Weberg: It’s funny when you bring that up, because I’ve got a buddy. We used to restore those. I knew nothing about motorcycles and he used to drag those things home from the junkyard and he’d get five or six of them.

He’d put one bike together and make one great bike. They were gorgeous. So yeah, you’re, you’re hitting the nail on the head with that one with me. I see their bikes and I think, Oh man, back in the olden days, you know.

Johnny Ransom: Oh yeah. And listen, it’s 3, 504 grand and being the rare color ones, you know, you can get up to 7, 500 to 10, 000.

Yeah. That’s new. That’s nice. It’s been redone to be able to have that and have that in your garage out there around your cars or whatever. Most of these guys are buying them up

Don Weberg: for the November sale, November three, four, and five, are there any truly significant cars coming up that you remember for that sale?

Johnny Ransom: Restomods right now, a lot of the new. Guys that’s buying these cars, you know, they’re not really into the carburetor cars. They’re all into these LS motor cars. So we got [00:49:00] quite a bit of Aristo mods. I got a couple of really nice Nomads and some Corvettes. It’s really, really super nice. It’s going to really rock the house, so to speak.

I got a Copo coming and I got a LS6 is coming. And both of those cars will be certified through Jeremy Nates. I got a little bit of everything. Like you said, I got some Ferraris. Got some Porsches all the way down to 35 DeSotos, air cooled, unbelievable, beautiful 30s cars. I got a little bit of everything for everybody.

Crew Chief Eric: Obviously, we’re talking about classic cars, muscle cars, and trucks. Those are the ones that really sell at auction. And you said the word restomod, and that got my attention. And there’s been a trend lately of taking these classic cars, these muscle cars, and these trucks, and turning them into EVs by retrofitting in Tesla power plants and others.

So I wanted to get your take on this. Evolution, as we like to call it around here, and how that might change the auction world.

Johnny Ransom: I got an electric truck. First time I ever sold one. Going to try to sell one. Maybe a Rivian. Whatever. I’m not [00:50:00] really up on them, but I got one. Okay? The guy called me, and when he called me, I immediately was typing in and watching them see what they were going online.

And then also, I told him, hold on a second, let me make a few phone calls. I called a couple of my buddies. There’s like, Johnny, you can’t get them. There’s a waiting list like you wouldn’t believe. Crazy not to take it. That’s all I needed here. Caught him back. I hooked him right on in. I said, yeah, I gotta have it.

So I got one. I want everybody to watch. Let’s see what it does. I want to see how much it brings. Well, you know, I’m kind of torn because, you know, the Lightning trucks, they’re over the top right now. I’m expecting that truck to do real well too, because they don’t have no time, no miles on it whatsoever, right?

I mean, I know everything is trying to go for green new deal. Everything’s trying to change. I just don’t know, man. I really, I don’t think in my world and most people I talked to, did I hang out with, and this email collector card, they got white hair, dude. And they’re not buying it. Okay? They’re just not buying it.

They love to [00:51:00] hear that rumble. They like that power. They’re not buying it whatsoever.

Don Weberg: Johnny, don’t worry. In another 20 years, we’ll be auctioning off that vintage Tesla Model S. You don’t see them like this anymore. They’ve still got the original battery pack. Check this thing out. Let’s plug it in, you know?

Crew Chief Eric: That’s right. I hear that,

Johnny, I gotta ask you, any shout outs, promotions, or anything else you’d like to share that we didn’t cover thus far?

Johnny Ransom: Yes, I’d like to have a shout out to our good friend Reliable Carriers. They’re one of our biggest sponsors. Really good friends of ours for the TAA team. Dale Wilson, really good. Work with you any kind of way.

He’ll haul your car anywhere in the United States and, uh, also liquid performance. They have all of our cleaning supplies and stuff and their technology on cleaning and auto detailing stuff is phenomenal. And also I want to thank Hagerty Insurance, they’re one of our sponsors also. They do a ton of stuff with us.

There’s another company out there called Navispak. They do all of our shipping, [00:52:00] all of our memorabilia and so forth. And I want to have a big shout out to them also. And JJ Best for the financing that they do for all of our financing needs. They really help us, really help us out a lot.

Don Weberg: Six acres under one roof in Greensboro, North Carolina.

G a a classic car auctions keeps their guests comfortable in a fully climate controlled environment. No sunburns, no hats blowing off, no rain. Just an enjoyable time. Cruising their website, www.gaaclassiccars.com. We’ll show there is something for everyone at these events ranging from vintage and exotics to modern classics from all genres.

With bidding options ranging from in person to online and telephone, buying a vehicle or piece of memorabilia is simple. The first time and seasoned auction goer benefits from a professional staff helping you enjoy the entire experience from beginning to end. You can follow the GAA team on social at GAAClassicCars.[00:53:00]

on Facebook, Instagram and I got to

Crew Chief Eric: tell you, I can’t thank you enough for coming on and explaining to me, especially how the auction world works. And you know, now I know exactly what to do. You’re going to see me there at a GAA auction in a white suit, my collar pop, dark shades on a Jordache duffel bag.

And my ping pong pallet ready to bid on the next vehicle coming across that line. I love it. I can’t wait. I can’t wait. We’re going to put you up front. Well, again, thank you so much for coming on and telling us all about this.

Johnny Ransom: You guys are wonderful. I appreciate it so much. And thank you for having me on tonight.

It’s been an awesome time. I really enjoyed it.

Don Weberg: The following episode is brought to us. In part by garage style magazine, since 2007 garage style magazine has been [00:54:00] the definitive source for car collectors, continually delivering information about automobilia, Petroliana events, and more to learn more about the annual publication and its new website.

Be sure to follow them on social media at garage style magazine, or log onto www. garagestylemagazine. com because after all. What doesn’t belong in your garage?

Crew Chief Brad: If you like what you’ve heard and want to learn more about GTM, be sure to check us out on www. gtmotorsports. org. You can also find us on Instagram at grandtorymotorsports.

Also, if you want to get involved or have suggestions for future shows, you can call or text us at 202 630 1770, or send us an email at crewchief at gtmotorsports. org. We’d love to hear from you.

Crew Chief Eric: Hey everybody, Crew Chief Eric here. We really hope you enjoyed this episode of BreakFix, and we wanted to remind you that GTM remains a [00:55:00] no annual fees organization, and our goal is to continue to bring you quality episodes like this one at no charge.

As a loyal listener, please consider subscribing to our Patreon for bonus and behind the scenes content, extra goodies, and GTM swag. For as little as 2. 50 a month, you can keep our developers, writers, editors, casters, and other volunteers fed on their strict diet of fig newtons, gummy bears, and monster.

Consider signing up for Patreon today at www. patreon. com forward slash GT Motorsports. And remember, without fans, supporters, and members like you, none of this would be possible.

Rock N Roll

Skip ahead if you must… Here’s the highlights from this episode you might be most interested in and their corresponding time stamps.

• 00:00 Introduction to Break/Fix Podcast
• 00:25 Garage Style Magazine Sponsorship
• 00:57 The Excitement of Classic Car Auctions
• 01:59 Meet Johnny Ransom from GAA Classic Car Auctions
• 02:10 Johnny’s Journey into the Automotive World
• 05:13 The Birth of GAA Classic Car Auctions
• 08:15 GAA’s Unique Auction Experience
• 11:28 Memorabilia Sales at GAA Auctions
• 13:27 Diverse Range of Vehicles at GAA
• 15:17 Auctioneer Dynamics and Attendee Experience
• 16:37 First-Time Auction Goer Tips
• 19:36 Bidding and Payment Process
• 24:27 Ensuring Title Transfers and Paperwork
• 28:00 State Tax Regulations for Car Purchases
• 28:29 Handling Titles and State Inspections
• 29:08 Auction Fees and Buying Process
• 29:56 Selling Your Car at GAA
• 31:44 Placing and Pricing Cars for Auction
• 35:08 Running and Driving Requirements
• 35:29 Handling Large Car Collections
• 37:21 Post-Auction Sales and Consignments
• 39:02 Auction vs. Private Sale
• 44:23 Future of GAA and Online Auctions
• 47:13 Upcoming Auctions and Notable Cars
• 49:36 Electric Vehicles in Auctions
• 51:19 Shoutouts and Closing Remarks

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