Evaluation: One of 252 507s built and one of 13 delivered new to Venezuela. Originally finished in Silberblau (silver blue), then repainted white. Its American expat owner moved it with him to Toronto in 1961. Sold years later to Philadelphia and stored there along with another 507 and mostly sat but was occasionally started and serviced. Then finally brought out in May of this year.
Awful, peeling, blistering old repaint in Pontiac Bright Blue sprayed in 1979. Worn, discolored upholstery with a pulled seam on the driver’s seat cushion. Aged and tired barn find but sound and complete. Video introduction in the barn and at Lime Rock, an important barn find from a shed in Philadelphia where it has been secreted since it was acquired by Herman Bold in 1979 for $22,000 43 years ago.
Bottom Line: This car is a rat. It also is a wonderful rat, started from time to time and driven out of its shed under its own power after decades in limbo. It got the Audrain collectors’ juices flowing, but they couldn’t match the phone bidder who bought it. Now the new owner is going to have to decide what to do with it having paid generously but not egregiously for the privilege of owning it.
