[cabmandone]

Originally Posted by Jeff Higgins

I've had this conversation with many Porsche owning friends. We were having a lot of these kinds of conversations amongst my Pac West R Gruppe chapter buddies as we all watched in stunned amazement when the value of our cars were skyrocketing. It got to be very, very tempting for many of us to sell cars in which we had maybe $10-$20k invested for healthy six figure sums.

Well, some of us sold, some of us did not. For those of who did not, it boiled down to just a couple of reasons. One, sentimental value. In my case, my two young sons grew up learning to work on cars by helping me wrench on my 911. We spent a lot of father/son time together and formed a lasting bond that I'm not sure we would have formed in any other way. They are both grown and gone now, but we still spend a lot of Porsche centric time together. Any time I'm around that car I can't help but think of all of the good times it represents for us.

The other reason is money. Yes, six figures for an early car is ludicrous, and many jumped at that opportunity. Those of us who did not saw it this way - while a good deal of money, it wasn't life changing money. Getting rid of the car would be life changing, however. At least for those of us deeply involved in the hobby, and deeply involved in our club.

So, it sounds like you have half of that equation - the sentimental value, the link to your brother. It sounds like you are somewhat lacking in the second component, though. While it sounds like you don't need the money, it does sound like you are not that deeply involved in the hobby, or into some club. So, yeah, hmm... tough call. I'm a very sentimental guy, so I lean that way on a lot of decisions, so if it were me and I didn't need the money to proceed... hmm... I'd probably keep it...

One of the things that weighs on this is the fact I'll probably never buy another "icon". and the 911 of this vintage is an icon. Even younger kids at the car shows we went to knew it was a Porsche 911.
You're right about not being that into the hobby part of ownership. I just don't enjoy wrenching on it anymore. There was the fun of getting it together. There was the fun of getting it right to where it was a good example of the vehicle. Now it's work. I've always felt that once a hobby becomes work, it's time to move on.