For more reasons than can be expressed, we are selling our bus that we called home for more than 5 years. It has been up in Colorado for the last two years and needs a new home. Below is how it was listed on eBay. It was a successful auction and the new owner now has it up in St Louis and will continue building where we left off.
We were sad to see it go, but glad to see it went to someone who will enjoy it as much as we did.
As Listed on eBay on July 14th, 2008
Bus Conversion TMC MCI MC9 MC-9, Detroit Diesel 6V92
Vehicle Description
This auction is for an MCI 9 bus conversion that is at about 50-60% complete. This bus was purchased in Florida as a church bus, was previously a greyhound bus. We purchased the bus for $20,000, shelled the bus, then built it from the ground up to what it is right now. The only thing it really needs to finish it off is a finished floor and ceiling, and some reworking of the bins to fit current needs. We replaced the Detroit Diesel 6V92 and had a completely new engine put in it in our home state of Alabama. After the new engine (ordered directly from Detroit, a 6V92 rebuild) we put less than 1000 hours on it, and it has always worked perfectly.
The bus is currently sitting in Creede Colorado and has to be moved before the end of the summer months. Creede is very cold, and summer ends August to September. We have to have the bus moved from this location. We had a death in the family and the house property it is sitting on is being sold, so it can not stay at its current location. The winning bidder must have the bus moved by September 1st.
The bus has been in its current location for about 2 years. We stored it in Colorado because we were building a house and the weather there is cold and dry, great for storage. The engine has not been cranked since then. It will need a new set of starting batteries and a full tank of fuel and probably need the fuel lines bled to prime the pumps and the throttle cable needs to be fixed (that is just a wire that attaches to the throttle in the engine compartment, an easy fix).
The bus is being sold as is, where it is, with no intended warranty. The bus is titled in Alabama and we have clear title, and it is title in the state of Alabama as a motorhome. We will sign and ship the title upon receipt of final payment for the bus.
My wife and I were full timers in this bus for almost 5 years and traveled to every state in the U.S. in this bus. We have made countless upgrades, fixes, adjustments, and we have put over $75,000 of improvements into the bus, plus a $20,000 Detroit 6V92 engine. We worked for almost 6 years on the cabinets which are all solid wood, no partial board. All cabinets are custom made for this bus. The kitchen has huge cabinets, draws, and great counter space. Some of the features include.
All in all, we have:
Original Bus purchase – $20,000
Improvements – $75,000
New Detroit 6V92 – $20,000
Total added by us – $115,000
Our loss is your chance for a great gain if you are looking for a new DIY project or just need a Detroit 6V92 Turbo engine. The engine itself is probably worth what the auction will close for, so if all you want out of it is the engine, it is in great shape, but, the bus MUST be moved from its current location. There is even storage facilities nearby that you could just have a towing company bring it to for later use if that is what you wanted to do.
What is included with the bus:
GREAT Detroit Diesel 6V92 Turbo
Installed in 2004 by Detroit dealer
Less than 1,000 original hours on the engine
This engine was professionally installed by a Detroit bus dealer in Alabama. This is a very popular engine still in use today on buses, fishing boats, and a ton of construction equipment. It is a power horse of an engine and costs us $20,000 to install.
ALLISON TRANSMISSION
this was original with the bus as far as we know. We have never had a problem with the transmission at all
TIRES
We purchased 6 new Goodyear G-391 tires. These tires were about $650 each at the time of purchase. They have about 50% treat on them. The tags have about 5% tread and we did not replace them. There is a spare tire in the front compartment. We have all chrome rims on each wheel. There were also about $3,000 for the set and includes the drives.
LIVING QUARTERS – RV
Two RV A/C units – the rear unit has a bad squirel cage motor, but the compressor is great, the other works perfectly.
3 FULL 100 watt solar panels and control panel mounted on the roof
A stackable washer/dryer. Installed only months before we parked it, they work GREAT. These are the full stackage units from Lowes built into the closet.
20 gallon hot water heater
Large TV
All granite marble counter tops, professionally installed.
All solid wood cabinets
Flexsteel chairs
Large full size side by side refrigerator with ice maker
Full size shower
RV toilet
Bathroom sink in matching marble counter top with cabinets
LOWER BINS
The bus has three full open bins. The first bin to the front was where we stored the house batteries, it now has the hot water heater on one side with electric boxes in the middle and storage on the other side. The middle bin is storage and the rear bin has the tanks. There are 4 75 gallon tanks. Two 75 gallon black/grey and two 75 gallon fresh tanks. There are two water pumps, one for the front and one for the rear of the bus. The washer/dryer drains into the grey tanks. There is also a small portable generator on the outside bin under and rear of the drivers seat.
This is a work in progress motorhome, rv, bus, project. It needs some TLC if you want to make it into a home, if you want everything we have put into it at this point, you will still need to remove it from the current location first. I am sure there are a tons of things that are included here that I forgot to mention. Keep in mind that this is a DIY project. A ton of work has been done, and we lived and drove the bus while we did the work, but it is not a finished and polished half a million dollar motor home or Prevost. It can be if you want to put some work in it, or you can use it as is like we did for many years.
I will answer any questions here on the listing. Please review all the photos included. They are from the time we bought the bus in 2000 through the conversion process. The cabin with the snow is where the bus is currently sitting. I can give you the exact address if you like, the bus is actually viewable in google earth where it sits.
We did not place a reserve on the auction and we started the listing at a penny because we need to sell the bus and have it removed from the property so the owner can sell the house. We currently live in Alabama and can not afford to pick it up and drive it down to our house, otherwise we wouldn’t sell it because we have put so much into this bus.
The winning bidder will need to pay 10% up front through paypal within 24 hours of the end of the auction. The remaining payment needs to be made within a few days through a money order or cashier’s check from a U.S. bank only. We will only sell to U.S. bidders that can remove the bus from the property. Once we receive the final cashier’s check payment we will express mail the title to you. The next door neighbor to the property is a very helpful person who works in construction. He can fill the fuel tank for you and possibly help with logistics. We will provide you his name and phone number when the auction is over.
If you do not have any feedback or low feedback, have negative feedback please contact us prior to bidding. We are only taking serious bidders and if your user ID does not look to be legitimate, your bid will be removed and your user ID blocked from future bidding. We have sold professionally on eBay for many years under the ID piecesofthepast-al, so you can check our great feedback over there too. Any attempt at fraudulent bidders will be removed.
On Jul-08-08 at 03:39:23 PDT, seller added the following information:
I am very sorry I can’t believe I forgot to put the year and transmission type. The bus is a 1980 TMC MCI-9 with a 4-speed automatic transmission.
On Jul-09-08 at 12:30:40 PDT, seller added the following information:
There have been a few questions that I will try to address here.
1. Q-Can the next door neighbor help with getting it started?
A- you would need to work that out with him. I will provide the winning bidder with his name and phone number, he is aware we are selling the coach. He will probably do what he can for you, he is a super nice guy.
2. Q-what do I need to do to get the bus started?
A- the coach has been at this location in storage since we stopped traveling about 2 years ago. The new engine has about 10,000 miles on it, about 1,000 hours total, so the engine is in great condition. Anyone familiar with big diesel engines knows they need a few things to get going. Heat, fuel, and power. So,
(1) You will need two new truck sized starting batteries (these are big rig bats).
(2) You will need to prime the fuel lines. This just takes filling the tank with diesel (full if possible), disconnecting the fuel line from the engine and starting the flow into the filters. The reconnecting them.
(3) and heat. The engine is equipped with a great engine block heater. It will need to heat up the coolant for several hours to get a good crank (this is just because it has been sitting, don’t have to do this each time). Coolant levels should also be checked.
(4) block heater must be turned off prior to cranking the engine. There is a rear engine starter on the control panel from the back, pretty standard.
3. Q-are there any repairs that need to be made prior to driving off.
A – The only thing I know of is the throttle cable. It came disconnected at the engine block. This is just a metal wire that broke. All you need to do is connect the two pieces together with a bracket or metal crimp. This is an easy and very very cheap repair but needs to be looked at. Once you start it and air it up, just as a standard practice you will need to check the air lines/valves to make sure you don’t have any air leaks. No bus is air tight, they all seep air from their systems.
4. Q-How many miles does the coach have, what kind of gas mileage does the Detroit 6V92 get?
A – this is almost impossible to answer since it spent its life as a greyhound bus. Once retired we put about 80,000 miles on it, and about 10,000 miles on the new engine (1,000 hours). The bus dash board does have an accurate engine hour gage which is total hours for the bus but I don’t remember what it is reading right now. Gas mileage on a 6V92 is 6-7mpg and doesn’t change much no matter what you do. It is a HUGE engine.
5. Q-When is it available to be picked up?
A – we are going to be at the bus the first week in August to remove our personal belongings from inside. This is just a few remaining clothes and items like that. After that, you can take it any time you like between August 5th and September 5th or so. It needs to be removed prior to the winter setting in when you will not be able to move the bus due to the weather in that part of CO.
6. Q-Do you have clear title?
A – yes, we do. The title is from the state of Alabama and it is stated on the title as a motorhome.
7. Q-Can I call you to ask you a question?
A – yes, just send me an email and I will send you my office phone number where you can call me during office hours.
On Jul-12-08 at 04:15:38 PDT, seller added the following information:ADDITIONAL Q&A
There have been a few more questions come through that I wanted to address, these are a continuation of the first posted Q&A.
1. Q – What condition is the generator in and, how big is it, where is it?
A – the generator is just a small portable 3500 watt gas generator, same as you would buy at Lowes or Home Depot. It was running when we left it, but it is a gas generator so I am not really sure about its status. The cost from Lowest was something like $500-$700 or so. We used it a lot, so it might need a good carburetor cleaning after sitting a while. You can take the 50amp plug for the coach electric and plug it into the 30amp generator and it runs everything except usually only one a/c unit at a time (or the hot water heater in the front bin). The front bin has the 120v on one side and the 12v wiring on the other side and there is a 20 gallon electric hot water heater in the middle of the front bin. The wiring isn’t real pretty looking but you can just plug the 120v into either outside RV power or the generator. Any other questions at all just let me know, thanks. Scott
2. Q – Will you send the keys with the title?
A -there are no keys to start or run the bus, it is a push button, but there are also several switches you have to flip, in order, to be able to crank it. Almost all buses built during this time were built without a key ignition. We did however put in a keyed entry on the door which is locked, and that we will send with the title, but we also have a copy of that key in the cabin where the bus is sitting and when we are up there in the first week of August we will place that key in the bus somewhere.
3. Q – I know the bus is being sold as-is, but what if I don’t know how to get it started, what then?
A – it will be the owners responsibility to move the bus off the property. The winning bidder will need to make their final payment within 3 days of the winning bid. At that point the title and key will be mailed to you, and then you own it, it will be your responsibility to move it, if not by you, a local mechanic can get it started, or you could have it transported to a local shop to have them start it. Either way, I could safely say, using the steps I outlines in the auction, I could go right up there and have it running in a matter of a day. There are several good diesel mechanics around the south central Colorado area. If you couldn’t get it started, I would have one come out and start it.
4. Q – Is September 1st the last day to move it set in stone?
A – I said it needed to be moved by September 1st, this is not set in stone, we have a little wiggle room on the “remove by date”. It starts to get very cold up there in September / October so it is as much the weather as the house being sold, so no, if you needed to move it on September 3rd or 8th, that is fine, just needs to be moved before the freeze starts to set in or the house is sold (freeze will most likely come first).
5. Q – Can I stay in the bus a few days while I am there to pick it up?
A – You can stay there in the bus while you work on getting it ready to move if that is what you want to do. Keep in mind there is no water there. Everything gets winterized in a severe way when no one is there, that includes the outside water. There is 50amp electric on the pole where the bus is parked, that will be on and you can plug in there if you need to while you are there.
6. Q – Will the guy next door fill up the fuel tank for me?
A – I will provide the name and phone number of the next door neighbor. What he does and doesn’t do for you is up to him, but he has told me in the past that he can get the fuel tank filled up. You will probably need to send him a payment and then he can have it fuel up before you arrive. It holds about 150 gallons of diesel.
7. Q – Can I go see the bus if I am close by?
A – yes, by all means, please run by and take a look at it if you like. Email me and I will send you the address where the bus is located, but the auction ends on Monday and we will not “hold” it until you go see the bus, sorry.
These are all very good questions and I will post additional Q&A’s here as they come in over the weekend if needed. Please contact me with any questions you might have, I will respond as quickly as possible. Thanks, Scott
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This is probably the saddest post I could make on this blog but we have come to the decision that we can not keep up with our house here and the boat we love down at the coast.
I will be posted more photos and information as time goes on but you can look through this blog and all the posts and history of the boat to know what we are selling. It is a 1979 Morgan Out Island 33 in great shape. We had put a lot of hard work into her since we purchase her in Tampa in 2006. The only issue she has at all is the 50hp Perkins motor needs a new head gasket. The Perkins has been serviced, a new heat exchanger installed, filters changed, and she runs GREAT. Starts right up every time, but she does need the header gasket replaced.
Comes with all sails and equipment needed to take an off-shore cruise to the keys or Bahamas. I will post the latest survey soon. We did not have one done as we did not continue the coast guard registration process. Along with all the normals for a boat this size, it also has a GREAT marine a/c and heater unit. We used this all summer last year and this winter and it works great. It is a very roomy cabin, perfect for a live-a-board with the headroom and sleeps at least 5 comfortably. The interior is very clean and in very nice condition. Floors and wood work on the inside are in great shape. Two water holding tanks that hold about 50 gallons of water, a 35 gallon diesel tank, working head and fresh water shower.
To see the history of the vessel please visit the history page, you can also see the most recent survey as well. We had not completed the name change so it is still technically called the s/v LAUGHALOT. The boat is located at the Bear Point Marina in Orange Beach Alabama. You are more than welcome to visit the marina to see the boat. The current asking price is $19,500. The current NADA price is about $23,000 but we have discounted the header gasket work that needs to be done, which should only be about $1500 or so. The marina is VERY nice and the slip is very reasonable at $350 per month, which includes electric, water, phone, and cable.
Any questions at all please let us know through the contact page above and I will be happy to return your email. You can also ask your questions through the comment box below and I will post answers there publicly.
Here are some recent photos.
I am sure the new owner will enjoy it as much as we have. We spent many weekends on the boat and enjoyed each one.
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This question comes up quite a bit, but when you are talking about individuals businesses or blogs, not a corporation, the simple answer is, probably not as much as you think. Certainly not as much as you have put into it.
One of my favorite things to watch is Buy it Now prices on eBay and personal items people put up for sale, like their car or motorcycle. I have this GREAT thing, I paid $5,000 for it, used it for 5 years, it is in perfect, brand new condition and here it is for sale for $5,500, great deal. What we deem as precious and important to us, really only has a value of what someone else is willing to pay, and in my experience, it is not as much as we would want it to be.
There are “collectibles” and things like that of course, but I find those don’t even hold up to current prices unless it is really the hottest of hot in the latest trend or gimmick. We even had a genuine Rolex watch, with an appraisal that had a replacement value of $7,500 and it looks like its current ebay selling price is around $1,200. It comes down to this. Do you actually want to sell the item or business in question, or do you want to sell it for what you want to sell it for?
I am going to examine this question in a series of posts since it can be quite a long subject. In this post I will look at a few variables in determining value to your business, asset, blog, online property, or other digital assets and what it might be worth if you want to sell it. Should you look at selling on Sitepoint as opposed to eBay or Amazon and what other alternatives are there for you to sell your Internet assets. Other points that might come up as future topics are pricing domain names and their value (you can also see Register a Domain Name for eBay Affiliate Traffic, 10 Ways to Set Goals for Your Online Business, or GoDaddy Cash Parking Makes Little Money for some of my other related topics on this subject.
Value is Determined by Someone Else
As I mentioned above, the value of something is not really determined by you at all. How much something is worth depends on how much someone else is willing to pay for it. If you think something is worth $5,000 and someone else is willing to pay $10,000, then it is worth $10k, and of course the opposite is also true.
A good example of this is the current fire sale of blogs. At first, the money making seo blogs were said to be worth bundles. Then as a few were sold off, the value of each was shown, to be what someone else was willing to pay for it. There were, and are, several metrics that bloggers decided each blog was worth and gave it value, but most went by a price per subscriber of about $15.
All of this came to mind when I read, A Difficult Decision – BloggingExperiment.com For Sale, a nice blog which I have read for some time. All of sudden the for sale sign went out. It was up for auction, but has since been sold for an undisclosed amount, but the seller / owner (Ben) was looking for “5 figures”, which is about in line with the price per subscriber listed above. That would make the sale about $13,500 (that is according to the calculation above, I have no knowledge of what it actually sold for).
If we just stay with the guesstimate above as an example, Ben was doing a year long experiment, which he was 265 days into, when he decided to sell his blog. Since he sold it, I would assume he got a price he was willing to accept. If it was my guess above, that comes to about $51/day, or about $6/hour if you go on an 8 hour day, or approximately $18,000/year. But, it is only worth what someone else is willing to pay for it, and sometimes that is better than what we know it is worth.
Don’t self impose an over valuation of your asset. If you do, whatever you are trying to sell will sit there for a long time, perhaps months or years before you find a buyer you will agree with. If you decide you want to sell it, sell it, for what someone else is willing to buy it for, in a reasonable period of time. Ben obviously made the decision to sell his blog, and did so, in about 5 days.
Value Depends on What You Put Into It
As with most things in life, you get what you put into it. One thing that I think is a misnomer among others looking at Internet entrepreneurs is how much work is involved. Sticking with the blog theme from Blogging Experiment, I know it is a hands on, daily grind, meticulous operation to keep that blog at its current traffic level and subscriber list. If he just let it go for a week, or a month, and let it run itself, it would run right into the ground from its prime.
Blog in particular are not self sustaining businesses that you can setup and let run. They take a lot of time and effort, effort that most are not willing to put into a blog, which is what makes sites like Pro Blogger so good, they put a ton of hours into the site each day. Not all of us have the staff and resources to do what they do, but it certainly adds value to their site. What a quick tip to add value to your blog or website. Add content. Not scrapped content or stuff just pulled in from other sites, but real, well written, new, fresh content. That will add readers, advertisers, and value to your site.
Value Depends on How You Present It
One final way to put value into your online asset, presentation. You may have the worlds best thing, but if it looks bad, smells bad, and isn’t generally presented well, it won’t have the value you think it should, or probably does. This may be a clean design or new look, but most likely you have already have this in place.
I can relate this to an eBay listing (or ad if you prefer). You can have the exact same product as someone else on eBay, sell it for the same price, same shipping, and delivery time, but yours will not sell if the presentation it not better than the competition. This may just be nicely worded descriptions of what you are trying to sell or site metrics, visitors, stats, all the things people really want to know about the item for sale.
Give a lot of information. I think people generally read about 10% of what is presented to them, so make the important points stand out. Highlight your strengths, but don’t hide your weaknesses, and give a lot of information about the item for sale. The more questions you get about the item for sale, the worse you did in explaining the sale to potential buyers, especially if you get 10 people asking the same exact question.
What are your best tips to showing the value of an item?
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Our work on the clean-up of the Catalina 22 is finished. We worked hard to get her clean and fixed up enough to sell and now she has gone to a new home in Georgia. She is going to have her renovation completed there by her new owner. Hopefully we will get pictures of her when she is fully completed. There she goes.
This was one of the first sailboats we actually purchased with the idea of cleaning up the boat and selling it to a new owner. It looked in pretty bad shape when we first purchased the boat (see How Do You De-Mast a Catalina 22) but we knew it was a good sailboat under all the grime. We have a lot of fun getting the boat and cleaning it up and doing what we knew to do, and we didn’t do what we didn’t know how to do. The new owner is a Catalina 22 sailboat restoration project person, so he should do wonders to bringing it back to its original condition.
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Our work on the clean-up of the Catalina 22 is finished. We worked hard to get her clean and fixed up enough to sell and now she has gone to a new home in Georgia. She is going to have her renovation completed there by her new owner. Hopefully we will get pictures of her when she is fully completed. Here are some photos of our work (if you want to see the before and the after, check out the post How to De-Mast a Catalina 22 Sailboat photos).
It was a messy process of pulling every single thing out of the boat, pressure washing everything, and then putting it all back together again. It really was a lot of fun and had the timing been a little better we might have taken her out sailing before we sold her, but it wasn’t to be this time.
We were able to sell the boat for $3,000 to a Catalina restorer who said it would go for $6,000 when he got done with it, I hope it does, it was a nice little boat, and one a lot of sailors love to race. It is now off to a home in Georgia.
