This is a touchy and subjective issue due to this rule:
4.7: Scavenger Sales: If you sell pieces off of your car, the money that comes back in can be used to offset the initial purchase price. Just be prepared to convince some exceedingly skeptical judges of the validity of all those transactions.
As Loren has said, you can pretty much buy and profit off of parts cars for an infinite budget.
I have certainly used the Scavenger Sale approach to stay on budget. In our initial build I started with the 1973 240Z I bought at a Police auction for $200. I spent a lot of time finding the preferred donor car for the other parts I wanted, an 81-83 280ZX 2+2. I bought that for $150. So I initially spent $350.
Then the morphing, scrapping and recongigerating began.
I was not that efficient about selling parts off either car and made money on the parts car and still have parts from both left over.
I wanted to sell parts off the parts car to cover the cost of putting the motor together since that was the main point of getting the car. The parts car was easily profitable since I bought it for $150.
That said I, I could have bought a $1000 parts car and sold it down to $0 according to many interpretations. The thought being a $1000 parts car would have been in better shape than the $150 parts car. So why should a patient and diligent shopper only be able to recoup $150 when you could go $1000 on a more expensive car?
Likewise, you could buy a $1500 car for Lemons and sell it down to $500 instead of buying whats left of a $200 car and working your way up to $500.
This is a gray area and can be debated either way. Being from Houston, we can always get into some creative Enron accounting.
Jonny and Phil or whoever does your BS inspection will make the final call. If you have $2000 in a Fiat, no one will probably care. Your $350 Miata/E30 on the other hand may still get penalty laps.
Good luck.
Troy
#35 LRE
1973 Datsun 240Z
