78 King Cobra

[Rob S]

I bought a real 78 King Cobra about 7 or 8 years ago. I bought the car with no motor and a rebuilt manual transmission. The body is in overall good condition with some small minor dings only one big dent in the driver side rear quarter. There is no rot at all on the body just a couple of holes in the driver side floor which can easily be repaired. I spent years collecting all the hard to find original parts needed for the restoration including an original front air dam, center caps with original king cobra emblem, deluxe interior door panels with not cobra ii emblems, etc. The only parts I have left to buy are reproduction interior parts like seat skins, headliner, carpet and floor mats. I recently found out that I'll have to find a new place to store the car since the house where I rent the garage is being sold. The thought of selling the car crossed my mind even though it's the last thing I wanna do. When I bought the car I remember that there weren't too many around but you could find them for sale if you looked hard enough. When iv been looking over the last few months iv realized that if I ever sold this car I might not be able to get another one. I'm assuming and hoping that after years of people trashing these cars they finally realized how rare the king cobra is and have decided to hold onto them if they have one. With all this being said I'm curious if anyone can actually put a $ value on a king in my cars current condition and one on a fully restored car. I intend to make this one of the nicest king cobras in the world when finished and understand that you almost never get all your money back on a restoration but just out of curiosity would like to see if I can find an accurate $ value for the car

 

[jozsefsz]

This is a good resource: Price Guide Report

It's obviously all based on condition and buyer, but your range is about 4-20K. Which will pretty much pay for a decent restoration, but not much more sadly. I don't know if these cars will ever have the potential to reach 6 or 7 figures like a nice rare first-gen.

 

[Rob S]

This is a good resource: Price Guide Report

It's obviously all based on condition and buyer, but your range is about 4-20K. Which will pretty much pay for a decent restoration, but not much more sadly. I don't know if these cars will ever have the potential to reach 6 or 7 figures like a nice rare first-gen.

That's pretty much the range I was thinking..I prob have about 5 grand into it and since I'm doing most of the work myself prob have another 5-8 grand I have to put into it..iv seen the interest and value slowly climb since I restored my coupe 10 years ago so hopefully it will continue but I definetly agree that it won't go anywhere near the price of the first gens

 

[mercurycapri]

I love the 78 cobra's good luck with it.

 

[MustangIIMatt]

I bought a real 78 King Cobra about 7 or 8 years ago. I bought the car with no motor and a rebuilt manual transmission. The body is in overall good condition with some small minor dings only one big dent in the driver side rear quarter. There is no rot at all on the body just a couple of holes in the driver side floor which can easily be repaired. I spent years collecting all the hard to find original parts needed for the restoration including an original front air dam, center caps with original king cobra emblem, deluxe interior door panels with not cobra ii emblems, etc. The only parts I have left to buy are reproduction interior parts like seat skins, headliner, carpet and floor mats. I recently found out that I'll have to find a new place to store the car since the house where I rent the garage is being sold. The thought of selling the car crossed my mind even though it's the last thing I wanna do. When I bought the car I remember that there weren't too many around but you could find them for sale if you looked hard enough. When iv been looking over the last few months iv realized that if I ever sold this car I might not be able to get another one. I'm assuming and hoping that after years of people trashing these cars they finally realized how rare the king cobra is and have decided to hold onto them if they have one. With all this being said I'm curious if anyone can actually put a $ value on a king in my cars current condition and one on a fully restored car. I intend to make this one of the nicest king cobras in the world when finished and understand that you almost never get all your money back on a restoration but just out of curiosity would like to see if I can find an accurate $ value for the car

I'd get an appraisal done on it. You might be surprised.
Make sure and get both a "replacement value" and a "resale value" done on it, they'll be two VERY different numbers. Use "replacement value" for insurance purposes, and "resale value" should you choose to sell it.
The reason the numbers will be different is because "replacement" value will be the cost of finding another one and getting it to the condition yours is in now. "Resale" value will be what it's worth to someone else to buy it.