Most popular Volkswagen Karmann Ghia for sale

I decided to buy this car because it was advertised as "restored" by the seller. Unfortunately, I relied upon his advertisement, and upon my conversation on the phone with the seller. I am responsible for making the mistake of not inspecting the vehicle personally as it turned out to be a complete falsehood by the seller, and the vehicle is worth less than half of what I paid. This was my 3rd internet vehicle purchase; both others went very well even though I did not personally inspect the vehicles. Let the buyer beware!

The price seemed fair for what appeared to be a '69 Ghia in good condition.
The Good:
The body was/is rust free but has some crude bondo work and the front skirt was cut out with what must have been tin-snips to allow room for the wrong sized tires that were put on it. Interior was decent but not new as indicated in the description, with broken seat levers and dirty seat covers.
The BAD:
If I had paid any more than I did, I would be very upset. Not only is the engine not a 1600cc engine as described, (it is a 40 hp version instead of the 57 hp 1600cc), the muffler is bad, the starter grinds due to it being a 12v starter fitted to the original 6V cam. The brakes were shot, the ball joints were exploded, the steering control is shot and the carburator had rust in it. I will have to put a minimum of another $3000-$4000 to get this car in running and SAFE condition. While this will bring the price to the range of cars in this condition, the write up was misleading. I will not blame the seller too much as he seems to resell vehicles for others and does not know a VW part from a vacuum cleaner part.
Having said the negatives, I am still hopeful that this car will be a good car and yes, I am so happy about the lack of rust that I can say I think this will work out. However, if I knew this up front, I would have bid on vehicles that already were in running condition.

First off, let me tell you how difficult it is to find a 60's Ghia that is in fairly good shape. This particular vehicle caught my eye and I instantly fell in love! It is completely restored and in mint condition. I never thought that I would win the auction as easily as I did too. Let's just say that I'm a "stealth" bidder. I won the auction for $8801.00 which is an excellent price. I found a for sale sign under the passenger side front seat asking $15,000.00 so I think I got a really good deal. After all this is my "dream car". I love everything about the car! Old Volkswagens are so cool. I had to fix a few small things in order to get an inspection sticker for the state of Vermont. A relatively simple task. The best thing about an old Volkswagen is that an "average Joe" can tinker with it. You can still find parts but finding someone to resilver the rear view mirror was rather difficult. I've said it before and I'll say it again..."They just don't build'em like they used to".