Ever buy back a car you built.

I have a chance to buy back my factory five spec racer. I deeply love this car and it was one of my favorite. It has been repainted and the cage has been removed so it much more street friendly. I keep thinking that its just nostalgia that keeps getting me to look at it. I can buy the car back for about what I sold it for and its much more usable then it was when i sold it. 

Any thoughts on this or has anybody done this. I could get a better FFR for the same money if I looked around but since it was my first real track/autocross car it keeps pulling at my heart strings. 

I can't say anything other than that I understand. My Stalker V6 has been through several other owners, and I keep waiting for the price to go down enough for me to buy it back!

Over the years, I have bought, restored, sold, bought back, and restored again several TR8s.  There is one out in my driveway now thats on its third go round here.  Amazing to think this thing has been brought back from the brink to be a beautiful ride this many times.  First time was engine fire, second time was just neglect and a scorned spouse that keyed the car, third time was neglect, rust, and a basketball hoop falling on it.  62,000 miles and on its third major restoration with bare metal respray. I have always had a knack of finding really cheap neglected TR8s and bringing them back to life, but I must confess that I had to part out many many TR7s to be able to do so.  If race cars count, then I have a SCCA ITS TR8 thats on its third body shell, second cage, and god knows how many engine tranny combinations.

I did. Re-restored it, then re-modified it. The re-sold it. I never.really re-loved it. It was better as a memory, just like my ex girlfriends. 

Sort of.  Sold the 2002 WRX I bought around 2016 or so in 2020 to help pay for an expensive roof repair.  This past March I heard a rumour that RX was coming back to Dayton & half-jokingly asked my friend I sold it to "hey are you bored with my car yet?  haha"

He replied "well now that you mention it".  So I drove up and bought it back.  I had done a decent amount of work to it, he did some over the four years even if he didn't drive it much.  But I've noticed besides selling the wheels I liked (I replaced), he had it tuned by someone & at the last minute he mentioned a "pop and crackle tune".  Ugh.  Also the headlights come on for no reason while driving, high beams don't work, neither do the fog lights.

So not 100% sure I would do it again, given the chance to do-over.

In reply to Dusterbd13-michael :

Funny you should say that. When I saw the thread last night I was going to respond...

Many times, and it was always a disappointment. Have you ever gotten back with an old girlfriend because you remembered it being so good, and it really wasn't?
 In some cases I bought a car back to flip, in some cases I bought them back for the parts. In every instance they were in significantly rougher shape than when I sold them. In the times where I actually bought the car back to drive it didn't last. It was never what I was hoping it would be.

No experience here. Anything that leaves my ownership does so on a stretcher. But if you're saying it's arguably better than you left it, I'd say go for it. We aren't emotionless robots; things mean stuff to us. Get your old car back

There is nothing rational about building or buying a Factory Five Spec racer.  The whole experience is about how it makes you feel.  If you can afford it buy it and if you decide that it's not bringing you the joy that you thought it would sell it again.

There are some cars I wouldn’t mind having back–like either CRX, my EG, my wife’s 2000 Civic Si, even my wagon. But I’m also pretty content with the current lineup. 

I owned the same Trans-Am three times. 

I called it Herpes.

Unlike herpes, it finally went away for good.

Yes. My first car. 1973 super vw. The first round was a teenager trying to keep an old car alive and learning to "fix" things. Sold it to a guy for his teenage daughter to learn to drive and use in high school right about the time I got a job and got tired of fixing things all the time. 
Ran into guy 9 years later and his daughter had gotten married and moved away and he still had the car. So I bought it back, rebuilt the engine, added a turbo, and streeted the car for a year. Got a wild hair and decided to sell it again to fund another project. Bad idea. I wish I still had it. 

David S. Wallens said:

There are some cars I wouldn’t mind having back–like either CRX, my EG, my wife’s 2000 Civic Si, even my wagon. But I’m also pretty content with the current lineup. 

OK, if I could buy back my supercharged MR2, I would.  The buyer is on here, forget the username.  ARE YOU READING THIS??

Not a car, but I sold my first sailplane to my friend John.  There are two of these in the world, the other's in a museum.  When he inherited a windfall, he bought a house, half dozen cars and every dead glider project in America.  Poor thing sits in a trailer baking and freezing as a mouse house in the winter.

Sad.  And he won't sell it.

I have, yes.

I think I was 19 when I bought my Lancia Scorpion the first time.  That would have been 1981.  The PO had a turbo on it that was a bit over boosted and was very prone to blowing the head gasket.  This was my daily so that really wasn't a good fit.   I ended up putting a non-turbo engine and continued to drive it.  Life changes came and I sold it in 1986. All of this happened in Phoenix. 
 

The internet came along and there was e-groups which became Yahoo Groups and there was a Scorpion forum. The then-owner posted a photo of his car in 2001 and I contacted him.  I was living back east and come to Phoenix later that year to visit family and met the owner and asked him to contact me if he ever wanted to sell.  A year later someone on the Yahoo Scorpion  posted that there was a clean green Scorpion for sale on eBay.  The owner I had met the year before had sold it and this current owner was selling. It didn't meet reserve but was able to work it out and I had it back.   
Leda coil overs, Weil wood brakes, and a 2GR-FE has made this an awesome car.   Still have it now.  
 

 Nope. Because I run them into the ground or keep them forever.

My 9C1, I deeply loved that car, but the tin worm ate it alive. I mean it had load bearing paint near the end.

On the other end, I'll never sell the Murdercycle. It's my first bike. It owes me nothing. Its tiny. Its obscure even if it's a Honda. Its archaic 6 volt. And I love it. I've been asked at least a thousand times when I'm going to sell it and get a bigger bike. I can't.  I wont. I'd spend the rest of my life trying to get out back.

Reliving the same experience over and over keeps you from having new experiences. Its a lesson I'm having a hard time learning.

One of my autocross pals built a Citation X-11 back in the day. He wound up owning it 3 times. I nicknamed it the "Boomerang Car" because he kept throwing it away and it kept coming back.

I have a couple I wish I could buy back. Sellers remorse I suppose. 

Well thought about it and passed on the car. I already have a car that fits the track..hard driving use. 

Did remind me why I loved it so much though and I found one that could be a better fit as a street car given that I have the 550 Spyder for autocross and eventually track work once I complete the cage. 

There are a few I wish I hadn't sold, but then I wouldn't have been able to buy the next one.  I just don't have the space and funds to keep them all.

I haven't bought one back, but I did sell my 318is back to the guy I bought it from 18 months prior. 

I bought back a rabbit I had spec'd to Gti levels after the kid I sold it to rolled it. I had just done the entire suspension and brake system in that car. It all went under an 81 Scirocco I bought.

I'd like to have back the 88 Alfa Spider Veloce I sold in 02 though.

Yes and it was a car I bought here.  In 2003 a Quattro 90 with a turbo swap was up for 200X money and only a hundred miles away.  The swap was IMHO done poorly but it ran.  And it was a blast.  A few years later and a few thousand poorer it had a proper exhaust, EFI, better suspension in other words it was done.  But my goal of building a street track car was killed by life issues so I sold it.  Went to some kid who got too many tickets and sold it.  Went to another kid who put it into a guard rail in the rain in his first week of ownership.  Found it on craigslist and bought it back.  Barely made it home, the front left corner was hit, had to stop to buy a roll of duct tape to hold the hood down and the suspension was so bent the tire was thru the cords in a 50 mile drive home.  The car was not fixable but many others came to buy parts they needed.  So in the end I broke even but barely.