1976 GMC JIMMY casa grande - camper
- Thread starter oner0002
- Start date
77blazerchalet
Former Chalet owner
Casa Grande #0855, built in 8/76.
Being the guy who mostly keeps track of these, I don't have a good handle on what's happened with this one yet. It was for sale in Crosslake Wisconsin Craigslist ads for quite a while two years ago, and was bought by a guy who joined our Chalet/Casa Grande forum, but the Jimmy was suffering from terminal rust. Emailed the seller, no reply back yet. His ad says "rust free Arizona truck" which could be true if he got a different truck to salvage the project, but then this would be an orphaned camper unit on a non-factory original truck, which ruins the collector value. What you have is whatever rust-free Jimmys or Blazers are worth, combined with a decent condition orphaned camper unit being worth $300-$500. $7 or $8 grand, tops?
Now, if he made the original Jimmy 'rust free' in a technical sense by replacing every toasted panel with new metal, now you are talking about the cost of all the labor and parts which go into a total restoration (which should also include matching numbers engine / tranny), so the advertised price is actually in the neighborhood of a full restoration value. Problem is, the ad also says it has "new.. engine and tranny 350 motor". The VIN I have in my mega-spreadsheet for this particular Jimmy says it had a 400 engine from the factory. For guys at the 'Barrett-Jackson Auction level' of analyzing collector values, it now not only doesn't have a matching numbers engine, it has the wrong size engine in it. On top of that, it isn't fully restored yet, since I see the same big chips in the faded vinyl stripes that I saw when a guy sent me pics of it from its Crosslake WI location.
Being the guy who mostly keeps track of these, I don't have a good handle on what's happened with this one yet. It was for sale in Crosslake Wisconsin Craigslist ads for quite a while two years ago, and was bought by a guy who joined our Chalet/Casa Grande forum, but the Jimmy was suffering from terminal rust. Emailed the seller, no reply back yet. His ad says "rust free Arizona truck" which could be true if he got a different truck to salvage the project, but then this would be an orphaned camper unit on a non-factory original truck, which ruins the collector value. What you have is whatever rust-free Jimmys or Blazers are worth, combined with a decent condition orphaned camper unit being worth $300-$500. $7 or $8 grand, tops?
Now, if he made the original Jimmy 'rust free' in a technical sense by replacing every toasted panel with new metal, now you are talking about the cost of all the labor and parts which go into a total restoration (which should also include matching numbers engine / tranny), so the advertised price is actually in the neighborhood of a full restoration value. Problem is, the ad also says it has "new.. engine and tranny 350 motor". The VIN I have in my mega-spreadsheet for this particular Jimmy says it had a 400 engine from the factory. For guys at the 'Barrett-Jackson Auction level' of analyzing collector values, it now not only doesn't have a matching numbers engine, it has the wrong size engine in it. On top of that, it isn't fully restored yet, since I see the same big chips in the faded vinyl stripes that I saw when a guy sent me pics of it from its Crosslake WI location.