CraigsList: A 4-Door C3 Corvette For $275,000
This Corvette America is one a handful of late C3s with four doors, four seats, two T-Tops.
How is it possible that the supposed sole remaining Corvette America isn’t decked out in stars-and-bars? It’s almost criminal, but what the seller claims to be the last of five C3 Corvette with four doors, coined the “Corvette America,” is up for sale on San Francisco CraigsList for a mere $275,000. That seems like a lot of money for a car from the Dark Years of the C3, when horsepower eluded all cars and the base ‘Vette made fewer than 200 ponies. Still, this is a relic from the peak of disco and adult films and American automakers trying anything to gain traction with the domestic car-buying public. We’re glad to see it exist, even if the asking price seems pretty steep.
California Custom Coach built the prototype, which was on display at the 1979 Chicago Auto Show with four leather bucket seats and twin T-Tops, which probably would have been marketed as TURBO-TWIN T-TOP ROOF or some other such Malaise Era-appropriate name. As it turns out, only a handful were made, probably primarily for promotional purposes. The seller says this red one is the last remaining of five built, but Super Chevy suggested with their 2001 profile of a gray Corvette America that six were built (one prototype and five production). Whether or not it was five or six doesn’t really matter; this red one is rare and certainly more valuable than a run-of-the-mill C3, but how much money is it worth?
A red Corvette America was posted for sale in 2010 for $300,000 and since this seller claims there was only one red four-door Vette and he bought it in 1985, it’s likely this very one. Jalopnik’s writer who found the 2010 sale suggested then that Jay Leno at one time owned a Corvette America and if it’s still around, he’s probably a bit gunshy to show that he owns such an affront to good Corvettes.