2024-03-06 09:54:15
A warehouse with hundreds of old classic cars has been opened in South Africa. These precious cars were found at the Koetzer family estate. The father owned a huge collection, mainly Mercedes. After he died in 2020, his children sold 240 cars. Now it turns out he had a lot more.
“Surreal and amazing” is how auctioneer Joff van Reenen describes the moment he first entered the barn in South Africa’s Eastern Cape province. The warehouse belonged to Louis Koetzer, who died in a car accident in 2020. According to South African media, the man nicknamed Oom Louis is the country’s biggest car collector.
Louis and his wife Hermione were tragically killed in a car accident on a remote mountain pass in early 2020. Later that year, relatives sold hundreds of cars from his collection.
Now that the heirs want to sell part of their parents’ giant estate, a new shipment of cars has been discovered. “It’s hard to put into words the emotion I felt when I entered the warehouse, which is at least the size of three tennis courts,” says Van Reenen. “It contained rows of dozens of cars lined up like an army ready to attack.”
Judging by the thick layer of dust, the cars must have been there for decades. “On the first day, the dust was so thick that we couldn’t even tell the color, make or model.” In the end, it turns out that these are mostly Mercedes from the 1960s and 1970s. Total in the warehouse and in some farms on the site there are over 200 cars.There were also countless engines and other parts.
The entire collection of cars will be available for sale between March 25 and April 3 at creativeridesauctions.com.