Recommendations on an enclosed trailer transport co?

[84Impulse]

Hello Gents,
Newbie here homing in on a Delorean, in the midwest, looking to transport to the DC area(1600 miles). Getting some pretty insanely expensive quotes, ranging from $2000, to 3000. Had a Lamborghini shipped from Dallas 4 yrs back for ~1000. Is this post-pandemic inflation that Im seeing?! Can anyone please recommend a good, reasonable enclosed transport company? Thanks in advance.

Kurt

[David T]

Everything is going up in price and rapidly lately including fuel. Be very careful you are not being handled by a broker. A broker could use multiple carriers, each one taking the car for a portion of the trip, loading and unloading the car and it sits somewhere in between. If anyone damages the car no one will take responsibility and it could take a while to get the car. Make sure you have your own insurance on the car before transport. Use a well-known carrier that has tracking so you can follow the progress. If you try to save money and the car arrives damaged, anything you thought you saved is gone and now you have to deal with getting it fixed and who is going to pay for it. It isn't worth the hassle. For what it is worth I have had good experience with Horseless Carriage. Not the cheapest one but one of the best. If your trip is not on a major route like CA to NY or NY to FLA expect to pay more. Enclosed transport isn't all it's cracked up to be but it is better than open transport. On one car I had transported from CA to NY, they must have gone through the southwest desert. The car was COVERED in fine brown sand! First thing I had to do was wash the car! It even got inside.

[84Impulse]

Everything is going up in price and rapidly lately including fuel. Be very careful you are not being handled by a broker. A broker could use multiple carriers, each one taking the car for a portion of the trip, loading and unloading the car and it sits somewhere in between. If anyone damages the car no one will take responsibility and it could take a while to get the car. Make sure you have your own insurance on the car before transport. Use a well-known carrier that has tracking so you can follow the progress. If you try to save money and the car arrives damaged, anything you thought you saved is gone and now you have to deal with getting it fixed and who is going to pay for it. It isn't worth the hassle. For what it is worth I have had good experience with Horseless Carriage. Not the cheapest one but one of the best. If your trip is not on a major route like CA to NY or NY to FLA expect to pay more. Enclosed transport isn't all it's cracked up to be but it is better than open transport. On one car I had transported from CA to NY, they must have gone through the southwest desert. The car was COVERED in fine brown sand! First thing I had to do was wash the car! It even got inside.

Wow, thank you David! I really do appreciate your insight, very kind. Sorry to hear about the sandstorm your car went thru.
Its amazing how your car can be juggled like this by the broker. Will definitely have it insured if deal goes through. The best rate I received is with Passport (pretty sure they are a good company, after researching). It is a luck of the draw to some degree. I've heard of some guys getting their exotics damaged by the best of carriers.
Again, thanks, and really hope to become an owner soon!
Kurt

[MrChocky]

Hello Gents,
Newbie here homing in on a Delorean, in the midwest, looking to transport to the DC area(1600 miles). Getting some pretty insanely expensive quotes, ranging from $2000, to 3000. Had a Lamborghini shipped from Dallas 4 yrs back for ~1000. Is this post-pandemic inflation that I'm seeing?! Can anyone please recommend a good, reasonable enclosed transport company? Thanks in advance.

Kurt

Yes, the classic car market is on fire. Spend any time on a major freeway and see what you can spot. And so rates have gone up, and my understanding is that the shipping business has/had pretty slim margins.

I've never shipped before either, and for my project from Hawaii, I had to make a quick decision, or risk not getting the car at all. I went with a shipping coordinator company - the first one I looked at had terrible reviews, and the second one I went with was much better. All I had to do was send in a small amount of paperwork and a deposit. The seller did do a fair amount of work to prep the car (no loose parts, etc), but in the end he said he just rolled up with the car (port of Honolulu) - real easy.

I went with an open transport. Given the cosmetic condition of the car, I didn't feel like this was a huge deal. And yes, I probably paid a little extra versus organizing things myself, but given that as I mentioned, I'd never done this before, and the slight complexities of shipping from Hawaii, I felt that $2400 shipped to my door on the East Coast was entirely reasonable. Perhaps I'll regret it when the car arrives, and yes, if I did it again I'd probably do something different (although it seems unlikely I'll ever ship a car to/from Hawaii again).

[84Impulse]

Yes, the classic car market is on fire. Spend any time on a major freeway and see what you can spot. And so rates have gone up, and my understanding is that the shipping business has/had pretty slim margins.

I've never shipped before either, and for my project from Hawaii, I had to make a quick decision, or risk not getting the car at all. I went with a shipping coordinator company - the first one I looked at had terrible reviews, and the second one I went with was much better. All I had to do was send in a small amount of paperwork and a deposit. The seller did do a fair amount of work to prep the car (no loose parts, etc), but in the end he said he just rolled up with the car (port of Honolulu) - real easy.

I went with an open transport. Given the cosmetic condition of the car, I didn't feel like this was a huge deal. And yes, I probably paid a little extra versus organizing things myself, but given that as I mentioned, I'd never done this before, and the slight complexities of shipping from Hawaii, I felt that $2400 shipped to my door on the East Coast was entirely reasonable. Perhaps I'll regret it when the car arrives, and yes, if I did it again I'd probably do something different (although it seems unlikely I'll ever ship a car to/from Hawaii again).

Thanks MrC! I wrote a long response and it somehow didnt post! Let us know how car is when back

[Rich]

+1 on David T's advice. Not only is fuel expensive but the driver shortage must be hitting them as well as the rest of the industry.

Also, refer to this thread about the subject of shipping DeLoreans in general.

Adding an amplification of the advice to be careful with brokers. Deal directly with the shipping outfit. Reliable, Plycar, Passport Transport and Horseless are all good name brands - pretty sure they all do only enclosed shipments.

Take a few minutes to read this recent article by Hagerty about collector car shipping.

Among the other tidbits in that article about asking a broker for a quote....

"A clear downside of this marketplace approach [getting an online broker quotation] is well known to anyone who has filled out a request with an online mortgage vendor or an extended warranty provider. Once you’ve hit the “Submit” button, you’ll be getting emails and phone calls about your shipment from now until what will feel like the end of time." Maybe they all share your email address with each other. If you do fill out an online quote form with a shipping broker consider using a single-purpose dummy/burner email address you can abandon after you've had enough.

Everything is going up in price and rapidly lately including fuel. Be very careful you are not being handled by a broker. A broker could use multiple carriers, each one taking the car for a portion of the trip, loading and unloading the car and it sits somewhere in between. If anyone damages the car no one will take responsibility and it could take a while to get the car. Make sure you have your own insurance on the car before transport. Use a well-known carrier that has tracking so you can follow the progress. If you try to save money and the car arrives damaged, anything you thought you saved is gone and now you have to deal with getting it fixed and who is going to pay for it. It isn't worth the hassle. For what it is worth I have had good experience with Horseless Carriage. Not the cheapest one but one of the best. If your trip is not on a major route like CA to NY or NY to FLA expect to pay more. Enclosed transport isn't all it's cracked up to be but it is better than open transport. On one car I had transported from CA to NY, they must have gone through the southwest desert. The car was COVERED in fine brown sand! First thing I had to do was wash the car! It even got inside.

[84Impulse]

Thank you Rich! Very kind of you to help steer me here. Looking at passport now, and will ask them to guarantee that only one truck will be used. Thanks for the link and quotation too!

[David T]

Even the big guys may use multiple trucks, loading and unloading the car at their terminals. Even if they don't, they may load and unload your car to get others in and out of the truck before delivering the car to you. That is why it is even more expensive to transport cars that won't start and drive on their own. Get quotes from at least 2. Among the top national ones are Passport, H/C and Escort. If the car you are transporting is a POS and you don't care, open transport can save you a few bucks but don't do it in the wintertime.

[84Impulse]

Even the big guys may use multiple trucks, loading and unloading the car at their terminals. Even if they don't, they may load and unload your car to get others in and out of the truck before delivering the car to you. That is why it is even more expensive to transport cars that won't start and drive on their own. Get quotes from at least 2. Among the top national ones are Passport, H/C and Escort. If the car you are transporting is a POS and you don't care, open transport can save you a few bucks but don't do it in the wintertime.

Kind thanks again, Dave! I had a suspicion this may happen, but its probably safer(im hoping!!) with one of the top transports. Again, thanks

[TheStoot]

If I got my car shipped it would have been along a not so main route so it was looking like 2-3k to ship from Mississippi to Massachusetts. I didn’t wanna spend the extra money to ship so I just flew to it and drove it home instead. Best fucking experience I’ve had to date!