Matt Silver in fireman's gear with one of his trucks, which he is now selling on Trade Me. Photo / Supplied
Matt Silver in fireman's gear with one of his trucks, which he is now selling on Trade Me. Photo / Supplied
A fire engine enthusiast is still looking to sell most of his vintage collection after a Trade Me auction failed to shift the lot, despite 58,000 page views.
More than 900 people added the auction to their Trade Me watchlist, but three offers fell through after the auction closed.
Matt Silver owns about 18 fire trucks, some of them rare prototypes, which he began collecting in the early 2000s.
After nearly two decades of housing the trucks in a Wellington warehouse, Silver is keen to part with them so he can focus on settling down and starting a family.
He has 10 weeks before his lease is up to shift them all.
"I've got to the point in my life where there is other things I'm looking to do, one thing is meet a woman and settle down and hopefully have a child," said Silver, who turned 47 in March.
A former rural fire engine in the unusual colour yellow. Photo / Trade Me
Silver is downsizing his whole life, having also sold his bed and other furniture.
"As I've got older, my attitude's changed and I see more value in settling down and not being so materialistic," he said.
The collection was listed on Trade Me in March and was the online auction site's most-viewed motor listing for the month.
However Silver has only managed to negotiate the sale of one truck, leaving him with about 14 left to find homes for.
The remainder are too old to sell and will be broken down for parts or scrapped.
"In that last auction there were 14 fire engines up for sale and what happened was a number of people, three parties came to me and said we're very interested," Silver said.
"After the sale finished I was negotiating with a couple of them and it ended up falling flat and not going ahead."
One of Matt silver's vintage fire trucks. Photo / Trade Me
Silver's preference is to keep the remaining engines together, and will list another bulk auction over the weekend.
If the auction fell through again, Silver said he'd list the engines separately.
"I'm quite confident they may sell individually. Essentially there are four or five fire engines that other people are saying let me know if you're going to sell it [on its own]."
Part of Matt Silver's collection. Photo / Trade Me
Silver's trucks weren't the only quirky auction of interest on Trade Me last month.
A 1968 Holden Monaro which had been hiding away in shed for the last 15 years was the second most popular car listing in March, fetching more than 25,000 views from car lovers around the country before it sold for $50,200.
A 2017 Lamborghini and a 2017 Tesla came in third and fourth for the most viewed motors last month with both listings fetching over 19,500 views each.
And a nifty little pink 1980 Honda Acoma was also very popular, with nearly 13,000 views before selling.
This pink 1980 Honda Acoma had almost 13,000 view before selling. Photo / Trade Me
