Modesto, California, where this 1969 Mustang Mach I lives, is about 70 miles south of the State capital, Sacramento. It’s farm country, and the home to the Gallo Family Winery, so after you do some tasting and call your designated driver, you might want to tour over and see this tidy red SportsRoof, as Fastbacks had come to be called by the ’69 model year. This car, with a current bid over $11K and the reserve not met, has a buy-it-now price of $55,000 in its listing here on eBay.

It’s the perfect cruise-night trophy winner: nice enough on the top side to be worth looking at, but nowhere close to perfect under the hood or on the underside. There’s a lot of surface rust on the underneath regions, and the engine itself looks a bit of a fright, though it’s nothing that a good cosmetic detail couldn’t address. The next owner, who should first of all verify from a Marti Report that this car was indeed born a Mach I, could also add value by redoing the interior door panels, perhaps tightening up the seat upholstery, particularly at the pilot position, and buffing out the paint. Likely as not, the AC also needs to be retrofitted to take the new refrigerant, but at least the compressor is mounted.

But before you start making bids, note that there are some irregularities in the ad. For one, the car is listed as having over 700,000 miles. Slip of a digit, perhaps, but the only further claims made as to the fitness of the engine are “runs awsome [sic]” and “runs great,” and there is no indication of the age of any rebuild it may have enjoyed or how many times the odo has made the trip around. While we’re on the engine, this one has a 351-CID Windsor, and with no indication to the contrary, it would appear to be the lesser, 2-barrel carb version rather than the 351 4-barrel. Power comes through the drivetrain via an automatic transmission. Despite the Mach I designation, in other words, this is a tame and useable driver.

The ad also says that the owner has had it five-plus years, then that the brother of the ad writer has had it for twenty. Why the discrepancy? The paint is also an area of mystery, with the “original” car having been resprayed, but in the past far enough for the seller not to know when. So back to the comment above: If authentic, this seems like the platform for a show car, but at the moment, it’s just a starting point. Probably better to see how soft that $55K ask is and get the Mach I with the idea to drive it around as is, fixing the little things mentioned earlier as you go and foregoing the expense and impatience of a full restoration. Oh, and without fail, dump those ridiculous wheels, first thing.