I know a local guy who owns an original Shelby Cobra 289; he took it off the road in 1975, & it hasn't left his garage since then. This is a very specialized collecting area, & only someone who is really into this car knows what to look for; there are several VIN plates in locations that only an expert knows, & they must all be correct. This fellow gets queries once or twice a year from folks who track him down from DMV records, but he won't even let them see the car.

One interesting story concerns "Bill Cosby's Cobra". Apparently Bill once owned this car, but sold it. A subsequent owner drove it off the Pacific Coast Highway, & it remained submerged for a while. Eventually someone salvaged the unusable wreck & removed all the VIN plates & put them on another wrecked Cobra that had been repaired, & sold the car as "Bill Cosby's restored Cobra".

The bottom line: You had better know what you are looking at, or you may get a car that has "problems".