84 SR5 in Colorado

[84sr54wd]

Some states maintain title records from long, long, ago.
Oddly, troglodyte Missouri does. I enquired of the MO Dept. of Revenue a few years ago (to list it on our VIN Thread) and it came up with the VIN number - but nothing else as to Whitie's fate after me (in '85).
You might check VA's similar licensing department - and even your County's tax base. If you don't know the VIN, check with whichever insurance company you last used - they keep info forever.
Where are you located in VA?
Tom M.

When I get some time, I am going to see if my father still has the record of when he sold my 84 Tercel back in 1995. He keeps detailed records of everything he ever does and is a highly organized man, so I will check with him to see if I can get any information. I am sure we can somehow dig up the VIN of the car and possibly even the name of who bought it. In today's day and age with Facebook and records ....its amazing who you can find and how. Thanks for this information!

[84sr54wd]

unfortunately the fate of many econo-boxes from the '80's is that most of them have been to the wrecking yard, and than to the crusher, and recycled into something else many years ago. They can either rust out, or get wrecked past the point is not worth fixing at all, the scrap metal it represents is worth more to the owner than the value of the car, or sometimes even the parts on it. Many wrecking yards do not keep them very long because the demand for parts is so small for cars that old. They may become collectable at some point, but that has not occured yet. though very nice examples with rare low miles have been going for remarkable sums, one pristine example with only 30-something thousand original miles sold on E-bay for $10,800 a few years ago. Still not in the "collectable" catagory, which means there is no profit in restoring them for resale, but they may reach that point some time, when replacement parts are impossible to get. I have rebuilt mine several times over, and have done it for others, but that is because we happen to like this car enough to do it.

I agree completely....I was talking to my parents just the other day about this whole thing. My 84 4wd was sold in 1995 when I got my new Jeep to go off to college with. I remember after we sold it, I still saw these cars around for another 5-8 years. However, now that it is 2014, I bet it has been 10-14 years now since I have seen another one on the road in my area of the East Coast (Richmond, Va.). They have disappeared now. I venture to say that it has nothing to do with the mechanical aspects of the car, but the downfall of this car was the cheap Japanese metal and then priming and paint technologies were not good back in the 80's and so the metal was the weak area. It gets very humid here and mix that with the rest and you have a recipe for the extinction that has taken place. That is another reason that I am so excited about this car I bought......many people out there had these cars and knew what they were and I fully expect it to be something that people will see me in and will start conversations. It's simply a Toyota icon and I am stoked to think that I might have purchased one of the best well preserved examples of the car. I'm glad I got my hands on it to appreciate and take care of vs. someone buying it just because it was cheap and they needed something to tank around in and beat it to hell.

[84sr54wd]

ARCHINSTL - I live in Richmond Va.....which is about 1.5 hours (if traffic cooperates) South of Washington DC.