Low mileage Austin Maestro makes £3260 at auction

A 1984 Austin Maestro that was found in a garage with just 102 miles on the clock made £3260 when it went under the hammer - more than double what most price guides would value the car at.

The 1.3HLE had 100 factory miles on, plus two from the first owner when it was sold at Barons auction on 2 September. Offered in very original condition, it came with the carpet protectors still fitted from the dealer, Henley’s, and the original 1984/85 tax disc.

Parked alongside the Maestro was another low mileage BL offering in the way of a Rover 214SLi with 37,000 recorded miles, which made £1642. At other end of the scale was a Rolls-Royce Corniche convertible – which went for slightly above top estimate at £44,812 – and a 1964 Austin-Healey 3000, which sold for £43,692.

There was plenty of high-end metal on offer at Barons, perhaps the most sought after being a 1972 one-owner Jaguar E-type S3 FHC. The car stormed past its (what we thought was a rather low) £17,500-£20,000 estimate to sell for £45,372.

Part of the collection of the late David Cheeseman, it attracted a huge amount of interest, with bids coming in over the internet, from three phone bidders and from bidders in the bustling sale room itself.

Barons had nine Cheeseman collection cars in the sale, and every one sold. The XK150 Roadster topped the price list, making £50,000, the XK120 FHC achieved £43,692, the Mk2 3.8 £15,132, the rare Series One XJ6 manual £9084, the 1978 Triumph Stag £9868 and the three no reserve cars selling for around £2500.

Another E-type – this one a bright red Series Three Roadster that had been in the same ownership for 29 years and had covered less than 60,000 miles – just nudged over its top estimate to achieve £42,072. The Weber twin-choke carburettors possibly putting off the Jaguar purists.

The sale also featured some non-British cars that made good money, including a 1988 UR Quattro coupé (£11,384), closely followed by a 1976 VW T2 Campervan £11,100).