This Ford Escort 1600 Sport auction result gave us one of the most entertaining bidding battles we’ve filmed for a while.
Before the 1979 Mk2 Escort went under the hammer at Anglia Car Auctions, we took a closer look at the car and asked UK Barn Finds followers to predict what it would sell for.
There were plenty of guesses.
Now we have the answer.
After an auction lasting more than eight minutes, the hammer finally came down at £15,000.
This wasn’t a freshly restored Escort prepared specially for auction.
The 1979 Ford Escort 1600 Sport came from a deceased estate and had been found at the back of its long-term keeper’s garage, where it had been stored for many years.
According to Anglia Car Auctions, that keeper had owned the Escort since it was only three years old.
The V5C recorded just three former keepers and the odometer showed 58,042 miles.
And then there’s the colour.
The Escort’s black paintwork immediately caught our attention when we looked around it before the sale.
ACA stated that the black finish was believed to be factory, while inside is an eye-catching cloth interior which appeared original and looked as though it could respond well to a careful clean.
As we mentioned when we first featured the car, enthusiasts will inevitably have their own opinions about some of the details.
The headlights, for example, aren’t what everybody might expect to see on a 1600 Sport.
But that’s part of the fun with an old Ford that has survived decades in the hands of a long-term owner.
Cars evolve. Parts get changed. Owners personalise them.
Would you return everything to factory specification, or preserve some of the changes as part of the car’s history?
This was very much a car emerging from long-term storage rather than one ready to jump in and drive home.
The vendor advised that the handbrake had seized and that some battery bolts were missing.
Its paperwork was relatively modest, comprising some receipts from 2007 and 2008 along with insurance documents from 2011 to 2013.
Interestingly, its original number plates were still with the car in the boot, along with a new tyre and some new mats.
For the right Ford enthusiast, though, the attraction was obvious.
It’s a Mk2 Escort.
More specifically, it’s a 1600 Sport that had spent decades with the same keeper before eventually emerging from the back of a garage.
Before auction day, we filmed the Escort and asked our followers a simple question:
How much will it sell for?
Anglia Car Auctions had placed an estimate of £8,000-£12,000 on it.
But estimates only tell you so much.
When two or more people decide they really want the same car, an auction can very quickly find its own level.
And this one certainly did.
The original auction lasted for more than eight minutes.
That’s a long time for one car to occupy the rostrum.
Rather than simply racing through the bids, this became a proper battle as the auctioneer worked between interested parties and the price gradually climbed.
We’ve condensed the auction to around two and a half minutes, but kept the important part intact – the bidding itself.
If you haven’t seen the result yet, have a figure in mind before you press play.
Eventually, there was only one bidder left.
The hammer came down at £15,000.
With buyer’s premium added, Anglia Car Auctions records the final result as £16,200.
That’s comfortably beyond the £8,000-£12,000 estimate.
More importantly, it gives us another fascinating real-world indication of just how much appetite remains for interesting Mk2 Escorts.
It’s impossible to know exactly what motivated each bidder.
Perhaps it was the rarity of finding a 1600 Sport for sale.
Perhaps the long-term ownership appealed.
Perhaps somebody particularly wanted a black example.
Or perhaps this was simply one of those occasions when two people looked at the same garage-find Escort and decided they weren’t going home without it.
That’s what makes live auctions so interesting.
A valuation can tell you what a car ought to be worth.
An auction tells you what the people who actually want it are prepared to pay on the day.
For this Escort, that figure was £15,000 before fees.
If you commented on our original video before the auction, now’s the time to see how close you were.
And if £15,000 was more than you expected, we’d be interested to know where you would have stopped.
Would you restore the Escort back towards factory specification, give it a careful mechanical recommissioning and preserve what you can, or take it in another direction entirely?
Whatever happens next, after spending years tucked away at the back of a garage, this Escort 1600 Sport certainly made an impressive return to the outside world.
You can see the original auction listing and photographs on the Anglia Car Auctions website:
https://angliacarauctions.co.uk/auctions/2774-22-Aug-2026/15687~1-1979-ford-escort-1600-sport-mk2
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