Folks, I was lucky caller number one. After talking to the owner (who IS extremely pleasant) over a two day period I passed on the car after seeing several pictures.
In my opinion the car is legit, however by the looks of it it's been run VERY hard and I just decided that I didn't want a resto. project. The owner faxed me a copy of the original sales receipt; VIN matched and car was listed as "Buick GNX". Strange however that it was purchased at a Lincoln Mercury dealer up in Illinois (matched CarFax mileage though). The evaporator box DOES have the ASC emissions sticker--can see it in a picture I had him send me; the rear suspension pictures show a very rough, dirty and rusty GNX factory set-up; the Maclaren door sticker is correct, however the 009 dash plate is very faded; CarFax matches the current owners somewhat "moving" history of where the car has been. The engine compartment is really unpresentable. Looks like the receiver dryer and AC lines have been replaced though the owner knew nothing about it. He didn't seem too concerned with the rarity of the car (just replaced the alternator and gave them the original as a core--ouch), however he is very honest about what he knows has been done to the car (bigger injectors, 2nd owner installed a 4.11 rear end; a/c converted to R134, "she burns a little oil) and he talked about how he races an '86 Turbo-T. Someone along the way looks like they had some real quarter mile fun--current owner said he's never run it in the quarter. You'll have to judge for yourself.
Dennis Kirban was kind enough to spend some time on the phone with me to discuss what to really be concerned about and ultimately I walked--although he's right, if the car is legit it's not going to lose value. I knew there was a gentleman in CA that was waiting for my decision--looks like he passed too based on what I read here.
Net/net, if your inclined to want a resto. project I think a cheap plane trip to the Memphis area will be money well spent. I decided I'd wait for the right car and pay bigger money, however this may very well be cheap entry into the elite 547.
