With Car Week behind us, everyone seems to be talking about the $750m+ worth of cars that sold or the incredible $40m paid for the Ferrari Luce. But there was really only one result I was waiting for.

The 1979 Mercedes-Benz 280 TE Wagon I wrote about last week, and had my very keen eye on, was estimated at $130k to $160k. Unfortunately for me, it ended up selling for $252,000 including premium, which I think must be some kind of record for a W123. At that price, I was very definitely out!

I've moved on though. As we all know, there's always another car around the corner that gets me hooked, and I'm sure it won't take long...

(Quick confession: I managed to delete the entire newsletter tonight without saving it. Complete rookie error. So this is version two, written rather later than planned. Please forgive any typos!)

There's a 2000 Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution VI GSR Tommi Mäkinen Edition on BaT right now, sitting in New Zealand, and it's exactly the sort of car that gets people excited for good reason.

Canal Blue over black and red cloth, around 92,000km, a six-speed manual, and one of those Evos that people genuinely chase. The TME cars have the special bodywork, Recaros and, of course, the whole Tommi Mäkinen connection. It's a very cool thing and the auction ends today.

But it was actually the comments that caught my attention.

Someone asked about importing it into the U.S. and suddenly we had a 25% estimate, another estimate around 15%, and a bit of confusion over whether the fact the car is currently in New Zealand changes anything.

Honestly, I don't blame anyone.

Import rules have moved around enough this year that unless you're dealing with them regularly, it's very easy to mix up three completely different things: where the car is currently sitting, where it originally came from and whether it's old enough to qualify for the 25-year federal exemption.

This Evo is in New Zealand, but it's a Japanese car. That matters because the country you're shipping it from and the car's country of origin are not necessarily the same thing.

Then there's the 25-year rule, which is another area where I think people understandably get confused. At 26 years old, this Evo is old enough to qualify for the federal 25-year DOT exemption, which makes bringing it into the U.S. considerably easier from a compliance point of view.

But that doesn't automatically mean there is no customs duty. They're two different things. And that's exactly why we built the TDV Import Calculator.

Rather than one person saying 25%, someone else saying 15% and the next person trying to remember which tariff changed last month, you put in the actual car, where it was built, where it's being shipped from and the purchase price, and the calculator works through the relevant rules for you.

It's free, takes about 30 seconds and, more importantly, explains what it's doing rather than just throwing a number at you.

There is one other thing I'd be looking at if I were bidding on this particular Evo. It's not completely stock. There's an HKS air filter, GReddy intercooler, aftermarket downpipe, boost controller and some tuning, so I'd certainly make sure my broker has the full picture before the car starts its journey. None of that necessarily stops you importing it, but with any modified car I'd rather disclose everything upfront than discover later that somebody has a question.

The bigger point here is simple. If you're buying something overseas, don't wait until the final five minutes of an auction to start working out what it'll really cost to get it home.

Between shipping, duties, customs fees and whatever else applies to that particular car, guessing can become expensive very quickly.

And with the rules having moved around so much this year, I'd much rather spend 30 seconds checking than rely on whichever percentage somebody happens to remember from the comments.

This 2002 BMW 325i Touring caught my attention for a few reasons. It's Alpine White, rear-wheel drive, five-speed manual, completely unmodified and, remarkably, has been with the same owner since new. It's also no reserve and currently sitting at $5,900.

But that's not actually why I'm writing about it. I spend a lot of time telling people that if they don't know how to sell a car online, find someone who does. A good PowerSeller can prepare the car properly, take the right photos, answer the questions and generally stop an auction going sideways.

But who's going to do that here? There's simply not enough money in a car like this to pay someone to provide that level of service, and reading through the comments, you can see this is exactly the sort of seller who could probably use some help.

She's owned the BMW since 2002 and openly says she's an amateur when someone asks for better videos. Then the questions start coming. There's what looks like something burnt or melted in the engine bay, which turns out, according to the seller, to be dirt and mouse droppings. There are missing keys. The car has failed California emissions twice, despite some work being done, and then the comments get into whether she can legally sell the car in California without a current smog certificate. Her response is basically that she disclosed it to Cars & Bids and assumes they know what they're doing.

None of this makes her a bad seller. Quite the opposite. She seems perfectly genuine and is trying to answer everything being thrown at her.

She just doesn't really know what she's letting herself into. And that made me wonder whether the platforms themselves need to offer something between "here's your auction, good luck" and having a professional PowerSeller represent the entire car.

Maybe there's a premium seller-assistance option. Someone who reviews your photos before the auction goes live, tells you which additional shots you need, helps you make the videos properly, identifies obvious questions that bidders are going to ask, makes sure you've got answers ready on things like smog and paperwork, and perhaps even helps you respond when the comments start getting technical.

Not full representation. Just some hand-holding. Charge $250, $500, whatever the economics need to be. Maybe some platforms already do versions of this behind the scenes, but I think there's room to make it a proper product.

Because ironically, the seller of a $5,000 car may need considerably more help than the seller of a $500,000 one.

As for the BMW itself, underneath all this is still a one-owner, California-owned, manual, rear-wheel-drive E46 wagon with 118,900 miles and a clean Carfax. Yes, there are cosmetic issues and, most importantly, an unresolved emissions problem that I'd absolutely want to understand before bidding.

But those problems are going to put people off. And if you can get comfortable with them, maybe that's exactly where the opportunity is.

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