Farmall 1206

Just out of curiosity, can a 1206 be worth 46000.00? Even with new tires? It's posted at The Tractor House, no picture.

sure it can....I know of one that had almost that much $$$ put into it. It's as close to better than perfect than you can get.

A 1206 brought $29000 just a week ago here in Iowa. And as good as it was $35000 would not have surprised me.

Gary

To me it is and old tractor , yes they did not make a million of them but it is and old tractor . Would i like to have one yes , would be put under glass and tucked away , NO it would be doing what it was made for working along side of the 706 and the 806 . Just like my S/MTA and the other 4 S/MTA's in my neighbour hood . Yesterday one of those COLLECTOR ITEMS was picking corn and the second S/MTA was hauling wagons . The third was grinding feed at another farm and mine was setting in the shed doing nothing . To me there are all kinds of nut cases with more money then brains. Case and point here , about 10-12 years ago i bought a one owner 806 off a farmer out in N/W Ind. and i gave him a fair price for it , it needed a little work and a paint job . Had real good tires on it sheet metal was straight but faded and org. Needed a seat and some lights and leaks fixed . Well i fixed them and had a friend do a paint job on it . I was going to keep it and become a BTO. with three tractors , the three being my S/MTA and my 706 . I had it setting outside the shop all painted up with a new seat and paint and i was working on a Farmall M carb when i heard a strange truck pull in and his guy that i had never seen befor walks in and says is that your 806 setting out there and i told him that it was and he asked how much i wanted for it and i informed him that it WAS NOT FOR SALE . But he did not want to hear that and kept bugging me about HOW MUCH . At the time you could go anywhere and buy a 806 for nomore then 5500 bucks in nice shape. Well i figured that oh what the heck and threw a 8750 price on it and setting next to it was a nice clean 1066 that i would sell for 8250 and i was making a good profit at that price on the 1066 . When i told him all he said was OH and turned and walked out the door and left. Thought to myself that took the wind out of his sail . and i went back to what i was doing . Twenty min. later i hear a car pull in and was thinking now who and in walks this guy and his wife and aid how do you want the check made out ?? Flat told them no checks strickly CASH and she went to the back and came back with CASH. Same with my S/MTA people have offered me a lot of money for it but i learned to turn them down and i also learned that IF i don't apint them the ones i want to keep that NO ONE will bug you for it . Case in point here my 806 that i have now is about as UGLY a one that yo will find , yep it has oil leaks it needs a paint job needs two lights fixed and did i say it is plum ugly , BUT it runs great good T/A the best P/S of any Farmall i have ever owned . Everybody has used it and all agree that it is a good tractor BUT NOBODY wants it . But let me fix the oil leaks and lights add a new seat and a paint job and it would be history For what ever price i put on it. To me they are just tractors , they were made to do work and as long as you can find parts to fix them they keep doing what they were ment to do . They will go put a crop in the ground just the same as a new one and what ever crop you do plant it does not care what it got planted with just the same as when you harvest the crop where it be a 1500 dollar combine or a half million dollar combine . In the end when all the dust settles i will put more dollars in my pocket then the guy with the big payments . Just like the old performance cars , would i like to have one , yes i would love to find me a 68 Plymoth Road Runner , would i pay the price what they are wanting for one , Not in your widest dreams . Why would i pay 20-30 grand or more for a car that i bought new for 2400 bucks for. Or like the 61 Ford Rag top that i saw in E/Bay that if that car had the correct interior and still had the imprint of my knuckles in the dash from when my Hurst shift broke on me going into third gear i would have sworen it was my old 61 with a 390 tri power in the same color but would i give the 52 K they were wanting . Nope. I have a 53 S/H thqat i will probable never get to as to me it is a worthless tractor for our use the only thing that it could be used for it running the elevator to put corn into the cribs . It needs and overhaul needs paint needs a seat all lights did work and needs tires now . The engine did run up till the sheep chewed off the wire one day when they got out and it has sat since . Since it does not have enough power to pull three bottoms or pull the planter or pull the baler with a wagon behind it in our hill or the weight why keep it and dump money into it .

Gary, the man that bought that 1206 originally sold it to the man(estate) that had the auction. He bought it from his FIL. His FIL bought it new. It came back to central Iowa. About 6 miles from the farm progress grounds.

Glad the tractor went back home.

There is quite a story behind that estate.

Email if you want to here the story.

There must have been a family history behind it. I for one would spend whatever it took to buy the OLIVER Model 1955 that my papaw bought new and was sold on his retirement farm sale in 1977. What I would give for just one more round riding in that tractor with the man we lost in 2009.

That's quite a story about the 806. Did you ever find out the story behind it? The guy wanted it real bad, we can see that. Was he(or close to) the previous owner? I think I may be one of the nut cases you're talking about. Rather than buy a running 460D and paint it, I've got $4500 invested in a water-damaged D236 because of sentimentality. Oh, well. It's fun.

Moral of that story is "Never price anything you don't want to sell". I had a boss that did that some years back, he had a really slick Jeep CJ-7. Some kid started bugging him about it, he told the kid he didn't want to sell it but the kid just kept on bugging him every time he'd run into him. Boss finally got tired of it and shot the kid a price that was about twice what the thing was worth, just to shut him up. Kid didn't say anything and walked away, but about a month later the Boss pulled into his driveway and there sat the kid, who grinned and told him that he'd brought the money for the Jeep. Boss didn't really have any choice but to sell it, since he'd priced it, but he sure was sick to see it rolling out of his driveway.

The 1206 paint scheme is my favorite.They dont start well,shift well,and the rear ends can be a little noisy but to me they are like a 55 Chevy a true classic.I have a few nice original JDs but my 1206 gets ten times the attention.I know of some that have brought 20K +and the #7501 sold a few years back for good money.They are not that rare but nice ones sell good.Our dollar has shrank where you just as well spend some on something you like and can actually drive,use,or just have.

No he was not a relative , he lived about two miles from where my old shop was . and about 380 miles from where the tractor came from . Myself i don't buy tractors for senimetal values i buy them to make money and farm with my mistakes . My S/MTA was bought because i wanted one and when i bought it was cheap and needed little work to be good and it got painted because it was twenty years past needing a paint job . My first 706 that i bought was a three striker ( narrow ft., fast hitch , and NO PTO) and it was CHEAP i mean dirt cheap like 650 bucks. And it was a Gasser . I farmed with it for 12-13 years along with a Junk set of cut down 710 plows and a 13 foot 370 disc that i rebladed because it really needed blades . I bought a super nice 1240 J D plateless planter with monitor for 650 bucks and i had a Massey 300 combine that i bought for 650 bucks and a 22 corn head for 7.50 , yes that is correct seven dollars and fifty cents for a working corn head then the next year i added a cab for a 150 bucks to the combine and upgraded the charging system and added more lights to it out of two five gallon buckes of lights i bought at a sale for 2.50 . I had a super nice little combine that did a super job in corn and small grain and made MONEY combining for the small guys with little fields and little gates . I also opened up fields for guys that had pull type pickers , one round around the outside and one pass down the middel and charged twenty bucks travle and 24 and hour , when doing custom combining i charged 24 and acre as long as they could keep the grain away from me but if i had to set waiting to empty out they had fifteen min . then we went on the clock . In good corn that little old small combine could keep two 16 foot grain trucks and 6 Kill bros. gravity wagons and two tractors humping hauling seven miles as my one customer found out as the first year i did his he brought up a I H 1600 load star with a 16 foot midwest grain bed and his J D 4230 with two kill bros 350 boxes with the high sides and said that his son would be up as soon as he was done milking and by that time i might have the one filled Told him that i did not want to set and wait and he told me that they will be way ahead of me . well the first round next to the woods was a little light and i made it about three quarters of a way around the field and the bine was full and i had to pull out and go dump So while i was up by the road dumping when i finished i mover the tractor and wagons to the far end as i knew then i would not be ale to make a full round . Even with the walk back to the road and back in the seat and shelling i had everything filled including the bin when Rusty stopped back before his son got there to take the first load in . He went and got his brothers truck with the same bed but under a Ford another 4230 and two more 350 Kill bros. and borrowed two more plus got a neighbor kid to drive one of the tractors . i was shelling in 184 BPA corn and was dumping at both ends . That little 300 made me a bunch of money for under a grand investment . What i have done since 1983 was to make a living to keep a roof over our heads and feed my family . Try my best to treat people right and be fair .