UPDATE – This 1976 Buick Electra 225 Limited has traveled from New Hampshire down to Florida, added 111 to the odometer, gained some skinnier white wall tires, and is listed for sale again – this time here on eBay in Sarasota, Florida. The seller is asking $37,900, a mere $19,000 more than what it sold for back in November of 2021! Please check out the new photos and let us know your thoughts on this black beauty. Thanks to Larry D. for sending in this updated tip!
FROM 11/20/2021 – Wait a minute, this is a Buick. Most of you have heard that phrase before, as big as a Buick, and this 1976 Buick Electra 225 Limited is about as big as it gets for Buick, at least without being a limo or other stretched car. This sleek black beauty is listed here on eBay in Swanzey, New Hampshire, the current bid price is just over $9,677 and the reserve isn’t met yet. Thanks to Larry D for sending in this tip!
This thing is drop-dead gorgeous and this was the last year of the fourth-generation Electra 225s before GM downsized them, but let’s chat about the 800-pound gorilla and/or the elephant in the room first: those whitewall tires! I agree, they’re too much for me and I don’t like them at all, but the owner did or does, and that’s really all that matters in the vehicle world. We have enough people telling us what to do in real life, we should damn well be able to do what we want to do with our vehicles, at least in the looks department. I’m off of the soapbox now, sorry.
This long, low luxury car has a mind-blowing 11,544 miles on it, according to the seller. Check out the photos and I think that you’ll agree that it’s not 111,544 miles but really just over 11k. Back in the late-1970s, I had a beautiful green 1971 Buick Electra 225 four-door hardtop that I got from the original owner’s son for, gulp, $750! I know, those days are gone forever. It was as mint as the day it came off of the showroom floor, worked like new, and got 11 mpg in the city and 17 on the highway. Like a dope, I sold it a few months later for $750 to buy some speakers for the band that I was in at the time. Here’s a horrible image of it, a scanned-in slide.
A red interior is my weakness. This one looks as perfect as it should for an ultra-low-mile car both front and back. Although, I wonder if that’s a trick of the camera on the photo of the back seat where some of the “buttons” appear to be worn and also the inside of the strap on the side? The trunk looks great, too, as does the super solid underside.
Oh baby, there it is! This is Buick’s 455 cubic-inch V8 which in 1976 would have had around 205 horsepower. My ’71 Electra had a bit more, 230 net hp or so, and that isn’t a big difference. As expected, this one runs great and it sure looks clean. Any thoughts on this deuce-and-a-quarter?
I did enjoy this. Brought me back to my walk to school in north-east Toronto at age 7 in 1974. I walked past a huge Buick Wildcat and then a few houses later a Lotus Europa.
Being sold by a Toyota dealer. Trade in?
I appreciate the reproduction super wide white radials. They are not a bargain. Almost as much as a modern 18″ tire. They would look better on a ’61 Buick, or any Pre ’62, for that matter.
Obviously, we know they where the previous owner’s preference. If I were to buy this, off they would go. I do like that there are still options out there for a narrow version of the white wall. Coker, Hankook, and even Uniroyal made them.
I am with the owner. The tires are an expensive addition. I like them. This is a very special car and when it rolls people take note. An American version of a VIP. I see the price ending much higher and very likely leaving the US. Large American cars are hot outside the US.
Lovely car but it won’t be coming to the Uk I’m afraid . Our petrol is now $10 per US Gallon. Help !
Yes, a pinstripe whitewall would suit the car better.
Now, thay is one sweet ride! The only oyhet model that gets my motor running is the convertable. But I hate to think what that might run.
Definitely one worth watching🙂
Never had a Electra convterble last big buick was Centurion but i can see putting one together..
Outstanding!
Your ’71 may have only had a 25hp advantage, but it also had 400 lb less to haul around, thanks to 5-mph bumpers and emissions equipment on the ’76.
Nonetheless, this is probably the ultimate 1976 Electra, from the days when owning an Electra meant that you could probably afford a Cadillac, but preferred to keep a slightly lower profile.
Like driving a cloud. Beautiful
Looks like the styling dept just phoned this one in. Nothing like the great ones from around 1970 or so!
OK, my first real, drivable car was a ’62 Electra I bought in about 1976 for $200 from a little old lady down the street who literally only drove it to church on Sunday. No kidding. Her husband had passed away, it was his car, so she seldom used it. It was the size of a house, had the 455 Wildcat, and got about 8 gallons to the mile. That said, I could fit about 50 guys in there and it went like a bat outa hell. I topped in out at about 130 mph and then thought the better of it. It was a nondescript beige color with standard fabric sofas inside (or seemed like it).
Scotty, I didn’t know you played music! What type guitar did you play? And can
you still play today? ’75 and ’76 Electra’s
are my favorite Buicks from the malaise
era and they do indeed have a commanding presence about them. This
one’s really 👍 nice and I really like those
wide whites. They set the car apart from
any other Electra you might see these days.
I just can’t buy the seller’s 11K mileage
claim on this car though. Show me the
docs and I just might believe him! She
sure is 😍 à beauty!
The former owner’s name was Vito.
And NO ONE complains to Vito about his whitewalls!
Pretty sure Vito also kept a very clean shovel in that trunk.
I tried one of these out. It was a 4 door hard top. Road like a boat. Took 40 acres to turn it around . It was a one owner–owned buy a older lady. My mom worked for. As I started back. I kicked it down to see about the pick up. I could see the gas gauge going down. It liked gas and since I didn,t own a gas station. I didn,t buy it. It was in real nice shape. It was a light green color.
Beautiful car, wide wide whites not.
We had a Buick Centurian with a 455. Almost a 225 Electra.
I know this is a minority opinion but I always liked the styling of the 4 door versions of GM’s full size cars from this era better than the 2 doors. The doors on these cars are so big and heavy it is hard to get out of the car if you park it next to another in a parking lot. Besides that, these 2 door Buicks got the goofy looking landau vinyl roof.
I drove a triple-brown 1974 version of this same car. It rode like a cloud. I drove one of my colleagues to lunch in it one day and she called it a “Z-Car,” which I thought was odd, but she explained she meant “Zzzzzzz-Car.”
I bought it when my 1976 Estate Wagon had been T-Boned and it was the first car for which I paid entirely in cash. But it wasn’t long until virtually everything on the car started to fail. It was only six years old at the time. My dad and I started the process of replacing everything as it broke. At one point he told me to go buy an alternator because I was surely going to need one, and sure enough, the next week it happened. But I had one in the trunk by then and replaced it in a parking lot. I finally got rid of it after the transmission failed, but the engine itself never gave me any grief. In fact, it was the first car in which I got a speeding ticket. I was showing my friend how fast it would go on the highway and barreled past a hidden highway patrolman.
My Father purchased a ’73 lemon yellow the tan vinyl top, called it his sports car because it was the first two door after several years of station wagons…
Auction update: this black beauty sold for $18,900!
I love these boats, and this one has the right look to it, white walls & all!
I thought of Adam Wade of the youtube channel “Rare Classic Cars” when I saw this Buick. It’s right up his alley. Check out his channel, he sure has a lot of cars.
Nice deuce and a quarter.
Look at rear picture. Bought at Pierce Buick in Hartford Connecticut. My parents bought the Estate Wagon version in the same year from the same dealership.
I love the front couch!!!(Plush )days are long gone darn it. Seats today are like sitting on a park bench. Sharp car. I like it!!
A thinner white wall tire would be much more suited for this ride
No question….
Back to My 74 Ltd which I’ve just posted a comment about. Mine did have Chrome Spokes which made the car look really sporty, n it/she also didnt have those Huglee WW’s. Anyhoo someone nicked the spoke wheel trims/hubcaps. So I went to the Local Dealer to enquire of the replacement cost for the Spoked Hub Caps, I jus about fell over $2,750-00x for 4 , to Ekk with that,n that were back in about 1984. So I drove without them, which now made her look not so pretty.
pierce buick is a dealership in hartford ct.
So the price of this car doubled in about 7 months after adding slightly more appropriate whitewall tires to it. Yikes. Good luck selling it.