There are times when we watch television, and without any great viewing choices we resort to one of those shows where the people bid on a storage locker. People bid on the storage unit, hoping to find a treasure worth more than the price they paid for the entire contents. Sometimes they find hidden valuable paintings behind a cheap canvas, other times they uncover some rare equipment, or collectibles, and they get far more than they paid.

We always wonder, why can’t I ever get in on one of those deals and find something valuable? It never fails, though, and the person who finds a treasure is almost always “someone else”. Estate sales are a little different, but sometimes we pass up on going to an estate sale because we often think that there is nothing for the gearhead in us, and we certainly don’t need a curio, dinette set, or a matching set of dishes where one of them has a four inch crack in it. No, we’re car guys and we leave the estate sales to horders, people who collect meaningless junk that they will keep forever.

Then there’s a story like this one that we found on one of our favorite sites, Cars In Barns. It turns out that there was an estate sale going on after a woman had passed away, and her out-of-state children hired a company to sell of the contents of the home. Little did they know, however, that inside the garage was a very nice 1969 Buick GS 350.

The Buick Gran Sport began life as a Skylark with the Gran Sport option, and by 1967 the Gran Sport, or GS, came into its own and took on a life of its own as well. The larger, 400 cubic inch mill was a bit more desireable, but the 350 small block in this car was still a respectable engine at that time, replacing the 340 that was in earlier models.

Later years found the famed 455 in the GS, and the Stage 1 package showed up, producing a few more ponies at 360 horsepower and 510 lb/ft of torque. Even with some mightier siblings around, though, the GS 350 survived them all until 1975 when the GS 231 made its debut. The GSX, however, was Buick’s answer to the Pontiac GTO Judge and the Olds 4-4-2 W30. The GSX is highly sought after, especially in Stage 1 trim.

As stated on the web site, the owner had been driving the car until he passed away in the late 1980s, and his widow parked the car in the garage. The car remained there until she passed away, and her surviving children hired the auction company to sell the home and contents. Can you imagine how you’d feel if you just happened to go to an estate sale, thinking there was literally nothing that you’d be interested in, and then all of a sudden you hear about a garage?

After learning that the couple lived there since the 1960s, you head out to the garage, and you can’t wait to see what’s inside. When the door raises, the anticipation is killing you, and you lean down to get a peak at what’s behind the door. The door is fully raised, and there before you is a classic car that nobody knew was there, and you finally think to yourself: Finally. I finally found something good and it’s all mine.

But then you wake up from your little nap, realizing it was all a dream, and you look up to see that the show on television was just about to end. Then you decide: it’s time to visit an estate sale. Hey, it could happen, right? Note to self…