Value difference between regular Frazer sedan and a Manhattan

[frankies frazer]

What is the value difference between a 1947 regular Frazer sedan and a 1947 Manhattan sedan,  if the two vehicles were in the same condition?
And which car has more value a Kaiser or a Frazer?

[Gordie]

As originally planned the Kaiser was to have been a front wheel drive car slightly smaller than the Frazer but because of lack of funds for developing a front wheel drive system it was decided to just re-badge the Frazer and make the Kaiser a less expensive companion car to the Frazer.  When they went on sale in mid 1946 they were much the same but the Frazer was an up-scale version with much nicer interior trim.  In March 1947 a deluxe version of the Frazer was offered with even nicer interiors and extra trim to identify the new "Manhattan".  Kaisers sold for a little less than Frazer's when new and the up-scale Manhattans sold for even more and competed with most mid range cars of the day.  I believe that the same values would hold true today and by not using dollars but perhaps a 10-20% difference in the cars values a fair guess could be made if the cars were actually of equal condition.  Old car value guides hold this theory to be true although by 5 to 10%.  Good books about Kaiser-Frazer history are available and make for fascinating reading.   "The Last  Onslaught on Detroit" by Richard Langworth and "Built to Better the Best" by our own K-F Historian Jack Mueller are well worth reading and give a real insight to the company through the years. No ones desire to have either of these car is the same so they can be what they are worth to the buyers and sellers.  All are very nice driving cars and desirable to own.

[kaiserfrazerlibrary]

Joe Frazer felt the Manhattan name suggested the up-market area of New York City and in addition to having higher quality interior fabrics, two-tone paint work and a larger standard equipment list, the 4-door Frazer convertibles and the 1951 4-door hardtops were Manhattans.  When Frazer production ended at the beginning of November 1950 (YES, I said 1950!) the Manhattan name was moved to Kaisers starting in 1952 as an upper end series.

As a rule, a Frazer may fetch a few hundred dollars more than a Kaiser or even a Kaiser Custom but it depends mostly on what catches someone's eye.

[hj-etx]

Manhattan! That was a name that worked! It had class! Compare to what they name car models today.
Well, Frazer Manhattans had better upholstery, more trim and tutone paint available. But 47-48 was a seller's market and a lot of the Frazer sold were Manhattans because they were more profit for the company and dealers. So yes, there is a bump in value over a regular Frazer but not much of one.
But things were changing by 1949. All the companies had introduced their postwar cars. Unless you hated GM, you probably considered a 135hp Olds 98 instead of a Manhattan. Right now 1949-50 Manhattans are harder to find as compared to regular Frazers.  Because of the difficulty in finding them I would think the later Frazer Manhattans would have a bigger bump in price over a regular Frazer. 

[kaiserfrazerlibrary]

You have to remember that less than 11,000 Manhattans were produced in the 1949-50 model year period.  Based on the number of dealers the company had in late 1948/early 1949 it came to less than 3 per dealer on average.  The KFOCI HANDBOOK has month-by-month production counts for the cars.