Probably the most valuable VW "Toy" really isn't a toy.  Porsche had 5 (if I remember correctly) scale models made when the Beetle was in it's final stages of pre-production.  I'll have to look up the details on them . . . I think he presented one to Hitler and one to Robert Bosch.  Some of them survived the war and are still around.  Some are still unaccounted for and presumed destroyed in the war.

The highest price ever paid for any Hot Wheels at auction (at the time anyway) was a two or three years ago when a prototype bay window bus with surf board sticking out of the hatch sold for . . . I don't remember the figure . . . I'm thinking something like $80,000 . . . anyway, it was WAY, WAY too much for a Hot Wheels car.  The production version of the bus had the surf boards on the top.  Seems like there were only about 10 of the prototypes made.

Tin wind up, battery powered, or friction motor VWs from the 50's and 60's bring a pretty good price.  The low end of that market is well within reach of the average collector, but the rarest brands and examples of them in mint condition and with the original box might cause someone like me to have to miss a couple house payments.  I've got two friction motor tin VWs in my collection . . . one is a well used mid-60s Beetle (actually, I think someone remembered where they buried it as a kid and dug it out of the mud 40 years later) and the other is a mint Karmann Ghia in a near mint box . . . but it's a reproduction so I got it for about $15.

Speaking of toys...We were cleaning out the den and this is what we found!  Unfortunately, the last part of the article was lost.  This article was in VW Trends September 1996.[img]

I do indeed...Why don't you and a few carabus
 over here Feb. 11 or 12 and see it in person? You've
 only seen the VW toys-this is the show where I bring
 out the rest (as well as the VWs, of course!). We can
 run a toy-sized version of an engine blow-put fresh
 batteries in the Smokin' Bug, the Pop-Up Wheelie Dune
 Buggy, and the Bump-n-Go Herbie, turn 'em loose, and
 see who runs the longest LOL...
                                                             Dolphe