I recently bought a classic car and learned a lot shopping over a couple years. At some point age matters more than mileage (high or low). Low mileage is beneficial for some parts of the vehicle but detrimental to many mechanical systems. The things that suffer are widespread and can come back to haunt you and nickel and dime you to death. Think 10 cent seals that require tons of labor to replace. I had to pass up quite a few low mileage cars that were in nice cosmetic shape but had barely been driven in the last 10-20 years. Too risky.
Now, if it's a special concours car owned by a pro collector and they know how to run and maintain it to keep low mileage, then fine, but very few cars fall into this category. The rest of them are considered to be in a state of neglect. A vehicle with 51 miles in 28 years is risky in my opinion. It may be that an International 4900 is a little more robust than the typical classic car, but it's still got mechanical systems with belts, seals, bushings, bearings, etc. All that stuff doesn't take kindly to sitting around in a state of disuse or neglect.
Is the VIN 1HTSJPCR1PH509232 ? If so, that looks to be in great shape, but there are a lot of hidden things that could come back to haunt you. I might take a chance for local / non-commercial use where you can tolerate some risk. And definitely be realistic and budget $5-10K for repairs, refurbs, and deferred maintenance. It would be highly unlikely for this truck to be turnkey and trouble free.
It would definitely be used for commercial/farm work and would have to be road worthy. I keep thinking of some kind of big time failure down the road, so I will participate but will back off at 5 figures. As was said by Citydude, someone will be awed by the low miles, not realizing what all has been discussed here.
All 10 tires have 100% tread, but are all dry rotted and require replacement. That alone is $5,000-$6,000. Then we have to figure on changing all fluids from all reservoirs and their corresponding filters. Thats another $500+ doing the work myself. Then we get into the unknowns (seals, gaskets, belts, brake chambers, pads, etc).
If that truck were being sold with a “normal” range of miles, it would sell for about $25,000. Thats just a chassis. It has no bed/body on it.
If I subtract all the cost of tires, fluids and throw in another $2,000 for “incidentals”, we are pushing $10,000. I also have to ship it 750 miles or go get it with my truck & trailer. Also theres auctioneers fee.
So roughly $25,000-$10,000-$2,000-$1,000 is about $12,000.
I’d probably bid $8-10,000 and thats about it.
Its not configured exactly how I want, so I will drop out on the low side. It’ll probably end up someone elses truck.