Eddie Van Halen's 'Hot For Teacher' Guitar Just Sold For Over $3 Million

Someone's got it bad, got it bad, got it bad, and by "it" I mean a lighter wallet. That's because they paid a lot of money for Eddie Van Halen's 'Hot For Teacher' Guitar.

Sotheby's auction house sold the guitar which came with some special memorabilia. It was part of a lot which included the straight jacket and white gloves that Van Halen wore in the video as well. The minimum bid was set at $1.8 million. However, the winning bid was substantially higher. An anonymous bidder took home the guitar for a cool $3.2 million.

The late great ax-slinging wizard had a lot of iconic guitars over the years. One of them was this custom-built Kramer that he played live and in the video for the 1984 hit song 'Hot For Teacher."

The guitar came with some documentation confirming its authenticity (you would hope so at that price). One such document was a letter written by Paul "Unk" Unkert who built the guitar at Kramer's factory in New Jersey.

"The ‘Hot For Teacher’ Van Halen was built by me at the Kramer Green Grove Road Plant in Neptune, NJ around 1982-1985/ #CO176. Look for ‘Unk’ stamps on Neck and Body. It was my last project for Ed and Kramer," he wrote in the letter, which dates to 2005.

Eddie Van Halen with his old Kramer guitar that just sold for over $3 million. (Photo by Ross Marino/Getty Images)

The Guitar Featured Eddie's Classic Specs And Came With A Signed Photo

It was also accompanied by a signed photo of EVH himself with the guitar on which he wrote "Is this your guitar or mine?"

As for the specs on this puppy (guitar nerds care about this stuff), it's typical of what Eddie used in that era. A super-Strat shape with a single humbucker in the bridge position and a Floyd Rose bridge. That was the Ed (and everyone who came after him) recipe for shredding greatness.

Kramer (which is owned by Gibson) still makes a similarly spec'd guitar for about $800. Just throwing that out there in case you want a little DIY project.

This would be incredible to have. It's probably the second most iconic Eddie Van Halen guitar behind the Frankenstrat, which he essentially built himself. Owning one of Ed's old guitars is like owning a pair of Michael Jordan's old sneakers.

Although this guitar was a little less expensive.

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