Eddie Van Halen ‘Hot For Teacher’ Video Guitar Sells for 7 Figures

Eddie Van Halen memorabilia continues to bring out big bidders. The latest item to hit the auction block was the guitar he used in the video for "Hot For Teacher." Unsurprisingly, it sold for big bucks.

The guitar was sold by Sotheby's. It was estimated to sell for between $2,000,000 - $3,000,000 with the minimum bid being $1,800,000. The winning bid ended up being $3,932,000.

Sotheby's noted of the guitar, "Kramer CO176 is the first rear-loaded striped guitar that Eddie Van Halen received from Kramer luthier Paul Unkert ... CO176 is believed to have been completed in late 1982 and delivered to Eddie in January of 1983. It was made from poplar wood and was one of Eddie’s main guitars throughout 1983 and 1984."

With this auction, the "Hot For Teacher" guitar is now one of the most expensive guitars to ever sell at auction. Per Guitar World, a select few guitars have sold for more. Among them is David Gilmour's Black Fender Stratocaster ($3,975,000) and two Kurt Cobain guitars. The guitar Cobain used in the video for "Smells Like Teen Spirit" sold for $4,550,000 in 2022. Meanwhile, Cobain's Martin D-18E he played on MTV Unplugged went for $4,550,000 in 2020

Eddie Van Halen was the most influential guitarist of our generation.

Of course, flashy, fleet-fingered guitarists were a dime a dozen in the late ‘70s and ‘80s. Eddie was better than all of them, but he was more than that. A songwriter, a keyboardist, a studio wizard, ¼ of Van Halen’s four-part harmony team and a band leader that was able to guide VH through losing the most distinctive frontman of the ‘80s and led them to four chart-topping albums with Sammy Hagar.

Here, we take on the tough task of ranking their top 30 songs. (It was really, really tough to cut any of the songs on the first six albums from this list.)