Hard-up Nasa sounds out potential US buyers for two of three remaining shuttles when they stop flying in 2010

It could be the ultimate Christmas present for anyone who can afford the stellar price tag: Nasa has announced plans to sell off its space shuttles when they stop flying in 2010, at a cost of at least $42m (£27m) apiece – postage and packing included.

Selling its remaining shuttles would bring in much-needed dollars to the hard-up American space agency, which is already facing a budget deficit for the next-generation Ares rockets that it is planned will return astronauts to the moon.

The advertised price is just the starting figure for any one of the orbiters Discovery, Atlantis or Endeavour, which between them have flown 86 missions into space since 1984. Included is the minimum $6m cost of stripping a shuttle of toxic and other hazardous materials, preparing it for travel and flying it to an airport of the buyer's choosing.

As an agency of the US government, Nasa insists it won't be selling its most prized assets to just anybody. So far, it is approaching only educational institutions, science museums and "other appropriate organisations" to gauge interest and assess the size of their chequebooks.

"Nasa is keenly aware of the essential value of these key assets to the space programme's rich history," an official says in a "request for information" document that seeks ideas for the public display of the shuttles after their retirement.

"The agency is therefore committed to making placement decisions that are determined to be in the best interest of the American taxpayer. Special attention will be paid to ensuring they will retire to appropriate places."

Only US citizens will be eligible to purchase and display the shuttles, which will be sold with all space-worthy fittings and fixtures except the main engines. Interested parties must promise to display the spacecraft in a climate-controlled indoor location.

Six main shuttle engines will be available for separate purchase for up to $800,000 each, excluding transport costs.

Previously, Nasa has donated historically important space hardware for free. Saturn rockets, lunar modules and other artifacts from the Apollo era are on display at various locations including the Kennedy Space Centre, in Florida, the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, in Washington DC, and the US Space and Rocket Centre, in Alabama.

Only two of the shuttles are likely to be sold, with the third expected to remain in government hands, possibly on display in Washington. "Nasa advised Congress that it would begin discussions with the Smithsonian Institution regarding accession of a flown orbiter to the national collection," the agency said in the document.

The idea is to "gauge the level and scope of interest of US organisations in acquiring the two other orbiters for public display once Nasa's programmatic requirements for the assets have been satisfied."

Nasa's own visitor centres, in Houston and at the Kennedy Space Centre, where all 124 shuttle launches to date have taken place, are among those invited to respond.

Five shuttles have flown into space since the programme began in 1981. Two of them, Challenger and Columbia, were destroyed in the disasters of 1986 and 2003 that cost 14 astronauts their lives.

The last shuttle mission is scheduled for September 2010, when construction of the international space station is expected to be complete. The incoming US president, Barack Obama, has appointed a team to assess the viability of extending shuttle flights beyond that date, to close the gap until the planned first manned flight of the new Orion crew capsule and Ares rocket in 2015.