THAT 1962 FERRARI 330 LM / 250 GTO SET A NEW PUBLIC AUCTION SALES RECORD!
Just the other day we told you about a car that looks set to break a record for the most expensive Ferrari ever sold at auction. It was tipped to fetch so much money that some thought it may rival the most expensive car ever sold, a record held by a 1955 Mercedes-Benz 300 SLR Uhlenhaut Coupé. Those who keep tabs on these things and have more knowledge than the usual motoring keyboard warriors said otherwise, and we were with them. The old Merc fetched a rather ridiculous price of $114,400,000, which translates to R2,230,000,000. To put that into even more perspective, that price could have built nine Nkandlas. Up until this much-publicised auction, the most expensive Ferrari ever sold at auction was a 1964 Tour de France-winning Ferrari 250 GTO which was sold for a massive price tag of $70 million, or R1,370,000,000. The main thing about that auction was that it was a closed affair with only a few of the world’s elite having access. That car was bought by David MacNeil, founder of automotive accessory giant WeatherTech. This 1962 Ferrari 330 LM / 250 GTO looked set to pull in some pretty serious money, and with this auction being a true public auction, hopes were high that the classic Italian street/race car with a storied provenance would fetch enough money to get it into the record books. The car had a class win and 2nd overall finish at the 1962 Nürburgring 1000 km, competed in the 1962 24h-Hours of LeMans, and it was the 1965 Sicilian Hillclimb Championship runner-up.
After its racing history and restoration, this 250 LM ended up under the curatorship of a chairman of the Ferrari Club of America and has been in possession of the current owner for a long 38 years. The car’s restoration was top-notch, evident by the fact that it won the FCA Platinum Award, the Coppa Bella Macchina at the Cavallino Classic, placed 2nd in the GTO Class at the prestigious 2011 Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance, and even Best of Show at the Amelia Island Concours d'Elegance. To some people, all of this stuff adds to the value, and that was expected to show in the sales price. Initial estimates leading up to the auction were that the car should rake in as much as the $60,000,000 price, and we thought that a stupendously wealthy collector may even chuck in an extra $10,000,000 for the sole reason of being able to brag about having the most expensive Ferrari ever sold at auction. When the car went under the hammer at a recent RM Sotheby’s auction, the world’s billionaire car collectors all tuned in to make telephonic and online bids. When all was said and done, the 1962 Ferrari 330 LM / 250 GTO did pull in more money than myself and all my friends will make in this lifetime, combined, but it didn’t manage to break any records. The car “only” managed to pull in a total of $51,705,000 - or R951,111,349. So we were wrong, the car didn’t break any records, and it didn’t fetch the guestimated $60,000,000. As is usually the case, the name of the buyer is yet to be revealed, but oddly it’s hard to guess because there are more than a handful of people who can afford the car, a sickening thought.
Take a look at the YouTube video that covers the entire auction of this 1962 Ferrari 330 LM / 250 GTO. You can watch for almost an hour, but if you have a real job and time is money, then you can fast forward to the good bits, like we did: RM Sotheby's | The One – 1962 Ferrari GTO | RM Sotheby's
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News Record RM Sotheby's Auction GTO 330 LM/250 GTO Ferrari 1962 Ferrari 330 LM / 250 GTO