how many owners are too many ?

i'm looking at a few 99 00 550's. how many owners are two many ? granted. a nice one or two owner car would be great but..........

 

personally, this is deal breaker for me.

I am a big advocate on these cars with limited owners. A 550 thats a 99, i would accept nothing more than 2 owners on that VIN....

My 86TR had 2 owners.....86-91....91-99...99-to me.

My 76 Glass had 1 owner family(Dad, Son 76-2003)...2003-2007...2007 -to me.

The next for me is compelte books and records of course a must.....but hey, im a freak !

 

don't understand why this is important.......

my '67 GTC has had 9 owners (including dealers); it's a Platinum car today......
my '01 550 - 3 owners; it's Platinum also.......

if the car is "right", why does it matter?

 

I would think verified maintenance history would be more important than the number of owners. I would take a multi owner, verified history car than a one owner, unknown history car anyday.

 

Can you define Platinum?

Thanks.

 

+1

 

I tend to agree, although a newer car with a lot of short term owners (1 year or less) may be a sign of trouble.

I don't even know how many owners my 365 2+2 or Boxer have had! My 456 has paperwork from day one, so a little easier. Even there it's murky-- it appears someone owned it for a short time and only did one minor bit of work to it-- but my only evidence is the name on the bill. For all I know, he took it in for the original owner to get something fixed-- who knows?

How do you really know, anyway? And do dealers count?

 

Dealer for me never count, cause if you looked at the GTO when the boom was going on, those cars were flipping monthly. Its not uncommom for these cars, but me personally, the VIN needs to be clear with as little as possbile ownership....after all why not, especially if your now looking for 355s, and 360s and 430s....there are so many to choose from now, why not be alittle more picky..its not like there is a shortage of 550s, or 575s or 360s.
Just my .2 lire.

 

rather pointless question, imho. if the service history is sound, the service history is sound. 1 owner or 10 - who cares?

doody

 

+1

Bad cars tend to have had more owners, but it doesn't mean that there is direct relationship between bad cars and number of owners.

It's all about the car. If it's good, it's good.


Onno

 

Is this question like discussing with your wife how many men she boinked before you married her?

 

except you'll have to pay to get rid of her

 

If a car has had more than one owner and you don't personally know him, what does it matter if there were 100 additional prior owners? The only value in limited ownership is to understand how the car was driven and maintained. As has been written in other threads, the potential for fraudulent mileage is reduced with multiple owners. Every time a car changes hands, the mileage is recorded. How likely would it be that each of say five owners disconnected the odometer? It amazes me how low the mileage is on some of these cars. Who pays $200K for a car and lets it sit in the garage? 10,000 miles on a ten year-old car on its third set of tires and second set of brakes and a new clutch? Please. I just don't buy it...or wouldn't buy a car that had been thrashed so badly that it needed those components replaced in only 10,000 miles. Often, the first owner of these cars is a celebrity or big time tifosi who gets a new one every time the model changes. Therefore, it's very likely that any car more than three years-old will have had at least two prior owners. For many of us, these cars are toys and we know how fast little boys get tired of their toys. To each his own, but it doesn't matter to me how many prior owners there were if I don't know each one of them personally. If a car has all of it's tools, keys, manuals, etc. and a complete service history and the original window sticker, that tells me that it has been in the custody of owners who cared.

 

Tons of Ferrari owners, I'm sad to say. Particularly in the US. Whether you buy it or not, it is a fact. I think it is mostly to do with the fact that a lot of F owners have a nice powerful car for daily driving already (AMG Merc or something like that), and the F only gets out when they feel like a drive for the sake of the drive, rather than to get somewhere in particular. Also, it is quite often not the only car that gets used for trips like that. A lot of people have more than 1 sportscar for a weekend drive. If you then combine this with all the other toys and hobbies these people have money for and that also lay claim on weekends, it's no wonder that they don't get used that often if people are not really passionate about their Ferrari. Surprising as it may seem, quite a few owners are not really interested in the car itself nor in driving it regularly. They just like the car for the right occasion, not for the sake of the car itself. Nothing particularly wrong with that (although I would never make the same choice), if it's your car you should use it the way you want to.


Onno

 

Maybe some people dont like the extra potential of fart smell that lingers in the leather ?

 

Yes, which judging determined your platinum?
Or is this just your idea...

 

Rental cars have a complete documented service history, yet imagine how they are driven and treated. Multiple owners raise the specter of similarly uncaring drivers. If you know you are going to flip the car soon, why not "drive it like you stole it"?

 

....Ignorance is bliss.

 

There's Mr. Doody.......long time no see....

It is about condition but in my case a long term owner USUALLY indicates commitment along with proper care.

Now on my first Ferrari I didn't care as long as I got the color, and that car was a good one that had a long history, counting the Auction yard fingerprints on the Title, Vern Cornell was the 'fourth' owner and that made me the 'sixth' one......

The second car Ed Hodel had owned it a long long time, second owner and I am the third......

Same goes for my third one.....history and color change story lost prior to 1981, when Jerry Fisher purchased it and maintained it religously until 02/07.......so probably third owner there as well......

No correlation to women.....breaking in a new car, or a virgin, is a real drag, IMO.......

Platinum is an FCA judging standard.......

 

Agreed. I'm the 3rd long-term owner on my 328, but it spent a few months with someone who was a serial Ferrari buyer (traded the 328 on a Boxer, then sold that less than year later) and then Steve Barney's neighbor (?) who probably didn't want a Ferrari and seems not to have driven it. The car runs great, looks great, makes great compression, is an FCA platinum winner, and hasn't let me down.

I suppose a 575M is new enough that you'd want to see only a couple of owners, but again... the car is what it is, and rich guys go through toys a lot.

If they're not factory farts, they would be aftermarket and thus not desirable.

Yes, but -- if someone has driven the crap out of a 550 on dirt and rock roads for six months, abused the gearbox and parked it in the sun all the time, you will know.

 

it seams to me like my car I'm the forth owner was sold twice this year, anyway each owner that comes along puts money into it or restores it alittle more and when it gets to you not that much more money has to come out of your pocket.....lolololol...its that poor sole in the middle who spent his life savings to bring the car back to life