Maranellos are disappearing

Someone needs to help me understand how a 2001 550 with 30k miles (albeit a very nice car) sells for $252k and a 10k barchetta is barely 100k more. I don’t get it… they used to trade at 2x or more what coupes did. Maybe they just haven’t caught up? Or maybe they’re a ridiculous value. I don’t get it!

 

The world is completely insane. Nifty’s sold today for only $131k….

 

I really think the 550/575 don't do well on BaT compared to the traditional auction houses. The Pozzi sold in line with Hagerty valuation. Nifty's car had several factors working against it. I don't think BaT was the right place to sell it. I would've at least tried here and maybe on Ferrari Market Letter where buyers such as the one who ended up stealing it on BaT can compete with other experienced Ferrari buyers to buy it.

 

Haven't been watching the 550 market too closely as I have no plan to sell my 33k mi tdf blue/crema but I thought good ~30k mi cars were maybe 175k. Or do you think the pozzi blue made a big difference here? I certainly would have been quite wary of that car having needed an engine rebuild with so few miles.

 

That was a couple of years ago. Things have moved a bit for almost all cars since then. Hagerty has the 2001 Maranello in no. 2 condition at $221k now. The Sotheby's Pozzi is at least in no. 2 condition. Add $20k for the Barchetta wheels and say another $10k for relatively rare color combo/options and the car should bring $250k assuming good service records. I wouldn't be afraid of an engine rebuild if done by the right people a few thousand miles ago. Depending on the details it may even be a positive.

 

I happened to see this 550 as I was passing on Friday www.pistonheads.com/buy/listing/12846367

No affiliation to the car by the way, although I know the dealers. It is LHD. I noticed the seats looked immaculate. I didn't ask but I'm thinking they must have been recovered or else someone has taken very great care of them (and if so, I'd like to know how!!). It has been registered in the UK since March 2002 but was for sale back in 2018 at Francorchamps Motors so I am guessing it has divided its time between the UK and Belgium.

I think I would have been asking why it needed an engine rebuild at all and whether it indicated anything about how the car had been treated. I'm also not sure the wheels add $20k. Normally options just make a car an easier or harder sell and add only a fraction of their purchase price. That said, regardless of how the buyer arrived at the purchase price, it sold for what it did.

 

That makes a big difference between UK and US markets. £90k/$120k will buy you a nice 30k Maranello here, and 20k more gets you an excellent one. From the above that makes US prices double UK prices ATM.

It's the same for gated 430s but I don't know if it's true for other Ferraris. Wonder why.

 

It is always possible a 550 got one or more of the soft "brass" valve guides instead of the bronze ones. Also possible a cambelt broke, especially if someone was still using the WSM schedule for cambelt changes.

 

RHD might have something to do with it making UK market a bit isolated from the much larger LHD pool?

 

European market is very soft compared to the rest. Some actually dropping in value because they're not selling.

Selfishly, hope it stays that way. US market on anything is completely insane and IMO pushing all the fun cars mostly into the hands of speculators that just want to see prices go up and up and up...

 

It's all about hype, rarity, and what people perceive as valuable at some point. US prices on gated Ferraris/Lambos have exploded and everyone is trying to get in as if it were the only thing that matters for future collectibility. Same happened to air cooled Porsches a few years ago. Collectors in the US tend to focus on a certain rare aspect of cars instead of the car as a whole offering a good experience, hence ridiculous price variatons in certain colors as well.

With cars up to '97 being 100% legal to import without modification to the US, I don't know why more people aren't taking advantage of the price delta.

 

Hi Terry @tazandjan what is the recommended change interval these days? The owner's manual says 3yr/50k km. I have some WSM pdfs but apparently I'm missing the last two sections, one of which is the service intervals. Mine's been off the road a couple years, and I really need to catch up on some things and get it sorted out again..

 

The 575M tech bulletin and 612 WSM both show 5 years for belt changes. The 550 (456s, too) uses exactly the same belts, pulleys, bearings, etc that the later V12s use, so most pros use 5 years for the 550 too. The last official Ferrari tech bulletin still lists 3 years because Ferrari never did accelerated-life testing on the older models.

The original 550 recommendation was for 30,000 miles/ 50,000 kms and no time interval. That resulted in a few failures using the old-style belts without kevlar reinforcement. Those belts have not been available for over a decade.

 

It's only cars through 02/1997, of which there are not many. The importation process (especially now given supply chain) is expensive with long lead times, and buying a car on another continent is probably a daunting transaction for the average buyer.

 

Thank you Terry @tazandjan .. I couldn't imagine it was less than 3 years, didn't realize there was an earlier no time interval recommendation.

 

Air freight!!

 

Just depends on how long you want to wait. Containerized freight (I would hope no one ships a Ferrari RO-RO) is $4500 for a 20' container right now from Western Europe ports to US East Coast. 4-6 weeks minimum.

Air freight is $4.50 to $5.00 per pound but you get the items in 2-3 days. 3900lb 550 = $17.5 - $20k (!)

 

I honestly don't think that's bad at all, for ocean freight.
If you buy a car in the US that you need to have shipped and want to use a reputable transport company, it's going to cost a minimum of $2-2.5k. When you consider the total package, the reason you would go for an imported car is because they're cheaper across the pond than they are here in the US, so if you're saving $10-15k the additional shipping cost is fairly irrelevant.

Regarding wait times as well, my 550 was from Detroit and it took almost 1-month to receive it. My FF was from a main dealer in CT who were the same ownership group as the dealer here in Florida, so they had constant transports going back and forth, and that still took 3 weeks.

 

That container cost is 2x pre-COVID pricing, actually. It's quite remarkable how cheap it is (or used to be) to ship huge amounts of goods halfway around the world. Wait times are definitely bad domestically - took my 360 three weeks to arrive from CT (although I didn't pay $2-2.5k).

 

Sold for 110,000 EUR all fees included.
Bonhams : Delivered new to the late John von Neumann,1997 Ferrari 550 Maranello Coupé Chassis no. ZFFZR49B000109662

 

Sold for $123k including premium. In line with Hagerty's valuation of $127k for 1997 with 38k miles. Beautiful color. Carpet can be toned down a little with darker green or black floormats, but the dash is harder to live with.

 

The Europeans seem to like green interiors. My Daytona was originally white with a dark green interior, but at least the dash and door panels were black.

 

initially it was just the carpeting that bothered me but that upper dash is pretty bad too.. especially the combination of two very different greens on the interior. the exterior is spectacular tho!

 

My car also has green dash and green carpet and I love it. I would say, however, that interior photographs are often not properly representative of the colours (Bordeaux, for example, almost never looks in photos like it does in real life) and you really need to physically see anything a little bit different to form a proper judgement.

 

Agreed! Was very difficult for me to capture the actual green shade of my e38 BMW that had Orinoco Green exterior with green/ecru highline interior. However, the green shades of the carpet and interior trim were very close to each other and to the exterior. Sometimes individuals ordering colors can miss variations in various color parameters that color professioals at car makers tend to match better.

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