Maranellos are disappearing

Dealer in Albuquerque sold a rebuild titled 550 for $50K around that time. Pretty nice car, even if salvaged, and came with full info on the damage and repair.

 

Be prepared for very dark and possibly rainy stay. February might be 20C degree colder but at least days are little longer then. Good thing about Helsinki is just about everything tourists are interested are within fairly small area. During November number of daylight hours drops from 8.5 to 6.5 in Helsinki and from 7.5 to under 4 in Rovaniemi. Cold weather means practically all interesting cars are hidden away. There might then be proper snow on the ground in Lapland. Santas Village is usual tourist trap. For certain age kids its possibly interesting experience but its small so definitely no Disneyland.

 

This is great info. Our girls are 8&9 so the Santa magic window is almost closed….must strike while the opportunity still remains!

 

Go for it! We took our daughter to see Santa in Lapland aged 9 and she absolutely loved it - it was a truly magical experience for her, and we enjoyed it immensely too.

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A year on would have been too late - by then she had discovered that Santa did not exist.

 

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Inside the "ice hotel"
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So where are all the maranellos going? Has everything been scooped up and thrown in collections already.

 

Less than half of the 575s registered in the UK are taxed and on the road so I presume the remainder are in collections. The data isn't available for 550s but since they are more collectible I expect that more are off road. It's very rare to see one being driven and few are for sale at any given time.

 

Especially with new v6 hypercar. It looks like this all the v12s Ferrari has ever made are done

 

Mine disappeared into the black hole known as "Australia".

 

In EU current actual value seems to be 90k euros. Swedish auction just ended few minutes ago.

1998 Ferrari 550 Maranello for sale by auction in Stockholm, Sweden (collectingcars.com)

 

If you said my mechanic has 150 cars at his shop (5 mechanics) in various states of repair… I would 100% believe you… November 2nd will be six months… Still waiting on a door actuator part from Italy

I showed up unannounced just to make sure the car actually still did exist and was being stored inside

he had one 575 that they converted to manual (almost done) A black super America… And two other 575s a Grigio and an Argento.

The place is an absolute candy store

#PatienceIsAVirtue

 

@Ferrari55whoa I hear ya. Anecdotally I hear the same story from others. The good shops have a lot more work than they can handle, and turn down business regularly. They have a hard time finding enough GOOD younger mechanics to hire, that is, the real craftsman-types who want to learn how to do more specialized work, restorations, etc. There just isn't enough to around. Most kids coming out of the trade schools and community college programs go to the big dealership groups or big operations where they can get better salaries and decent benefits.

The local indie shop I go to is the proprietor plus one FTE mechanic and one or two part timers. I asked him a few weeks ago about bringing in my 550 for an annual oil change and to have a few other items fixed and he said mid or late November earliest is when he can get to it.

 

Not a representative example.

That's a 78,000 km car, with modifications to suspension and exhaust, a patchy service history and a warning light showing. It's also not in one of the most desirable colour combos. Sweden is also not a good place to sell a Ferrari. The fact that it sold for 90K euros + fees of 6% would suggest a 30k km good colour combo clean car with history would be somewhere between 120k and 140k.

 

Clariifcation: The 69 UK RHD manual 575s are more collectible than the 457 (?) UK RHD 550s, due to their rarity. The manual 575s with FHP are more collectible still, and HGTC most so. The 550s are more collectible than the F1 575s.

 

Darius- 457 RHD UK 550s is the number Maranello Concessionaires quotes in their booklets. As good as anything I have seen.

 

I agree but was just making the point in general rather than by gearbox type. It's my presumption is that 550s are more likely to be in collections generally, but no numbers taxed or SORN are available so who knows.

 

I have the numbers. As at 17 October there were 457 550 Maranellos registered in the UK, of which 254 were taxed and 203 SORNed*.

Note that 457 is co-incidental in relation to the number originally supplied to the UK as it includes 82 left hand drive cars.

* For the benefit of non-UK readers SORN (Statutory Off Road Notice) means that in theory the car is not allowed to be driven on public roads. A good proportion of Ferraris are only taxed in the summer months and a sizeable number are in storage for longer periods and also not taxed. Cars listed for sale by dealers are also likely not to be taxed but can be driven under the dealer's trade license.

 

It was obviously near bottom end of current marked. Two years ago bottom was around 70k euros. Some cars which were available two years ago are still available. There is stock and its clearly not moving fast. If price difference comes too big between EU and USA eventually 120-140k euro cars start to move across ocean. Since US market seems to be cooling this is postponed at least for now.

 

1997 Ferrari 550 Maranello - LHD for sale by auction in Farnham, Surrey, United Kingdom

Seems cheap but if its imported to EU total price is near 100k euros. So was good candidate for US import.

Few more auctions to watch in EU.

1998 Ferrari 550 Maranello - VAT Q for sale by auction in Nürnberg, Germany
1998 Ferrari 550 Maranello - Classiche Certified for sale by auction in Rome, Italy

 

That first one is crazy cheap compared to the us market

 

Neat Euro 550 was RNM on BaT today but that hammer at $180 felt like all the money.

Hopefully the high bidder and seller can make a deal.

https://bringatrailer.com/listing/1999-ferrari-550-maranello-44/

 

Some interesting data and theories. 550 , 575 , Barchetta examples included...

Are You Crazy Not to Sell Your Classic Car now!?

 

On really long run it is inevitable. People who are interested in certain car model will simply die. Next generations will want every 250 GTO as there are so few of them. Modern day production numbers are 5-10x what they used to be even in 30 years ago for just about any collectable model and cars like Ferrari in general. This means in far future there will be endless number of nothing special Ferrari's available for everyone interested.

What will happen is 50 years from now someone will inherit great grandads Daytona, grandads F40, dads F80 etc. Even rare collector cars will start to pile up. There will be so many around no one has interest in keeping them all. This will happen even when more people have more money around the world. There is only so many people who will want to keep old cars around. Eventually some will have to be scrapped simply because there isn't enough takers above raw material value unless something radically changes.

Electrification will not change anything. Ferrari will make right number of electric models to sell them at high premium and healthy profit. But they will also start to pile up over the years.

 

Betting against future F40, 250/288 GTO or Daytona values would be as smart as shorting TSLA. The aura around these limited works of art will be maintained as long as humans breath. Look at Warhols, vintage Patek or Gibson les Paul guitars. Dreamers and future big earners keep being born, while supply doesn’t. EVs may not factor into it, you may be right there, that’s less about art and craftsmanship, more about efficient transportation. Just like quartz Rolex or Cartier, fewer people covet them. But I don’t doubt a 250 GTO will sell for a billion USD before 2099. Inflation plus mega brand equity plus limited supply. I’ll bet you one bitcoin I’m right. ;-/

 

One bitcoin will be $0.01 as soon as someone who has majority of them stashed away decided to sell large chunk of them. No one person or small investor group is holding all 458's and 488's and even if they did most people would just buy F8's and 296's. Modern day Ferrari production is just too large in longer timeframe. Less than 20 years from now there will be twice as many Ferrari's available as today. Next 15-20 years vs previous 70+ years is going to be similar number of cars made.

So many cars, not enough buyers and no place to store them all. Current system works for now without crashing overnight. But soon next generations need to absorb every single 50's winged US car, 60's muscle car, British roadster etc. so lovingly collected and rebuild by their parents. This includes all same time period exotics. Maybe something like 9/10 do not want to keep what they inherit. Someone somewhere has to buy them all. Its much easier and cheaper to properly store watches and guitars than cars.

This do not mean 550 and like can't go up over years. Its even likely for some time until they will level out. Still there is just too many of them to reach heights seen for some older models.

Around 4k F12's were made making it more common than 550. 812 and likely 12 cylinder will have even more supply. Production will just keep on going up and up as Ferrari just can't help themselves.