296 VS

I was talking more about not taking delivery after the car was shipped and received by the dealer. Canceling when your slot comes up is a different story.

 

I have owned 18 over the last 25 years. (egad!)
6 years ago, Pista, Lusso and a Port....now just a 296 GTS. I would love to get my wife a Roma Spider but she loves her Alfa Giulia Quad. Our other cars are Porsches, most notably a 1955 Porsche 550 Spyder.

 

Heard from two reliable sources that the CEO of RM was and still is stunned as to how much people will pay for an RM. It might not last but RM are milking it like crazy.

 

I am a12 Ferrari's over the last 15+ years but for whatever reason I am more excited about the 296 Speciale than I have been in a long time about a car.

 

Some simply go down the path of ‘finance not approved’ then fight for the deposit . I do not get it at all . They must not have had the resources to order in the first place . From what I have been told the US has the most cars under finance , in other markets it is 30-40 % max

 

thank you for the correction.
I do consider myself a car enthusiast, but I couldn’t care less about the Nurburgring time of my car. No one drives at this pace on a public road, very few of us have the skill to come within a minute of those times and road cars are hopeless on track compared to a well prepared race car (as my professional racing friends tell me every time they hear about ring times) . I would have an F50 over an F80 and a 250 SWB over any other Ferrari, because they would be more fun to drive (slower) and provide more emotion in the process.
At the end of the day it is all subjective and as you say IF Ferrari wanted to set record ring times they could (I am sure the F80 would not be far off the AMG One).

 

“The $135,000 typo story is urban legend, not reality.

Richard Mille didn’t stumble into success—he engineered it with precision, audacity, and elite branding.

If you’re seeing this story in marketing or social posts, it’s best understood as a clever parable about how perceived value and exclusivity drive luxury consumption—not an actual event in watch history.” CHTGBT

 

I agree, I am actually not a fan of RM watches (don’t like most open work) but I highly doubt RM could put out watches with that level of craftsmanship for $13k, urban legend for sure.

 

Thanks for the great conversation everyone.

I think the RM story, whether true or not, it is a great story which makes a point. People have to believe it’s legitimate. For example, none of us will ever drive a Range Rover up a mountain, 99% of them are driven to the shops, but, what makes it worth it, beyond the nice luxury stuff, is knowing, it COULD do it. For a Ferrari, its knowing its got genuine race car technology or at least learnings directly from racing, and knowing that makes it thrilling. You usually can find another car that does go faster, but the EXPERIENCE is what matters.

All this reminds me of an old story where a company was looking at pricing their portable CD player. They realized they could price it at $25 but no one would believe it would be worth it. So they priced it higher and it sold well…. End of the day you are talking about human nature, and subjectivity.

 

I have seen some of the prices, but not all. Seems like many of the options are discounted from the 296GTS except for the paint. Has anyone seen if the carbon wheels are still 35k+ in the US?

 

More on Speciale 8.5% tariff contribution:


Ferrari will reduce the compensation it introduced in April on the prices of certain cars sold in the United States once tariffs on products made in the European Union officially drop from 27.5% to 15%.

In April, when U.S. tariffs on car imports from the EU were raised to a total of 27.5%, Ferrari announced price increases of up to 10% on most models exported to the U.S.

"As soon as the new tariff scheme comes into effect, we will apply it; for now, we are sticking to our (current) commercial policy," Vigna said during a call with journalists to discuss Ferrari's second-quarter results.

 

What i disliked about the 458, 488 the 296 has fixed and by a significant margin. the front end is like a scalpel at low speeds 10/20/30mph. its a fun car to drive at low speeds. The 458 and 488 the steering was not responsive. I think that's the 296s biggest strength is the agility and nibleness it offers. Brakes are SO much better than the 458 too and the design has grown on me over the last 2 years where now i just admire it every time i look at one. It is stunning. The Speciale will take everything up a few notches and i am very excited. If Ferrari can only figure out a way around GPFs muffling the noise on all their products. I miss that part but i can't fault the company. the 296 still sounds great for a turbo car. Folks critical of it need to drive it, live with it and see if it changes their mind. it is a lot of change to take in for people (including me) who have looked at mid-rear engine Ferrari for sound and V8.

 

The thing you can fault them on with the GPF is putting it on cars where it isn't required, and not supporting aftermarket deletes.

 

The interesting thing for me is when the 458 came out we all said the car is so sharp! And now here we are, and the new car is considerably sharper feeling.

GPF and turbo, kind of what it is. Also the new sound laws are terribly restrictive.

 

Very true and hardly any effort IMO. But as I dont understand the the rules I cant confirm that this would not affect them at a corporate level.

 

I think if they were to make it somewhat easy to remove the GPF they could be subject to some pretty hefty EU fines. Sorry for the politics, but the EU went really crazy with this stuff and I also think if you own a car in the EU and remove the GPF you could also be liable for some big fines, and possibly even be faced with imprisonment.

 

Local dealer has no allocations on either as of last week.

 

Jewelry VIP - we all know him, did a PR stunt bragging about an allocation and got banned from Ferrari losing his allocation. Today he gets every Ferrari they offer.

It's just a game that every Ferrari VIP plays, whether it's trips F1 racing garage depreciation TM etc - every VIP pays for their allocations. Pay more in some fashion - you too will get LE's.
If anyone think it''s cheap to sit on multi million cars in garage - it's not, regardless of how much they appreciate.

 

All LE's seem to do well over time, expect VS to do the same.
Looking forward to seeing how this all plays out - challenging times for sure.

 

And yet cruise ships can dock at every port.

 

It's definitely challenging times, but if you look at the pricing on the Speciale, it made sense before the market seemed to move like crazy on the 458 Speciale, 458 Speciale Aperta, and 16M, and now, it makes a bit more sense. I also think the days of get the VS and feel like a brilliant financial person are done, but, as we've discussed, these are first and foremost cars, we want to enjoy them as such. We work hard for our money so we dont want to see it vanish. This is purely wishful thinking on my part, but I think the 296 Speciale will do pretty well over a long enough period. I doubt that will beat other investments, but you cant zip around in those.

 

Love SF90 & 296 esp incoming XX
Odd part - even when there is more hybrid hp - it's proving to not get it done as expected.
Yes those days may be done - but looking back I bought my 16M for 250k 100 behind sticker and Speciale 385k - 20k behind sticker. Needless to say they said the same thing back then - who knows, as you say zipping around is what it's about, nothing wrong doing it in a gorgeous Ferrari.

Corvette ZR1X, a high-performance, all-wheel-drive hybrid, has achieved a record-breaking Nürburgring lap time of 6:49.275. This time was set by GM engineer Drew Cattell, making him the fastest non-professional driver on the track. The ZR1X's lap time is faster than the standard ZR1's time of 6:50.763

 

The power, by itself, has become much less meaningful. One of the things I think some of us miss on the hybrid Ferraris, the electric contributes something around 20-30% of the power. They could have made it contribute much more, and give us even more power. But then the feeling of the ICE would be diminished. As it is, these cars feel like superpowerful ICE cars. I really think if they simply did not have the e mannetino and didnt talk about the electric stuff, most people would not complain about the hybrid at the same level as they do now, I think most of the complaining is due to perception. These cars are remarkable.

 

I agree. The 296 drives like an NA car to me. I hardly hear the turbos, and you don't think about the battery power.

 

100% - Ferrari wants to be known as a tech company, I think they sat in one to many Apple meetings.
The vette only went 1.5 seconds faster with the hybrid version, 1250hp vs 1064hp
200hp or whatever it's not actually getting very much accomplished - the GT3RS 6:49 with 1/2 the hp.
I think we all can agree - hybrid is a thing but it's not necessarily a good thing for performance.
Porsche Lambo Ferrari all backing off their electrics - the marketing / reality is not going as expected and there may be a storm brewing. Porsche Aston Mclaren are not in a great place - today.
Ferrari has a special sauce - they build the best drivers cars on the planet. Mclaren pushed Ferrari to build the Speciale, with a response that very few expected. Speciale 2.0 has some big shoes to fill - would love to see one drivers review. stat