Cancelled My 458 Order

Cancelled my 458 order today. Basically it came down to a financial decision. My original plan was to keep my Scuderia and buy the 458. My wife had decided we didn't need two Ferraris so one had to go. I wanted to try the 458 so I asked my dealer what my Scuderia would be worth in trade. The Scuderia was worth $210K. Talk about depreciation ... MSRP was $299K and the car has around 2500 miles. $32 a mile to drive the car. WOW. I could have coughed up the additional $45K and made the trade but I had to take a step back and rethink the whole Ferrari thing. Plus the 458 will depreciate after the first year. Adding everything up I could be out $150K or more. The 458 just wasn't worth it. So I'll keep the Scuderia and enjoy a great car.

My dealer and I did talk about a couple of things. How far will the Scuderia prices fall in the next 6 months. Wholesale could be below $200K. The Scuderia could be a real bargain. The 458 is a strange market. My dealer got around 15 allocations. All are sold but here is the odd part. A few of the customers were first time or second time owners. My dealer said he had not sold a new Ferrari to a first time buyer since the 355. It's not like he had to scrape the bottom of the barrel to find customers but they weren't lined up at the door either. A lot of his old time customers passed on the 458.

 

For $150k you could buy a very nice car...perhaps a new Porsche or a 246 Dino which could appreciate in value.

Makes sense to me.

 

You had an order in and canceled it? How soon was your allocation? Why not by a resale red and tan and drive it till it sells? I am sure you could sell it for what you bought it for, if not it would be close. I KNOW there are guys out there who want an order but do not have one.

 

My Suggestion would have been, to First drive The 458 and then decide. The 458 is à fantastic Car that is in my opinion As Fun and rewarding to drive, As is The Scuderia. If you do have driven it - Apologies for my Suggestion. Regards- e

 

i think u did the right decision

 

What do wives know about Ferrari's? Should of said mind ya business!

 

A couple of points here.

First the dealer location can have a vast difference in the customer base.

Second the economy still sucks. We all know this.

Third a lot of us (me included) are holding out for the spider. When the f430 came out you could order it immediately.

And lastly, credit the f430 and Scuderia for being so good it's difficult to give up.

 

Thank you for reaffirming my intentions on never marrying.

 

I admire Jeff for being so logical and practical.
I'm not,Ferrari purchases are very emotional for me and my bank account suffers...

 

Ok Jeff, if your under economic strain and having 2 Ferrari's can damage future investments or mode of living sure it's a wise choice.

But if your giving up a Ferrari to benefit ya wife's spending habit or whatever investment that is 100% directed to her that's not the way to go!

Yall know what's I'm talking about!

 

Good move on the car. Don't buy if you truly do not want it.

 

Maybe in a subtle way this choice reflects the already announced arrival later of a Scuderia version of the 458...
CH

 

Good decision. Very Interesting that your dealer has quite a few first time customers on his list.Not a good sign for the resale market.

 

Interesting analysis. Scuderia is a fantastic car and for an expected further 10k in depreciation it should be a no-brainer to keep it.

Agree that 458 should be ok for the first year but after that watch out. Since this is the universal view it will probably not happen and the surprise outcome might be that it falls faster than expected.

 

My thoughts exactly. Yikes.

 

Its too late for me to regret anyway.. I am already lined up in MODIS for June/July production. Cannot afford to keep both so looks like the Scuderia has to go. I did contemplate on which car to own and decided "what the heck" just go for it.

 

I figure,the 458 is so good that it really does not matter what the resale is going to be,it's not an investment to begin with and if anyone buys it with that thought in mind he has no business to buy it anyway.
I get it for my PERSONAL enjoyment only,if it drops in value it is irrelevant as I may choose to just extend the time of ownership.
To be honest,I never had a car I did not lose my shirt on and that includes all the Ferraris lately ,too.
458 dropping in value?
Nothing new or shocking,we better get used to it.

 

I understand completely. At this point in time, it is hard to see replacing and car that I own. Not because I don't lust after other cars (don't we want them all?) but because the cost to exchange has become much more.

A CS can be had in the low 100s (say 130-140, easy). That's incredible compared to 190 a bit over a year ago. But is it worth 80k more than my 355? Not so much.

You could list your scud for sale at a price you could live with. If it sells, buy the 458. If not, oh well!

 

Economics has always been called the 'dismal' science because budget constraints are a reality, experienced by those who jump in and experience them vs. the majority of idealist F wannabees who have little sense of what it means to lose $25 K a year.

So I reckon if you got the 458 and kept the Scuderia, you'd loose about $25K a year on each of them = $50K a year, over the next 4 years. That's a hit that's hard to absorb when the cars typcially sit in the garage 97% of the year. So I completely emphatize with your decision.

In my own case, I did go for a 458, but took a $100K hit on my CS and a $50K hit on my Ruf R Turbo trading them in. And I expect my 458 to depreciate $25K a year for the first 4 years. Yes I get to drive them but watch handfuls of dollars flush down the toilet as fast as I can upshift the F1 paddles.

 

You are so lucky to live in Canada and only lose $25k per year on either a Scud or a 458. That is only HK$200k per year and we lose far far more than that. An HK$4.2mn tax paid Scud is now HK$3.2. Loss of HK$1mn in 2 years.

 

I have never regarded cars, art, wine as anything other than consumption. Problem with Ferraris is that the new cars are getting a lot more expensive and the 1 or 2 year old cars are a lot harder to resell. It becomes less enjoyable when you are "stuck" with cars and the cash to pony in each time goes up a lot because of this double whammy

 

interesting realization you reached. had this years ago.
i am the cheapest guy i know. i have a lot of cars, but all in i dont think i have lost that much money on them.
the trick is just not to covet the latest one all the time. every car is the same, apart from some very rare examples we all know. the first owner takes about a 40-50% hit in the first 3 years. the next 3 years after that are usually another 40-50% hit, leaving you somewhere around 25-35% of original price after 6+ years. the higher the build number, the more it will adhere to this rule, and vice versa.

you did the right thing by passing on the 458 if your intention is only to have one ferrari. you have already taken a significant hit on the scud by buying it new, so now your only way to recover anything, is to drive it longer to amortize the loss over more years and miles. btw, you wont notice any performance difference, and will still b faster and cooler than 99% of the cars you encounter on a daily basis.

 

thats why I like it

 

Knew this would be the case in late '08 when I sold my Scud AND CS. Was painful but I figured it was best financially. Have missed both. The unfortunate reality now is that unless you can afford massive depreciation on a regular basis, swapping new or nearly new Ferrari's or any other make of car is not feasible for most of us. The 458 will surely depreciate significantly over time. The Scud will continue to decline in value, pushing the CS down with it. Would not be surprised to see wholesale values for Scud's below $150K and CS below $100K in 3 years. For each of us, it comes down to how much we can afford to play the game. Best.

 

i am of course biased, but i am not so sure about the price path of the cs. at least here in switzerland they are on the rise again. i saw them go from the new price of 270k all the way down to 120-130k, and now they are in the 160-180k area and not much give on that figure.