A stunningly clean 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO was sold in a rushed whirlwind of offers for a record $48.4 million in California on Saturday, the most astounding cost at any point paid for a car at closeout.
The super trim games car —in classic Ferrari red, naturally —turned into the most costly sold auto to date, after Sotheby’s in Monterey, California, pulverized a past vintage auto sell off record of $38.1 million for a 1963 model of the same design.
Initially thought to see a cost between $45-60 million, the low-threw gas-controlled brute presently denotes the most astounding closeout cost paid for a vintage vehicle in history.
Seller Greg Whitten, the boss of Numerix Software Ltd. — and an early Microsoft employee — purchased the car in 2000 for an estimated $10 million, although neither the auction house or the seller would confirm Whitten’s original purchase price.
The auctioned 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO is one of only 36 existing models of the elegant design, made between 1962-1964, and the cars have consistently fetched the highest price of any vintage automobile, in auction or out.
When originally made available for purchase in the early 1960s in the United States, prospective 250 GTO buyers had to shell out some $18,000 — and be personally approved to own the car by Enzo Ferrari himself.