This car, Lot 345, sold for $2,557,712 (£1,973,750), including buyer’s premium, at RM Sotheby’s London, U.K., auction, on November 2, 2024.
This is the sixth time SCM has covered an F40. That is not because we do not have other Ferraris to write about — it is because the F40 market always makes a good story. It is now 38 years past the introduction of the model, just two years shy of the milestone the model’s name celebrates, and the car is just as magical today as it was then.
Car and Driver magazine adroitly captured the F40’s character, writing, “Ferrari has played the dual-purpose aspect to the hilt. When you pull open the door, you are confronted with an interior as stark as any endurance racer’s. Ferrari could have glued some leather to the door panels and put some carpeting on the floor — it would have added only a couple of pounds. But that would have killed the racing ambiance.” Then C&D nailed the F40’s performance attributes, simply stating, “See that car up ahead? Zap, we were there.”
The F40 is the ultimate supercar. You want to look at it, you want to be seen in it, but most of all, you want to drive it. Other cars may be more exotic, may be faster, may be more exclusive, but none touch the F40 experience. Its design stands alone in a world of lookalike supercars. The interior is elegant in its starkness. The on-boost acceleration is downright brutal, while off-boost the F40 is as docile as a family sedan. The F40 is automotive nirvana.
Good times, bad times
When the F40 was introduced in 1988, the world was riding high on a strong economy and Ferrari fever was at its peak. You could not pay too much for a Ferrari — you could only buy too soon. Ferrari 288 GTO buyers had enjoyed an unprecedented windfall of appreciation, and not wanting to miss out on the gold rush, buyers were giddy for F40 positions. The car was introduced with an MSRP of around $385,000. Few got sold at that price, however, as the incredible demand for the car pushed the market price to around $1,000,000.
Not long after the first U.S. cars were delivered, the savings-and-loan industry crisis sapped $124 billion of government money from the economy to prop up failing financial institutions. About the same time, Iraq invaded Kuwait, causing a global oil crisis. A recession resulted, taking the joy and the profit away from Ferrari speculating. The recession officially lasted eight months, but the damage to the Ferrari market was catastrophic. Values dropped by as much as 75%, and that was if you could even find a buyer.
F40s were not immune from the carnage. Clients were walking away from large deposits just to get out of million-dollar contracts. Before the final-year F40s hit the showroom in 1992, a new F40 could be bought at list price and a used F40 could be bought well below MSRP.
When Bonhams & Brooks sold an F40 for $180,000 in 2000 (SCM# 10715), SCM’s auction reporter noted, “F40 prices have been strong and slowly climbing.” That was a spectacular 55% off the list price and an astonishing 84% depreciation from the market price when new. Even at fire-sale pricing, finding a buyer was not easy. The plummet was especially confusing, as the Ferrari market was well into recovery, with Ferrari’s new F355, 550 and 456 models selling well. Its F50 (the F40’s successor) sold out, despite Ferrari’s attempt to stifle speculation with mandatory initial leases and restricted resale for a limited period.
SCM’s Platinum Auction Database saw F40s slowly get back on their feet, with the average hitting $641,000 in 2009. The next two years saw a slight retreat, then nothing but gains on through today.
A slowing sprint
RM Sotheby’s near-$2.6m sale of F40 chassis 83052 fell short of our observed 2024 average auction price of almost $3.1m, but that is not a surprise. There are few F40 sales each year, and the sale of a couple premium or lesser examples can skew the numbers. Our subject F40 appears to be a very good example. Its history is well documented, the expensive maintenance items are completely up to date, and the car is Classiche certified. The mileage is represented as being 21,921 kilometers, a desirable 13,600 miles. About the only nit to pick is that it is an early example.
F40s are hugely popular in Europe but appear to be less valuable there. It is not unusual to find a European-version F40 pop up at a U.S. dealer or auction, indicating a seller attempting to arbitrage the markets. With that in mind, $2.6m looks a little light for a U.S. sale and about right for Europe.
As buyers tend to be favoring more-contemporary Ferrari supercars and special-series models, F40s may not continue to see the steep gains they made in the past. But as one of the most desirable cars on the planet, a retreat is not in the cards. The buyer may not see appreciation exceed their holding costs, but one drive will shore up any doubts it was a good buy. ♦
