A rare 1962 250 GTO has become the most expensive Ferrari ever sold at a public auction. Initially estimated at 55 million euros, the model was eventually sold for 44 million euros at RM Sotheby’s auction in New York on Monday.
This was enough to secure another historic record: the second most expensive collector car ever sold at an auction. The absolute record is still held by the 300 SLR Uhlenhaut Coupé, which was sold by the Mercedes-Benz Museum through RM Sotheby’s for an incredible 135 million euros in 2022.
The Ferrari 250 GTO, acronym for Gran Turismo Omologato, was built with the sole purpose of homologation in the FIA Group 3 category, to compete in GT and endurance races. Designed in two phases, initially by Giotto Bizzarrini, and then by the duo Sergio Scaglietti and Mauro Forghieri, it is equipped with the famous Colombo V12 Tipo 168 engine with a displacement of 3.0 liters and six carburetors, achieving 300 horsepower. It has a five-speed manual gearbox and rear-wheel drive.
Ferrari produced only 36 units of this model between 1962 and 1964, and this particular unit, with chassis #3765, was the only one to compete with the official Scuderia Ferrari team, achieving a victorious participation in the 1000 km of Nürburgring in its first year. After a few years of competition in Italy, in Sicily, the vehicle was sold and exported to the US in the late 1960s.
Restored and modified, this 250 GTO changed hands several times among American owners until it arrived in the hands of a collector from the state of Ohio in 1985, who sold it on Monday. “Regardless of what is happening in the financial markets, a vehicle of this caliber is a collector’s item, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for a collector,” said Michael Caimano of RM Sotheby’s to AFP, comparing the Ferrari to a work of art that you can “touch, smell, and hear.”
