The curse of the rear seats
12/30/2018
Sometimes you might think that a car becomes less desirable simply because it has two more or less usable seats in the back. We're not talking about seating niches where not even a small child could sit comfortably for any length of time, but seating that is at least tolerable for adults on short journeys. If such seats are available, the car can be used much more flexibly, but it seems to be difficult to increase its value. In fact, there are quite a few of these four-seaters that seem to have difficulty winning the public's favor.
Want some examples? We don't have to look far, because just yesterday three of these vehicles from luxury Italian manufacturers were auctioned off in Gstaad.
There was lot 133, a Lamborghini Espada 400 GT Series 3 from 1973 (picture above). The V12 engine is located in the front of the car, of course, but apart from that there are quite a few similarities with the Lamborghini Miura, which today fetches between half a million and several million at auction, depending on the model. And the Espada? It lured bidders to CHF 95,000 and then it was over. Sale under reserve.
The Ferrari 400 GT from 1979 (lot 116) fared no better. Yet it was one of the rare manual versions. The highest bid was CHF 75,000; a Ferrari 512 BB from the same year would certainly fetch four times that amount.
And it seems to be no different with the new classics. Although the Ferrari 456 M GT from 2000 was sold as lot 112 for CHF 52,500, given that it was the most interesting model from the series and also had a six-speed gearbox, one could have imagined prices at the level of a manual Ferrari 550 Maranello, which are significantly higher.
And you don't just have to look at the results of the classic car gallery auction in Gstaad , which we have already published in full, to reinforce this impression that more seats are not good for value development. This almost seems to be a "commandment", with exceptions of course proving the rule.
Incidentally, behind the wheel, all three cars mentioned are certainly at least (almost) as much fun as their "purebred" two-seater brothers. And not everyone sees their car primarily as an investment ...
