Say what you like about Donald Trump, but he sometimes has good taste … in cars.
On show this weekend at The Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance in Florida is his old 365kw 2007 Ferrari F430. The now President bought the car new for about $288,000. Garaged in Trump Tower, Don didn’t use the car a lot, selling it in 2011 with under 4000km on the clock. The only supercar owned by a president of the US, the bright red Ferrari coupe still has only done 10,000km.
The Italian Trumpmobile will go up for sale at Auctions America’s 15th annual Fort Lauderdale collector car sale, March 31-April 2. Expect to pay $400,000 for a car that’s worth $130,000 without the Trump history.
For someone so committed to the US car industry, The Donald has a lot of foreigners in his collection. He bought a new V12 1997 Lamborghini Diablo with a custom Le Mans blue paint job for $300,000. An old-style entrepreneur bought the Diablo in 1996 for $400,000, kept it a year and listed it for sale in September last year for $600,000. Unfortunately for him, the capitalist system failed and it didn’t sell.
However, last year, one Lambo owner took a leaf out of the master’s playbook and created an up-market rally car, the Lamborghini Trumpventador. In 1988 the Trumpster joined forces with Cadillac to market “the most opulent stretch limousine made”, the Trump Golden Series, with a fax, paper shredder, VCR and plenty of rosewood trim. Two were sold.
The only nods to the US auto industry in the Trump collection are two Cadillacs and a Tesla. Apart from them, it’s a vintage Rolls Phantom, a newish Rolls Silver Cloud, a Maybach, Mercedes S600 and Mercedes SLR McLaren.
For the more conservative buyer, Auctions America will also be offering senator and astronaut John Glenn’s 2000 Cadillac Deville DHS, a snip at $80,000. John bought the car new for $60,000 and it came “fully-loaded, complete with night vision radar and hands-free system, which responds to John’s voice”. If you’re not interested in the space history then you can buy the same model for between $900 and $9000.
This is a shortened version of the original article – read the rest at The Australian.
