The 2023 collector car auction season got off to a roaring start in January. The Bonhams Scottsdale auction reached $30M in sales, and RM Sotheby’s reported $44M. The big surprise came from Bonhams, where a 1912 Simplex brought $4.8M, a record for a pre-WWI car. Supercars were still supreme, though, with a Ferrari LaFerrari getting $4.075M at RM Sotheby’s and, earlier in the month, a Ferrari F40 topping the Mecum sale in Kissimmee, Florida at $3.135M.
Auction sales from Monterey Car Week totaled a record-setting $469 million; more than $126 million than last year’s total. RM Sotheby’s three-night auction accounted for more than half of that total, setting a record with a staggering $239.2 million in sales. Catch up on results from all the auction houses.
Most collector-car auction houses already offered absentee bidding options and live streaming auctions as part of regular operations, the safety and travel restrictions posed by COVID-19 spurred the industry to apply creative solutions. Learn more about Mecum, Gooding & Company, Bonhams and more are operating their summer auctions.
This year at Amelia Island, Bonhams will lift the gavel on nearly 120 collector cars spanning automotive history from the dawn of motoring to the mid-2010s, including vehicles from several noted collections. Industry experts selected their favorite cars of the group, including a Porsche, Aston Martin, Jaguar, and even a prewar Bugatti.