Breakouts and breakers: Monterey sales that stand out from our Price Guide

Monterey has always been the bellwether event setting the tone for the collector car market, particularly for top-tier cars as the market closes the year. Compared to 2022’s record setting sales, this year has been down, but that’s all relative. We still witnessed the second-best Monterey auction tally of all time. And while many sales were a bit more restrained than last year, plenty caught our attention.

Sifting through the outliers (cars with exceptional provenance or ultra rare specifications), quite a few sales bent our Price Guide-based predictions, and did so in one of two ways. First, there are the breakers—cars that broke our Price Guide with sales that soared past our condition-appropriate values but aren’t necessarily indicators that the market has changed. Breakouts, on the other hand, are the sales that eclipsed our Price Guide and we believe set a new market level (i.e., are repeatable).

Breaker: 1964 Ferrari 250 GT Lusso

Sold for $2,810,000 Broad Arrow

#1 condition (Concours) $1,850,000

Ferrari’s bigger and more luxurious version of the 250 GT, the “Lusso” literally translates to “Luxury.” Often overshadowed by other prancing horses carrying the 250 moniker, the Lusso is significant in its own right for helping add upscale cred to Ferrari’s sporting status. Despite its size and available equipment, the 250 Lusso kept its two-seat layout, leaving 2+2 duty to the 250 GTE.

$2.8 million is a strong result for this 250 Lusso. Then again, this car had a lot going for it: a skilled restoration, a one-of-one color combination of Grigio Fumo over a blue interior, and a long-term ownership of 20 years. With all boxes checked, this created a perfect storm worthy of a substantial bid. Objectively speaking, this sale doesn’t mean that all 250 Lussos have jumped $1 million over concours value, but it does show that the best cars can still command top dollar. Despite this and some other healthy sales of ’60s Ferraris at Monterey, this result is more an indication of the segment’s longevity rather than a signal of a bullish trend.

Breaker: 1969 Datsun 240Z

Sold for $132,000 Mecum

#1 condition (Concours) $79,600

Datsun’s once-affordable sports car is a hot commodity among collector car enthusiasts. And for good reason: these cars offered a nimble and sporty alternative to the Corvette when new and grew quite popular over its total production run. The 240Z has led the charge among Japanese classics, becoming one of the earliest of the mainstream collector cars from the Japanese segment to crack the $100,000 barrier with a handful of exceptional examples in recent years.

Speaking of exceptional cars, Mecum offered this one alongside a number of other Z-cars. As one of just 538 cars produced in 1969 for the 1970 model year, it’s among the earliest production examples available. Coupled with an eight-year restoration, this car really brought home the bacon in what has been a softening market for early Zs. Remember, that one sale doesn’t set a market, and a few of the other Zs Mecum offered fell short of their marks. For now, this one is in the breaker column, but we will keep an eye out to see if the 240Z market is back on the upswing.

Breakout: 2012 Lexus LFA

Sold for $1,105,000 RM Sotheby’s

#1 condition (Concours) $988,000

Lexus’ engineering tour de force was a difficult sell when new but it’s now become a collector car darling. It’s easy to see why—the LFA was obsessively, exhaustively designed. From every minute detail of the body to an engine so well balanced it could rev from idle to 9000 rpm in 0.6 seconds, it represented (and arguably still does) Toyota’s ultimate vision of a modern supercar. No wonder enthusiasts have come around to them in a big way.

While the far less common Nurburgring package is a solid seven-figure collector, the standard LFAs had only flirted with the $1 million mark until Monterey. RM Sotheby’s offered what can only be described as a new, in-wrapper car. You’re not going to find a closer-to-new LFA than this. While on its face that might suggest this car’s sale is a one-off, given how long the model has been approaching seven figures, this was simply the right car to cross the threshold. Now that that’s happened, don’t be surprised if other exceptional examples start to sell in this range.

Breakout: 1972 Alfa Romeo Montreal

Sold for $168,000 Gooding & Company

#1 condition (Concours) $149,000

The Montreal is arguably one of the most handsome cars to come out of Italy in the 1970s, full stop. This GT coupe was blessed with a beautiful Bertone body and a 2.5-liter V-8 engine derived from the Tipo 33 Stradale’s powerplant, the Montreal went and sounded as good as it looked. In fact, if the Italians built a car to emulate the American muscle car, this would have to be it.

Following a weak showing for the model toward the beginning of the year, this sale of what we rated as a #2 (excellent) condition car surprised by surpassing our estimates for a #1 (concours) quality example by $19,000. While not a huge amount, given how infrequently these come up for sale, a strong amount is more influential to the Montreal market than would be the case with a more common car, and points to a likely turnaround for Montreal values.

Breakout: 1973 Ferrari Dino 246 GTS

Sold for $775,000 RM Sotheby’s

#1 condition (Concours) $715,000

Yet another car that’s been on a tear lately, the Ferrari Dino is certainly a car that went from snubbed to beloved, and in relatively short order. Few will now deny it as a mainstream Ferrari collectible. In fact, we called it out as a car to watch in our 2022 Bull Market List.

With this sale, it appears that the Dino trajectory still has room to grow. This very nice driver-quality car with the popular “chairs and flares” option blew way past condition-appropriate value fetching a staggering $775,000. We’ve said it before, but these cars are now reliably more expensive than the ’70s flagship Ferrari Daytona. If Monterey has proven anything to us, the classic Ferrari market is still thriving despite continued proof that the collector car market is softening.