Data taken as at point of sale and doesn't include any sales agreed post-auction.
What's going on here?
Here are your 4 headlines from Gooding & Co's London auction
Tell me more
1 - Poor sell-through rate. Sell-through rate seriously struggled at 48%. That's one of the lowest sell-through rates we've seen all year.
2 - Small offering. 23 vehicles were offered, that's less than half of what we saw in 2023 (47) and again down on 2022 (39).
3 - The sale lacked a big hitter. 2020 saw the Pebble Beach winning Bugatti Type 59 sell for £9,535,000. The 2022 sales saw a 250 SWB Competizione sell for £7,762,500. Yet both the 2023 and 2024 top seller at sub-£3,000,000. Good by normal auction house standards but that's Gooding aren't about dealing in normal cars.
4 - 96% of vehicles failed to reach their lower estimate. Incredibly of the 23 vehicles that were offered, 22 of those failed to reach their lower estimate (even with premium added in for those that didn't sell). Truly remarkable.
5 - On the flip side of this, Gooding managed 3 world records for:
The ex-Mille Miglia Lancia Lambda (estimate: £550,000 - £650,000) sold at £528,750
The Bugatti Type 57 Atalante (estimate £3,000,000 - £4,000,000) sold at £2,362,500. Note: the Prototype, which we class a separate model in our taxonomy sold for £2.6m in 2017)
The Bugatti Type 43 A Roadster (estimate £3,000,000 - £4,000,000) sold at £2,981,250.
Why should I care
It was such a tough sale for two main reasons.
Firstly, the cars consigned were tricky. No other word for it. Niche, small audience stuff. A Sunbeam 3 Litre. A Ballot 2LTS. A Pegazo Z-102. It was an uphill climb from the start.
Secondarily, and this is the elephant in the room, the estimates were simply far far too high. The average delta between the estimate midpoint and the sale price (including premium where not sold) was 27%. That's about double what you'd expect to see. Those high estimates flow through to high reserves and all of a sudden you're in a tricky situation...
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