The Ferrari F40 is a legendary vehicle. It’s a classic poster car that hung on a quite a few bedroom walls. But while most supercars spend their lives in a climate-controlled garage, this one has an interesting story.
This 1991 Ferrari F40 survived the first 20 years of its life just fine. With just over 7,000 miles on the odometer, the car had seen some use but was in good condition.
Come 2011 and the F40’s owner is away in Europe on some business. The car is entrusted to a mechanic. It’s not clear if he was supposed to do any work on the Ferrari, but at some point, he took it for a “test run.”
It ended very badly. The mechanic jumped the curb, drove the F40 into a metal gate and totaled the front end. Good thing Ferrari put the engine in the back.
In 2013, Richard Rawlings from the Fast N’ Loud show on Discovery bought the car, still wrecked, for $400,000. The team at Gas Monkey Garage proceeded to restore it back to life.
It was stripped down entirely to repair and reinforce the frame. A lot of new parts found their way inside the F40, boosting the power to 550hp, up from 471hp originally.
The twin-turbochargers on the 2.9-liter V8 engine were upgraded. The team installed an aluminum flywheel and Kevlar clutch pack. Finally, the exhaust was replaced with a TUBI competition system.
Along the way, the original red body was repainted black and the car received a set of black, HRE, three-piece alloy wheels.
When the project was finally done, Rawlings had invested $295,000 into the build. The popular opinion is that both these figures are greatly exaggerated for TV. Either way, Rowling’s partner and main investor – Dennis Collins – ended up buying the F40 for his personal collection.
In 2014, the Ferrari was sold at the annual Scottsdale auction to baseball player Reggie Jackson for $742,500. But Jackson found it too fast and sold it again for $643,500. That’s a $100,000 bad idea.
The car went silent for a while, until 2017. Its owner – Richard Scott – operated parking lots for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs in LA. An investigation found that Scott took part in a scheme that drained $13 million from the VA over 15 years. He pleaded guilty, received a six-year prison sentence and was ordered to pay back $12 million that he took.
The government also seized his property, including the 1991 Ferrari F40. The vehicle is currently being auctioned online by Apply Auctioneering. The current price is $501,500 and if you want it, you can place your bid by February 11th.
The funny thing is, the Ferrari may actually end up going full circle. According to the Gas Monkey Garage website, Richard Rawlings is planning to bid and get it back home.