Archives for the Tag: Car News

Car thefts down since 1991 all time high

Posted by admin on December 22nd, 2014 in Category Car News (no responses)

You’ll always worry about your vehicle. It comes with the territory, what that weird ticking noise is, letting your kids take it out for the night, keeping the oil maintained, and making sure that the engine is in good and working order. Yet according to the FBI theft of your vehicle is not something most people worry about, because they don’t have to. According to statistics, 2013 showed the lowest number of stolen cars since 1967.

There were 699,594 vehicles reported stolen in 2013 – a positive figure no matter how you compare it to years past. Thefts were down by about 20,000 cars from 2012 and were 58 percent lower than their peak of 1,661,738 in 1991. An earlier look at the data found the Honda Accord and Civic to be the most stolen models in 2013.

The theft rate actually showed even more significant improvement. In 2013, there were 221.3 stolen cars for every 100,000 people in the US. That’s versus 659.01 in 1991. The last time figures were this good was in 1962 at 196.63 per 100k, according to the NICB’s data.

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How Much Would You Pay for a 1962 Ferrari?

Posted by admin on August 25th, 2014 in Category Car News (no responses)

Apparently someone thought the price tag of 40 million dollars seemed about right.  A red 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO Berlinetta, which was once involved in a fatal accident, has set the world record for a car sold at auction, going for $38.1 million at a sale in California, auction house Bonhams said.

The price offered on Thursday by a bidder whose identity was not disclosed surpassed the $30 million (all figures U.S.) paid last year for a 1954 Mercedes Benz W196 race car, also sold by Bonhams, the auctioneers said in a press release.

“We’ve always maintained that we would exceed the current world record and that the car would bring between $30-$40-million and today the GTO did just that,” Robert Brooks, chairman of Bonhams, said in a statement.

Some reports prior to the auction had said the car might fetch as much as $70 million, but a Bonhams spokeswoman said these were based purely on speculation.

The Ferrari was the jewel in the crown for Bonhams’ annual Quail Lodge event on the Monterey Peninsula in California.

The auction house said that it was the world’s longest single-ownership for a Ferrari 250 GTO Berlinetta, effectively held by one family for 49 years from 1965 to 2014.

The car sold from the Maranello Rosso Collection and stamped with chassis number ‘3851 GT’ was the 19th 250 GTO Berlinetta made by Ferrari and completed on Sept. 11, 1962, Bonhams said.

It was delivered to the leading French racing driver Jo Schlesser, to be co-driven by himself and French ski Champion Henri Oreiller in the 1962 Tour de France Automobile.

Oreiller later crashed the car during a race at Montlhery Autodrome, south of Paris, and died of his injuries in hospital. A newspaper report at the time said the Ferrari careered off the track and flipped twice after a tyre burst.

The car was repaired by Ferrari in Italy and was sold to Italian gentleman driver Paolo Colombo in time for the start of the 1963 competition season.

In 1965 young Fabrizio Violati, the scion of a wealthy Italian family, bought the car. “I saved the car from scrap and hid it from my parents. I only drove it at night so nobody would see me”, Bonhams quoted him as saying.  This car is a collectors item but it will be hard to feel it for any more than what this man purchased it for.

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