Skilly

That's a fair statement, and those BaT points of reference are great too. I had seen them as one of the places that I sourced for data, but with everything so dated, its a mixed bag on how it shakes out.

The market is most certainly in a correction phase - some of the crazy numbers are softening...honestly $230K for a decent 458 just leaves me shaking my head but I digress

I think the GT line is misunderstood by most exotic car enthusiasts...they understand Ferrari, Lambo etc, but the AMG GT line gets relegated to standard issue Mercedes AMG, which is cool, but generally not exotic. The Pro at least with 12 month trends seems to be standing out and showing the signs of an outlier. Whether that sticks, I agree its shaky. BUT, it is a limited production car, does turn heads (most people are scratching their head wondering "what is it?") and can easily run hard with any exotic out there. And of course, they are no more.

Orcbolg

I certainly agree with you. The entire lineup was market (or not marketed I suppose) poorly. They always Garner plenty of attention, yet when I talk about them with other exotic owners, they never seem to have a desire to own one themselves, and I've even had Lambo owners flat out tell me that they aren't exotics.

Skilly

Cue up the "what's an exotic" definition crowd! lol...

Fun fact, 15,000 Ferrari 458s out there and 750 Pros but the Ferrari is the clear exotic.

jb123mb

I love my GTR and picked it over a McLaren 720s and Lamborghini Huracán Evo.

In 40k miles of driving, i have only seen one GTC, NO GTR's ..... but a few Lamborghini's / McLarens / Ferrari's.

AMG GTR Pro

You my kind sir are a true car guy :-)

The 720 Spider is one of my all time favorite daily drivers.

AMG GTR Pro

I agree that the GT line is misunderstood. It aligns fairly well with the 911 on paper but the 911 following for their GT cars has developed over years and years. The AMG marquis struggles with exotic car branding. It skips over Exotic and goes to Hypercar with the ProjectONE but even the SLS was not really seen as an exotic except for perhaps the Black Series.

Low production volumes only get you so far.

thebishman

Anyone paying above MSRP at the moment in this crazy market should know that when it corrects, and it will when Supply = Demand again, they are going to lose a tremendous amount of value on the vast majority of ‘Sports’ cars that are for sale. That may/may not apply to the Pro, but I suspect it will.

Skilly

you mean the SLS that was 140K 3 years ago that will bring $240K today? even if it softens, there is no more supply so I dont think it dips back to pricing 3 years ago ...and that (maybe) exotic Black Series SLS, which was properly limited in its production is currently demanding >$700K

Theres actually one on BaT right now with a couple of days left to auction - it's a TERRIBLE time to sell a high end car with everyone complaining about the bloated values. Be interesting to see where this one lands. It has super high mileage (like daily driver) so it will be an outlier just for that reason but already well past MSRP.

https://bringatrailer.com/listing/20...lack-series-3/

Skilly

don't disagree at all...choose wisely for sure. The variables here are complex though. It's not just a situation where the GT becomes available again. Or the R8...or the Hurracan. etc. A lot of these cars are just done as we know it. So as supply in general fires up (which will take another year) it wont here.

Right now demand has largely softened and gives the impression that inventory topped up; it didn't. Thats been brought on from interest rates ratcheting upward, markets are shrinking, jobs are in question, and the buyer that has been spending like a drunken sailor is far less prevalent.

I think it's anybody's guess - the safe guess is 'generally' prices are going to correct downward. That said, long haul for these end of production vehicles, that had also had limited release will be outliers to the general market trend. It will add pressure to pricing in that, if they are sought after, there just will be less of them to get access to purchasing. That is supply and demand at its core.

Skilly

I forgot to point to this specifically. I had called it out in an earlier post here.

They have completely diluted this branding. It reminds me a lot of how BMW has abused their M brand the same way. You cant create exclusivity and then allow that same namesake to be applied across the fleet. We know the difference between a CLK Black Series but the general market will struggle to know what it is compared to a CLK Sport Edition with AMG styling options.

dlefty

And that’s why I love the GTR Pro, it’s rare, it looks cool, it performs amazingly, and all the “exotic” guys that have WORSE performing Lambos, etc, have no clue what it’s about.
I can roll through a pull out your lawn chair “car event” and among all the GT3RS, seriously aged looking HuriCANTS, and other common “super cars”, there’s only 1 GTR PRO, and everyone wonders what’s going on with it!

UCIMBZ

Mercedes-AMG is a separate brand and has only two models the GT and GT 4 door and it is not diluted. It is different than AMG tuned models.

Orcbolg

I'm not sure how true that is, but even if it is factual, I could ask 1000 people and the chances that anyone would know something like this is basically 0.

https://www.mercedes-amg.com/en/vehicles.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-AMG

Doctodd33

dont forget government mandates to EV will affect supply of all the current engines.

Skilly

yup...ok. And the general public has no clue of this delineation you're making. Marketing isn't your friend here either - it uses "AMG" everywhere. It's very diluted.

Skilly

THIS!!!

superswiss

If you think that's what AMG is then you neither understand branding nor the history of AMG. AMG was always about taking regular Mercedes-Benz models, and turn them into performance monsters. Anyone remember the Rote Sau (Red Pig) that put AMG on the map? In the whole existence of AMG, they've only had a handful of models they designed from the ground up. The vast majority are modified Mercedes-Benz models. Thinking only the GTs and SLS are real AMGs is complete ignorance of the history of AMG.

Skilly

All this said though, AMG has spread into being simply a brand exercise to sell cars. Just like they did at BMW with their M branding. The spirit of the AMG origin has been diluted to an emblem on the back of a C350, which goes to my point of general confusion in the market about the GT being exotic or not.

superswiss

That's one way to look at it. The other way is AMG is trying to establish itself as what's known as a lifestyle brand. Ferrari is the perfect example of a lifestyle brand. Many argue that Ferrari is not a car company. Ferrari sells more merch than cars, and since inception of Ferrari, their streets cars were created to finance the racing team and to this day Ferrari is still mainly about the racing team and its many fans who could never actually afford to own a Ferrari, but they buy merch by the ton. Ferrari primarily sells an idea and an image. Ferrari also carefully cultivates their customer base to keep this image alive, to the point where they are suing customers and flat out not allowing them to buy their cars if they don't behave the way Ferrari permits. Anybody can buy an AMG. You don't have to go beg at the front door.

Skilly

Interesting take. Ferrari is going about it completely differently though. They treat the Ferrari namesake as highly exclusive. They follow the same branding exercise that Rolex does - highly tuned instruments in limited supply; so much so that they can choose their customer amongst many potentials. And, just like Rolex does with its Tudor brand, Ferrari does the same with Maserati - you will see design cues and detuned Ferrari motors sitting inside certain cars, but you won't see a Ferrari namesake.

The mistake with Mercedes' move is that they have blended the AMG brand across the existing fleet - rather than excluding certain aspects of their fleet, they have done the opposite. They have included cars that would be laughed at with an AMG badge from its origin. This dilutes the brand and confuses the buyer from knowing the core of AMG engineering. Its a branding exercise to widen the customer net. BMW did this too and that's why you see a 320 with "M" logos all over it.

superswiss

Agreed, Moers expanded AMG to bring in more revenue and make it more profitable. But he also had crazy ideas like the AMG One. Mercedes is taking a page out of Ferrari's book with the new Mythos brand, which will sit above all the current sub-brands, even Maybach, and will feature highly exclusive models. An SL Speedster is being rumored for starters, but in the future they are also talking completely unique models that are not based on a Mercedes or AMG model, and Mercedes is thinning out the lower end. The A Class has already been chopped.

UCIMBZ

And the GT is one of them.

Skilly

And that has what to do with Mercedes decision to use the brand "AMG" everywhere and give the public impression that an AMG E43 is the same as an AMG GTR?

UCIMBZ

And I should care about people and their opinion why?

Orcbolg

I'm assuming you either didn't read the post that you originally responded to, or you've already forgotten the context of the discussion that you joined into. In the context of the conversation that everyone was having, it matters....