Tom Hartley Jr. Reveals The Greatest Supercar of All Time

Tom, what is the undisputed best classic car of all time?

Well, that obviously comes down to personal opinion. For me. I think a Ferrari 250 GTO. Is that. No, it's not in here, actually. That's a 288GTO. But a 250GTO, we've sold a couple of those in recent times. I've sold three of them so far in my career. They're a car that's, you know, somewhere between 60 to 80 million. And. And, yeah, and they are regarded as certainly the holy grail of classic Ferraris and would probably be the pinup poster car for most classic car aficionados.

Right. Is this the McLaren F1, the most overrated classic car of all time.

Now, off air, I know you already shared your opinion with me that you.

Thought that was the case, and notice you said opinion.

Yeah, And I certainly disagree. That is about the biggest load of nonsense I have ever heard.

But it's 20 million quid. Like, compare it to the F40.

Okay. I mean, let me. Let me give you a little bit of a crash course. Sure. Okay.

Yeah, yeah. Assume I know enough.

Okay. They made, circa 1300. 1300 Ferrari F40s. 1300. Yeah. There is 64 McLaren F1 road cars built.

Okay.

This is a road car that was built to have great luxury inside, be the fastest car on the planet, going over 240 miles an hour over 30 years ago, have a Kenwood radio system and a CD player in the front. And then with very little modification. And when I say very little modification, I mean stick a spoiler on the back and take one of the passenger seats out. It went and won Le Mans. It went and won the 24 hours of Le Mans. So a race where people, manufacturers, set out with their prototypes and they specifically build a car to go and race at Le Mans, make it as light as possible. And then McLaren in 95 became something like first, second, and fourth. So they held three of the top four places in what was a road car with very little modification like it is. Should absolutely have the title and own the title of probably being the greatest car of all time. So you are 1000% wrong.

Well, you're the guest. So.

Okay.

But sure. Surely everything is relative to how much you pay for it. Like, how much can you get an F40 for?

Now, we sell them for about two and a half million pounds.

So that's ten times the price. Almost 20 million for that.

That's about circa 20 million dollars. Okay, so that's about, say, 16 million pounds. Okay. So eight times the price. How.

Look at that.

Yeah, actually not even eight times the price. Say seven times the price. An F40 is a real pinup car. It's spectacular. It's one of the most iconic supercars of. It's a car that's probably maybe been better to us than any other car. Like, I've sold so many F40s over the years and sold them from being sort of £110,000, £115,000. And, you know, now we've. We have sold a couple for over £3 million. So they've been very good to us. However, you know, a McLaren F1, you being in the presence of a McLaren F1 today, you should appreciate. I appreciate I've bought and sold loads of these cars and whenever we get a McLaren F1 in, it properly excites me.

Yeah. It's not that I don't appreciate it. Please don't think I'm taking for granted you letting us be here, but Ferrari F40, pick one up for 2 million. It's got to be better value than a McLaren F1.

First of all, it was two and a half million, Rob. So you're lowballing already, right?

Would you not expect that of me?

Well, are we negotiating here or what are we doing? So. No, we wouldn't accept your 2 million.

Okay, fine.

Firstly, yeah, and secondly, it does become a lot of. It comes down to rarity, historical importance. If they made a hundred Ferrari F40s, right, these cars would certainly be eight figure cars. There'd be somewhere between 10 to 12 million pounds. If they made 100 to 150 cars, but they built 1300 of them.

Right.

Which is a lot of cars.

Yeah. Okay, so what is the most overrated classic car of all time?

Ooh, overrated classic car of all time. Classic car or collectible car?

Well, tell us the difference.

Well, for me, I wouldn't deem a Jaguar XJ220 as a classic car. I would consider it a modern supercar, but one of the early date modern supercars. But that really is a very poor car. It's a terrible car, right? It's, you know, it basically when you drive it, it feels like you have a lawnmower engine behind you. It's absolutely humongous. Beautiful looking car. I love it. Has so much presence and when you start it up, you feel like, oh, I need to send this car for a service because there's something wrong with it.

And the build up, the attraction sometimes is it.

Well, it's just quiet. It's a V6 engine. It's a V6 engine in a big car.

Yeah.

Sounds like very similar to. I've got a lawnmower at home that sounds very similar to it. And the build quality is absolutely shocking. So I recall I bought one once from. I sold a car to lottery winner up in Scotland. It would have been about 2001, maybe this XJ220 had owned a few thousand miles. He had the car for a month, said, tom, I hate it. Will you buy it back? Bought it back, flew up to collect the car. On the way back, I drove it home because I thought it'd be really cool to drive an XJ20 at home. @ the time I was dating my wife, who we've been married for the last 21 years, and I thought, I'm going to pick her up and we're going to take. I'm going to take her to the Cinema in this XJ220 and thought I would show off and go in down the slip road to get onto the motorway. I put my foot down and as I put my foot down, the radio just completely came straight out. And that's the type of build quality that I'm talking about. As I'm in second gear accelerating, the radio just goes, maybe so far. Yeah. And I wasn't going that quick.

So are you saying the XJ220 is the most overrated?

An XJ220 is a shockingly poor car.

And how much are they now?

I mean, somewhere between 300 to 450, 000, depending on the mileage.

Okay, so the price reflects.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. When you compare it to the likes of an F40, that was the same era. You know, an F40 is two and a half million pounds plus. Yeah. But for me, I appreciate. When we talk about classic cars or collectible cars, I appreciate all genres. We sell pre war cars, we sell classic cars, we sell modern supercars, we sell, as you've seen, several Formula one cars, Grand Prix cars. So it's hard for me to really criticize anything or that many cars because I actually appreciate them for what they are. Yeah.

But you can have the lowest appreciation as well as the highest appreciation. But you didn't really hold back on the XJ220.

No. That's an exception to the rule.

Now, I've got to ask you this, it wasn't even in my list, but what do you think of the Jaguar rebrand? They just did.

Just unbelievable. Just last year, we sold the most significant Jaguar on the planet. We sold The Le Mans winning Jaguar C Type, the works car. So this is the only surviving Le Mans winning works Jaguar. This is a car that basically saved millions of lives indirectly because it was the pioneer of disc brakes. So it was the first car to be fitted with disc brakes. And because it smashed everyone at Le Mobile, all the other manufacturers realized that actually we need to start putting disc brakes in our cars. So the safety that that brought into their production cars a few years later is such a significant car in the automobile world. And when you look at the technology, the innovation that Jaguar had in the 1950s and how dominant they were in racing compared to where they suddenly found themselves today and doing this rebranding that they've done, I just can't believe it. I think it's particularly sad.

Do you think it could be the end of them? Because a few people came out and said, that's going to be the end of Jaguar.

I'm not sure where they go. Unless they decide to rebrand again, I'm not sure where they go from here. Wow.

Okay then. So I know I asked you overrated. What about underrated? Like, what do a lot of people not understand that you, as someone who lives with them, drives them, appreciates them? You said before we went on air, you do drive these because some of them look like they've never been driven. But you like to know the nuance. What's the most underrated supercar or classic car or any car?

Underrated cars? Well, Porsche are, I don't think you could really describe them as underrated because they've got such a following all over the world. But Porsches are such great cars, such well engineered cars, such well built cars. And when you drive a 1971 Porsche 2.7 RS, even myself, that are so familiar with driving all different types of cars, if somebody said to you, how old is this car? You'd guess 30 years old. You wouldn't guess 55 years old because it's such a great car in its day. So I think there's many Porsches that are not necessarily underrated, but don't get enough appreciation for how good of cars that they actually are. And then I think, you know, some of the great 1960s Aston Martins are fantastic cars to drive. If you get a really well sorted car, there's so many great cars in the world.

So I'm going to come back a bit later to if someone has X budget, what would be an investment you might choose before that we are sat around some amazing cars and I know this isn't Even all of your stock. So what's the value of all the cars that you have in stock and how many cars?

I mean, today. Today it would be shocking, but we have a lot of cars like our own stock. At any one time. We will carry. We will carry cars of our own funds invested into cars. It'd be circa nine figures, sort of 100 million of stock of cars. That's of our own cars. And then we have other cars that, you know, recently we've taken on, on a consignment basis, a huge collection of Grand Prix cars that's been quite well publicized.

Is that Bernie Ecclestones?

Yes. And so, you know, you're talking about a collection of cars there that, you know, value sort of in the region of half a billion. That was.

Harry, if you could hear that in the background, half a billion of cars.

And then, you know, there's other cars. So for us, we've always got in our own funds invested. We have always circa 100 million. And then we have several other hundreds of millions of cars as well that we're also in control of. So we've always got quite a lot of special cars around us.

So there could be about a billion pounds worth of cars that you've either got or that you're in the process.

Of selling at this moment in time because of that very unique collection then obviously that has brought the averages up. Yeah, the averages up a little bit. Yeah.

It's like getting duck, duck, duck. 180 in cricket brings your average up. How does that make you feel? Because maybe there was one day when you were a boy and you just dreamed of having a nice car.

Do you know, I'm a very focused individual. So when I wake up every morning, I wake up very early, I go to sleep very late. And throughout that day, I'm very focused on doing deals, on, you know, performing what I'm apparently okay at. But I always take the time to look back on things. And I think the reason why I'm decent at my job is because I do get stimulated by all of these cars. I don't just. I don't just treat them as a ways and a means to make money. But if somebody came to me tomorrow. We've had lots of private equity companies, companies approach us over the last few years and said, hey, you know, let us basically buy the business and you run it for us. And I've got no interest in that because if somebody gave me a trillion pounds, I would only tomorrow morning do exactly the same as what I'm doing today, because I'm buying and selling the world's greatest cars. My business is my hobby and my hobby is my business. But when I. When I look back on things, and I think when I was growing up as a young boy, a little bit older than what our oldest son is at the moment, I used to always read the Classic Car magazine and, you know, there was a couple of dealers out there that would. Maybe you'd see like a Porsche 959 and a Ferrari F40, and I'd think, oh, my God, those cars are so special. And, you know, always longed to imagine being sat in them, changing the gears, driving them, and then in the late 1990s, to start buying and selling those cars. And then these days, when I look and just at the moment, like, you know, we've got here, We've got an F40, we've got two 288 GTO Evos. There's only three of those in private circulation in the whole world. We've got another 288GTO, another 288GTO on the plane on the way back from Australia in the next couple of days, we've got another 288 GTO and an F40, McLaren F1 and Pagani Utopias. And like, our supercar stock is utterly insane.

You've got the Valkyrie down there.

We forgot about that one. Yeah. And a Carrera GT and a McLaren P1. And like, we, at the moment in time, we've got just about every supercar on the planet. And we'll probably sell the F1 tomorrow, and then, you know, our focus will be on getting another F1. But I get so excited by the thrillers in the chase of getting those cars, obtaining those cars and then doing a deal on those cars.

And if there's one car in this whole showroom that stays. But I was allowed to repossess the rest of them from you and have them. Which one out of all of these stays with you?

I have a Lamborghini Miura over the other side that has, you'll see my private plate on it, 1thJ. And I've owned that car for about 15 years, and I love that car. I love everything about it. I think it's a timeless design. If it came out today, it would still look current. Yeah. So I really like that. I've got a 288 GTO that is the factory prototype. It's the oldest one in existence. Yeah. So that would be fighting with the Miura on which one stays.

It surprises me, actually. That Lamborghini, I just. There's only one Lamborghini in this showroom. Everything else is not that bar. Okay, there's the Urus there.

Yeah.

But there's all these Ferraris and the Lamborghini, and I just. I did. I wasn't getting Lamborghini vibes from you.

Well, I love Lamborghini as a brand. I really like the people. I consider them all friends. But that also shows you the power of Ferrari, because Ferrari, you could. You could have a building that's seven times the size of this and fill it up with important Ferraris. Not. Not just Ferraris, important Ferraris. But when you think about Lamborghini, the model, range to date, their company is nowhere near as well. It's not that much different, but it's not as old as Ferrari. It's not as established as Ferrari. But when you think about Lamborghini, you had a 350 GT which turned into a 400 GT. You had a Miura, you had a Countach, you had a Diablo, you had a Murcielago, you had an Inventador, and you now got the new Revolto. That's the full model range. So, you know. Yes, so.

So it's just because of history and volume and how many models have been made that you have more Ferraris?

Yeah, they just didn't. They haven't made that many different Lamborghinis. Yeah, they haven't produced that many cars.

But those last four you just mentioned, from the Countach upwards, I mean, that's classic, classic, classic. I have an Aventador.

Ask me the question again about what's the most overrated car?

All right. Yes. All right.

What's the.

Are you good? I know what you're going to say.

What am I going to say?

Okay, so what's the most overrated supercar?

I mean, a Countach is a bloody terrible car. Like, it is terrible. Like, you know, a Countach. We are. We're terrible at selling Countaches because when. When we get a Countach in stock and a client asks and says, hey, what do you think of that car, Tom? And I'm like, it's shocking.

Do you just say that?

Yeah. I mean, look, you can't be. Just because it's my opinion of them being shocking, there's some other people that will turn around and go, tom, that was my poster car and I want to buy it. But they'll respect you more for being so honest and transparent and not being a used car salesman.

Yeah.

And every car that you sell is your favorite and the greatest of its type. You know, I believe in just being very straight with people. Yeah. And I think a Countach is a real shitty car.

What shit about a Lamborghini Countach?

Well, I mean, have you ever tried to sit in one?

The only. I have an Aventador and I can just get in that.

Yeah.

But before that I tried to get in the Gallardo and anything. I can't get in them. I'm too tall.

And I mean, you're not that tall. What are you, six, two? Six three.

Thank you.

But six, three. And to get into a Countach, it would be the most uncomfortable experience. It does not drive good.

What's wrong with it?

They just. They're just not. If you compare it to a Ferrari of the same period. Yeah. You know, a Countach, it's a very dramatic styling. So the very early Countaches, the LP4 hundreds, I can appreciate them for. If you think about when that car was first launched at the Motor show, which I think was in around about 1970, and it was a Geneva, and you. You think about that car being launched and how dramatic that styling was, it was a real icon of its time. But it's not the type of car that you would want to be doing 5,000 miles a year in, let alone 15 or 20,000 miles a year in. It's quite difficult car to drive. They're very. They cost a lot of money to maintain. They're not comfortable. They go wrong. Would not be for me. It would not be a car that I'd be having in my own personal collection.

Okay. It has been said. So is that your one there, that F40?

That one is my own car. Yeah. That's a car that was Sterling Moss's new.

Right.

So delivered new to Sterling Moss. And then it had one other owner in the UK and then I bought that one about five years ago. Six years ago. We do have another F40 here. That's for sale. Yep. That's behind the F1.

Yeah. But I understand that's yours. And you. You're not selling that?

No, I don't want to sell that. No. That's part of the THJ pension fund. Right. I don't believe in traditional pensions.

No.

Well, that's.

A personal pension, isn't it?

Yeah.

Yeah. Okay, so if you're not going to sell that, what one in your collection would you sell?

I don't ever sell any cars that are in my own personal collection. I've got some Formula one cars for me. I. I'm sort of thinking that If I'm fortunate enough to live another few decades and, you know, I'm blessed enough, then it'd be nice to get to the end of that and go, look how many great cars that I sort of packed away over the years. And I've packed away a lot of really good things, from the Miura to a great 2.7 RS, the Ferrari supercars, some Formula One cars.

What can you do with Formula One cars? Because I know you said you sell them.

Yeah.

Who. Who buys a Formula one car? Do you know?

I. I think a Formula. I. I've been an advocate of Formula one cars for many years, and I've been expressing how undervalued they've been. Way too undervalued for way too long. They are much more appreciated these days. And the value. The value supports that. However, they've got so much further to go. Like, if you think about some of the great Formula one cars over there, we have. Are you into Formula One?

On a basic level, yes. Okay. I'm not an expert.

So over there, we've got Ayrton Senna's, maybe his most famous winning car.

Yes.

So it's a car that he won around Donington in, which is a racetrack close to us. It was in the wet. The lap was called the Lap of the Gods. He overtook five people on the first lap and then just smashed everyone in the field. He also won Brazil in that car. And if you think about the historical significance and how much Money Somebody like McLaren or Ferrari invest on their R D, on literally putting two men on a track for the season in maybe something like a handful of cars, because that's all that's ever built in a year. And Ferrari would have probably spent round about the turn of a century. They'd probably spend, you know, 6 or 700 million on those five cars that they're building for that one season. And if you think about the cost of them today, comparing it to road cars, and then, respectfully, we have so many clients who buy cars that either don't drive them, they buy them purely as an investment. We have some cars that people buy and they just leave with us in storage and never see them, or they buy them and say that they'll use it, but they'll probably use it at the racetrack. Well, if you're going to use a car on a racetrack, why not buy the pinnacle of racing cars? Why not buy a Formula one car? And you can definitely use them. You can definitely race them.

So an average person could drive a Formula one car.

I've been buying and selling cars all of my life. Since being a boy. I left school and went into the car business. But I'm not a racer. I haven't grown up karting, I haven't grown up racing. And last year I took part in the Monaco Historic Grand Prix in the Jackie Stewart March 701 and managed to come fit in the race. And you know, that's from me who's done a few days on the track. And I'm not, you know, I'm not like some people that have been brought up from being a kid. So that shows that being a real amateur, you can still use and enjoy these cars.

Right, so these Formula one cars you've got, roughly what do they sell for? I mean, I know there's different models.

But, you know, well, we've got cars there that probably range from something around about 5 million to the cars in the showroom at the moment somewhere around about 5 to 15 million pounds.

And you think that's cheap at that money?

Think about the history that these cars have, what they've created and what they've made, and the drivers that have touched them. Ayrton Senna sat in that seat. Get a DNA swab. The car hasn't been driven since Ayrton last won at Donington. So there's a Niki Lauda, six time Grand Prix winning, Monaco winning, championship winning Ferrari over there. It's probably worth a little bit more. That is worth more money than actually. So I'll change the, change the high figure.

Yeah, 20 million.

I mean, that car's probably worth a bit more than that.

Wow.

But that is just a piece of. So important in Ferrari's history. So if Lauda wouldn't have won the championship in 75, if he wouldn't have brought all that success back to Maranello, then Ferrari wouldn't have had the same amount of resource to invest into their road cars because they, you know, for them, the road car and race car business, they used to only sell road cars to be able to go to pay for the racing. And then later on in life that turned around where the racing for them was bringing more revenue for their road cars.

Yeah. Okay, so is there a car you could have bought or one that got away that you're still regretting to this day?

If I could write a book on that, Maybe, maybe.

But what's the one, though?

Do you know, I'm not really one who has many regrets because I've always been fortunate enough in life where I've never had anybody hold A gun to my head over anything. And I've always. I can honestly look back and say it was the right decision on the day. Now, that's. Yeah, but that has turned out to be the wrong decision sometimes. But I remember giving it due care and thought when I made the decision, and sometimes you can't win them all. Like, sometimes I've negotiated with people and I've missed. I've missed out on a car for very little money because I didn't think that there was somebody else behind me. I didn't think that there was somebody else that was there as a second bidder. I thought a seller was just basically just playing hardball and I've missed a deal. But I've been doing this for three decades, basically, like you're going to miss a few deals along the way.

There must be one. There must be one. There's a 50 million car out there that you could have had. Which one is it?

I mean, look, we've sold McLaren F1s since when they were less than a million pounds. And I remember selling them on the day. I remember selling a McLaren F1, actually, which was my. My. One of my favorite F1s in existence, and I remember selling it for £2 million. And I remember thinking I was an absolute superhero and I was the cleverest guy in the world. And then I think that client who bought that car has barely driven it since it's been parked in his garage. And this particular car would be worth north of £20 million. So, you know, if you, if we all had a crystal ball, you'd look back and say, well, I should have kept that one.

Right.

I should have also kept. I remember selling a Ferrari F40 delivery mileage, one owner from New, for £151,000. Like, you know, I should have kept that one.

So actually, the, the regrets aren't really the ones you didn't end up buying, but the ones you ended up selling.

Yeah, but the thing is, we. You always need. In my world, my business, where it's unique, is we hold a bigger inventory of cars than anybody else and we always need our funds, we always need to reinvest. We can't afford to buy. Yeah, we can't. We don't just. We're not. A lot of people we compete against are in the brokerage business, where they just sell cars on consignment. They just sell cars on brokerage.

Right.

And we don't do that. So I needed, at the time, I needed the £151,000 to reinvest at the time, I needed the 2 million to reinvest. Yeah. So, you know. Yes. You look back on it now and you think I'd have been probably bloody better off staying on the golf course, keeping those cars parked in the garage.

Yeah.

And, you know, they'd be worth more today. But that's not. Shouldn't. If we. If we. If we beat ourselves up on regrets.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, there's a question at the end of every episode. I do, and I've done 1200 and it is, what's your biggest regret? And most people say, I don't have them, but I don't believe them. I think we all have regrets and I think it's okay to regret because then you maybe don't make that same mistake next time. Successful people always say, well, I don't have any regrets.

Is that a regret, though, or is that learning? Is that. Is that basically learning from your mistakes?

Okay, so I regret going to university. It was a bad decision. I didn't know what I wanted to do. I wasn't this guy that knew I wanted to be a doctor. So I have to go to university. I didn't know what I wanted to do. I only went there because people were saying, well, that's what smart people do. So I was only going for the opinion of others, and it was a waste of time and money and it put me back. I didn't start my business till I was 27. I could have started it at 21. I think it's okay to regret that.

It was a bad decision. Okay. But then for me, my. My dad took me out of school when I was 11 years old to. To work in his business. And, you know, I didn't have a private tutor. I literally. I was taught through what was at the time, my dad's business. And I don't look back on that with regret because for me, at the time, it felt completely normal. I was the farmer's son. I was. You know, for me, if you're a farmer's son, you just expect to go and crop the fields. And I was the car dealer's son, and I better get on and start selling some cars. So I don't look back on that and regret it for me, but I learned from it. And I don't want the same. My wife and I don't want the same for our kids, so. Our kids.

But you didn't turn out too bad.

No, I know, but I just feel like there was also.

You felt like you missed some of your childhood, do you?

No, I actually, I don't remember any of that but so it, I can't miss something that I didn't because from being 11 years old I was straight into the business world. But I just feel like there's certain parts of education that I was fortunate enough but not everybody can, not everybody can be as lucky where I feel like I've been educated, self taught through the business world. But I don't think you can keep trying to do. I think you need a certain amount of formal education to have it as a foundation to build upon. Yeah, I think I was, I think I was particularly lucky and I'd be an advocate of kids going to school longer, not going to school to mess around and you know, I know this sounds harsh but I don't want my kids going to school to have a good time and play football. I want my kids to go to school to learn when they come out of school, when we've paid all the money we've paid for their education, which feels like it's extortion at any time.

Now there's the va didn't cost me.

Anything for my education. But when you've, when you've paid all that, I want them to come out and I want them to be well educated. I don't want them to tell me how they've been playing with Mick and John and now they've been doing kick ups at lunchtime.

So how old were you when you sold your first car then? You must have been young.

I was 12. 12.

You sold a car age 12? So what can you remember which one it was?

Porsche 993 Carrera 2 convertible in Iris blue. And my dad bought it for 47,000 and I sold it for 52.

And did you get a bit of commission out of that? Do you remember how much you made?

I did get a bit of commission, yeah, yeah, yeah, I got a bit of commission.

What, 500 quid?

You know, I can't, I can't actually remember if I, I don't want to say something that's not true, I can't remember but a lot for a 12 year old. Yeah. And that got immediately reinvested it. Oh.

Oh. So I just always put whatever cars.

I sold, whatever commission I made, I just always reinvested it into the business. Yeah.

Okay. So what would you say is the best car you've ever sold? Whether it's the amount of money you made or just the best deal because.

You must have one, it is insane. Some of the cars, the, the number of cars that we have sold that are just off the charts. I mentioned earlier about the Le Mans winning Jaguar. That should be in anybody's top 10 cars in the world. This car is historically so important. We sold, just last year alone, we sold the most successful McLaren F1 GTR.

How much was that?

I mean, we can't say how much for just, you know, for confidentiality reasons, but it was a lot of money.

So we're talking, what, north of 30 million?

Yes. Yeah. Yeah.

Wow.

But it was a very special car.

Yeah.

The most successful of all F1s.

Yeah.

We've sold numerous F1s. We've sold. We sold two 250 GTOs in 2024. We sold, you know, this. There's a. There's a photo of a 250 Testarossa up on the wall there. That's probably the most original, surviving significant Ferrari in the world. And we've sold that car twice.

What's the most expensive car you've ever sold? One that you can say, actually, the.

Most expensive are the GTOs. We sold three GTOs.

And they are how much?

Well, they range somewhere between sort of 60 to 80 million.

Wow. Why do you think Bernie Eccleston chose.

You to sell his car collection? Sounds a bit arrogant to say, but he might think that we're the best at what we do. So for us, when you have a collection of. That is of the magnitude of what he has assembled, which is really unrivalled to. It's the best race car collection in the whole world.

Right.

By a mile, you have an option of either sending it to maybe an auction to auction them off, which traditionally, I would think a lot of people with big collections have chosen to do. However, Bernie knows myself and my business very well. He's also the most successful car dealer of us all. So he seems to know what he's doing and I think he could see that it was a better option for him that we handled the sale of all the cars. We, we spent so much more time and so much more money on research in every single individual chassis that we handle so much more time. And each one of his cars, we made sure that no stone was left unturned and each car presented in their very best light. And then respectfully, you know, he hasn't got a. A whole bunch of specialists working for an auction house that are all possibly speaking to an interested party and then has something like a 90 second window per car in order for a car to achieve its best price. With my business, I am basically dealing with every. Even though I've got a good team with me. I am dealing with every single. Real candidate that is interested in the collection or any one of the individual cars. And he's not in. No, he hasn't got a gun to his head. He doesn't need them to be sold tomorrow. They can be sold tomorrow, they can be sold today. But if it took a year or two, he wants peace of mind to know that he got the best return for the last 50 years that he's invested in collecting cars.

How old is Bernie? He must be in his 80s.

He's 94.

94. Why is he selling his cars at 94?

I think he just. He's. He's. He's been collecting them for over 50 years and I think that basically for him, the time has come where he would probably like to see the cars get some satisfaction out. The cars going to a really good home. He's never shared them in with the public and he probably, I think, would like them now maybe to be more shared with the public. But he's got the best Ferrari collection in the world. And some of these Ferrari race cars, be nice for people to know about them. They're so unique, some of them.

Right.

They're one of a kind.

Yeah.

That people don't really know much about them. And then also, you know, he's 94, and if something were to happen to him, which I think he's on a secret potion, by the way, and I think he. He's doing all right. I think he's going to outlive both you and I. If something were to happen to him, then obviously his estate must be so big that it's another thing for somebody to worry about. It's another thing for his wife to worry about.

Yeah.

Okay.

So I was shocked when had a Look around this McLaren F1 you've got, it's done 40,000 miles.

Yes.

But I was pleasantly shocked because I like to drive my cars. I don't have the connection that you do, but I have a. A little collection. I have a couple of classics and I like to drive them because that's what they're made for. So are you someone that thinks, you know, you want to drive your cars a bit, it doesn't matter if you put a thousand miles a year on or do they have to stay really low mileage, it's still in the box.

I think that you, when you buy a car, you should definitely buy it and be. And want to drive it. And I think you should never be frightened of driving it because Even if you buy, you know, I've sold. Remember the delivery mileage F40 that I just told you about? At the time it done, it was £151,000. The same client still owns it, by the way. And he probably would have thought, oh, Jesus Christ, if I drive this car, it's suddenly going to be worth 120. And you know, I'm not going to spend £30,000 on putting a few miles on my car. But look what it's worth today. So he should never be frightened of using the car and enjoying it.

Yeah.

That said, I get great pleasure out of ownership. So some people I notice on social media will put a car for sale, a low mileage supercar. And you get so many keyboard warriors who are opinionated and say, oh my God, that's having. That's like having a beautiful wife and never sleeping with her. What's wrong with you? Right.

They drive their Ford Focus.

Yeah. Are you waiting for the next guy to. To come along?

Right.

And. And I'm reading these comments and I'm thinking. And I'm sat in my office and I'm looking down on my cars. Sorry, let me get that clear because my office is on another level. As in, as in height wise. Just to be clear.

You're just being a bit arrogant. No, no, no. But your office is up there.

Yeah, my office is up there. So I'm looking down through the glazed window at the cars.

100 super cars.

Yeah. And I'm looking at some of the cars that I personally own that are not in my business for sale, but I personally own them that I haven't driven for years and I don't love them less. Like, I'd like the idea of owning Sterling Mosses F40. I like the idea of owning the fact that it's done two and a half thousand miles from new, that Sterling took delivery of it. That in the history file, there's phenomenal correspondence between Enzo Ferrari and Sterling about this actual car. But I might not drive this car all of this year because I actually don't. Even for me, I've got a 288 GTO and I think a 288 GTO is a nicer car to drive than an F40. Oh, wow. And if I was taking one out tomorrow, I would take the GTO out seven days of the week.

Right.

So. But that doesn't mean that I'm. It doesn't mean that I should sell my F40 and it doesn't mean that I. I want to sell my F40. It just means that I get great pleasure of ownership, of just knowing that I own something so special.

I mean, just looking at that, is that not. Is the Ferrari F40 not the best looking car ever made?

Beauty's in the eye of the beholder for me. I think you're saying that, but I think There's a Ferrari 250 short wheelbase at the other side of the showroom. So a 1962 Ferrari 250 short wheelbase. And that for me is about beautiful as a car gets. Or, you know, when you look at a 300 SL gullwing, of which we're looking at one over there.

Yeah.

And, you know, two gold wings next to each other.

Haven't you?

We've got Ferrari 275 next door. Did you see there was like a gold Ferrari 275 GTB?

Yes.

And, you know, these are cars that, that, that Dolce vita era, the 1960s, those handmade Italian cars where Mario was building the left and Luigi was building the right. And, you know, they all have their little idiosyncrasies because they weren't built by robots and they're not plastic. You know, these are the cars for me that are the most beautiful cars, are the most special cars. Cars with the V12 engines inside, with carburetors and cars that, if you knew what you were doing, which I don't when it comes to the mechanics of it, but if you knew what you were doing, you could tune the carbs and deal with the setup yourself, rather than sending it to your local Ferrari dealer and asking the young kid to plug his laptop in and tell you what's wrong with the software.

So for that reason, do you dislike electric cars in the future that that could have on cars and petrol engines?

I don't dislike electric cars. I think. I think the word would be despise. I think. I think despising of electric car would be. Would be more accurate. I think it's so sad. You know, we deal with cars that are over 100 years old and we get a car that's over 100 years old and we've got a history of Valfrey that's like this. And then we're researching through some of all the different owners and it becomes. It's where I got my education from, you know, it becomes for me a part of education to read about those cars, the histories, the lives that they've led, the. The people that they've seen, the places where they've been. Yeah. And then you think to yourself that an electric car, it's going to get 10 years old, it's going to go straight to the scrap heap and the.

Battery will be done.

The battery will cost more than the car. Yeah. So where are the cars going to be? These cars aren't going to survive. These cars are just basically lifed. The actual. It's not the parts on the car, some of the parts on cars used to be lifed, but the actual cars themselves, they're lifed like, you know, somewhere between 10 years and 20 years old, they're gone. Wow.

And when you started up, so the McLaren F1, the Carrera GT and the F40 all got started and it's a bit naughty.

That's a naughty sound. I wasn't here when that happened, but that's a, you know, a V10, Carrera GT.

I was just going to say the Carrera GT sounded the best.

Carrera GT is the best sounding car of all time. So Harry just.

Harry's like, that's the clip. Yeah. You think the Carrera GT Carrera GT.

Is the best sounding car of all time. You're Talking about a V10 formula Formula 1 derived engine and it sounds phenomenal when you start it up, but it sounds way better when you drive it, really. When you drive it with the roof off and you start hitting somewhere between 5 to 7,000 RPMs and it's just, just.

Does he just scream?

Scream?

Because V10's the screamy sound is what V10 engine.

Even in Formula One, V10 was the greatest era.

Like. Yeah.

You know, it's just. It's off the charts.

Wow. That's a big thing. That sort of flawed me. I mean, I. I knew that V10s had that screamy sound, but that surprised me. Yeah, it did sound great.

Most people who's heard a crow GT start will.

Yeah. Because actually the F40 was the quietest of the three, which surprised me.

Yeah. I think I've got a sports exhaust on my F40 actually.

I think obviously it wasn't your one.

No. I would normally recommend putting a tuby exhaust on an F14.

We did. Do you know what? We did that on the mark and I share our cars. My business partner, we did that on the Testarossa. It's so much better.

Yeah, yeah, it does. It really does sound good.

Yeah. Right, okay. So you said that the Countach was one of the worst supercars, but Harry and I believe the E types way overrated.

Do you think that I am with you? Right. I am with you. Which. Which actually the reason I'm with you is. I think it's, it's, it's quite a famous quote that Enzo Ferrari once said that a Jaguar E Type was the most beautiful looking car of all time. And that's been re quoted about a billion times since. And it's been re quoted with every single E Type that's ever been sold. Yeah, I think he was taking the piss. I actually think he was walking around the show and I think he took the piss. I think at the time he was in much more in competition with Jaguar and you know, with their rate on their racing side, Jaguar was such a dominating force in that era in the 50s, they, they like owned Le Mans in the 50s. And then it went from Jaguar 2 Ferrari and I think when they brought that car out, I'm pretty certain Enzo was taking the piss when he said it's the most beautiful car of all time.

And you think that that hype created why everyone loves it because they're ugly?

Yeah, I think they're an ugly car. I don't think they're attractive. I do appreciate them because they are a bit of a national treasure, you know, in the, in the uk, everybody apart from you and I like, they, they're fond of E types. I don't quite get it, but the.

Xjs later look better. Yeah.

That wasn't a good car though.

No, no, my dad had them. There's always nostalgia and what you like, isn't there?

Well, it was when growing up as well, I think when you, when, when you, when you grew up from being a young boy or girl and you look back on the cars that you were first attracted to or you first remember looking at in magazines or on Top Gear. Who didn't love Top Gear? Yeah, everyone watched Top Gear.

Yeah.

And I think from there they're the cars that stick in your mind and sometimes people buy those cars and then they don't realize how crap they were until after they've bought them. And then they buy them and they're like, I don't, I don't know why I like this, that.

Well, the steering on the Testarossa is like a tractor.

Yeah, but it's so hard. It is a. That's also another overrated car, if I'm honest. Sorry about that.

But what, yeah, but I mean, what. They're, they're under 200 grand, so surely you have to put the price in with how you rate it because anything's good at the right money, isn't it?

So I collect Ferrari 355s, so I've also I've got about half a dozen 355s.

Why is one not enough?

Because I think they're so undervalued. It's like I just can't see how that car is not going to double and treble over the next 10 years.

Yeah.

So for me I think they're just a great thing to buy. Yeah. Probably shouldn't have said that because now I'm going to be competing with so many other people who's going to be buying three by fives.

Yeah. But you said you were an honest man anyway.

And I just think 355 is such a good car to drive. It was the first really good reliable Ferrari. Beauty's in the eye of the beholder. But I think it's such a pretty car. It is an absolute modern day Dino. Dino's. You know, we sell lots of Dinos and then I look at the Testarossa and the Testarossa was another icon. You know, it was a poster car. It, it was a car definitely much of its period of its era. You couldn't be confused about it being a 1980s car because it is a 1980s styling. But it's not a great car to drive like. I know.

No, it's a tractor. Yeah.

It's quite archaic. Yeah. It's very heavy. Costs a lot of money to maintain, to service.

Yeah.

Am I depressing you here?

No, no. I actually know all this.

Yeah.

I had the nostalgia. It was my pin up car. I bought it for 105000 pounds. I thought that's not a lot of money for a Ferrari Testarossa. It didn't take me very long to realize, okay, like you said, it stinks. It doesn't get into second. It steers like a tractor. I figured, well, that's just the experience. It mostly stays in the garage like your F40. I love looking at it but I'll never sell it.

And that's, that's, that's your people. Buyers like you have that attitude are the people that do best with their cars the worst. The people who do worse with their collectible cars are the ones who buy them purely as an investment class and not because they have any attraction to the car itself. When you buy a car, you should buy a car and think if Donald lets a bomb off tomorrow and he starts having a fight with everyone, with someone else and the price of our house goes down and the price of all our assets go down, then would I still want to own the Testarossa? And if you still want to own the Testarossa, then you've bought it for the right reasons and you will do better with that car than the guy who bought a Testarossa because he said, you know, I'm going to buy this car and I'm going to make 7% next year.

Right.

Like, because the people who do that never seem to time it right on when they should sell it.

So I actually was thinking of picking up a 355. I know you was it.

You only said that.

Now you just know. Well, you'll never know the truth but because they must still be under 100 grand, I guess.

No, no, no.

You can't get one for under 100 grand.

I hope not. Or I hope, I hope I can actually. But I hope we can. I need to be careful what we say here.

No you don't. You need to be honest.

Yeah.

Okay. So is there a particular 355 that's good to buy?

I think, I think we should stop talking about 355. You got to buy a manual. Forget F1. F1 was absolutely rubbish back in. Back in that period.

So get a manual one.

So get a manual 355.

Does it matter if it's the convertible one or not?

I think any good manual low mileage 355 is a very good thing to own. Yeah.

Okay.

That's what I would say.

Yeah. And you really don't want to talk about it anymore.

I'd like to leave that there. All right.

I'll tell you what we'll do because we've got a couple of different sort of fun rounds. Yeah. We're going to give you a choice and you can only pick one.

Okay.

And you need to say why. It's just five questions. Super, super quick and easy. So tell us which one and why. Ferrari or Lamborghini?

Ferrari.

Why?

The heritage, the racing pedigree, the fact that their cars have probably been the best cars on the market for the last 70 years. Okay.

V8, V10 or V12.

And why V12? Because V10s. I'm just thinking Lexus LFA and Porsche Carrera GT where V12s. I could list about 4,000 V12 cars that I would absolutely love. And I'm not a fan of V8 cars. I like the idea of front engine V12s. Okay.

Only own cars or only race cars. So you're not allowed to own any. But you can race any car you want.

Say that again.

Zori only you can only own whatever car you want. Yeah. But never Race them. Or you could race any car you want, anytime, but you can't own them. This recent budget should warn you that your pension is not safe and secure and they're coming for your inheritance. Do you even know how much is in your pension or where your pension is invested? Add to this the recent inheritance tax grab on your pensions and the risk of a market crash. You probably didn't know this and I didn't until recently, but physically gold can be added to your pension pot. Gold is inheritance tax free and has grown 700% in the last 20 years. You probably know from my content I'm investing heavily in silver and gold and that's why I've partnered with Direct Bullion. Myself and Nigel Farage are brand ambassadors and direct bullion can help you with gold to protect and grow your pension. I buy my gold and silver from direct bullion and I don't earn any money on any purchases of gold or silver. And if you buy direct from Direct Bullion, so if you go to robmore.directbullion.com you can get a great price on your silver and gold and you can get the Pension Gold Investing Guide completely for free. As you know, I don't do many strategic partnerships and when I do, I do them with people who are credible, who've been doing it a long time, who invest in things that I invest into and gold and silver's going wild. I'm investing heavily in gold and silver and I recommend you check out robmore.directbullion.com that's a shit question, isn't it?

It's hard. So you could only own the cars and not race them, or you could only race them and not own them. Yeah, but if you own them.

Sorry, I'd own them.

Yeah.

And I really. I realize halfway through.

Yeah, okay.

Classic car or hypercarbon?

Classic. Why? Because I think there's something about driving a classic car, the sophistication of it, that until you've experienced it, you can't appreciate, number one, the sensation of drive. When you drive a hypercar these days, a Ferrari LaFerrari.

Yeah.

Great car, fantastic car. Got nothing bad to say about it apart from the fact it's a hybrid. But anyway, we've got nothing else bad to say about it. But it's so easy to drive that you can't get anything from the car unless you're driving like a complete lunatic and you're prepared to risk killing someone, killing yourself or going to prison. And I don't fancy doing any one of those Three things where if you go and drive something like a Ferrari 275 and you might be driving it around about the speed limit on our country roads in the uk, you feel like you're properly driving the car, you're engaged in it, engage with the car and you're changing from second to third to fourth to fourth to third to second and you come up at the end of it, you're kind of proud of yourself the way you've drove it and you're like, yeah, I absolutely nailed that. And then, and then you pull up anywhere at all. You could pull up in Ashby town centre or you could pull up in Mayfair or outside a pub and I am telling you, you only get appreciating eyes. Look at it from the public. People will come over and go, this car's absolutely fantastic. How old is it? And wow, the condition of it's great. Such a beautiful car and only have compliments where you can drive a modern supercar and you can just tell, you park it in the middle of the town centre and sometimes you can get judgmental eyes looking, going, oh, I wonder what he does for a living. And you know, it's. There's something about owning a classic car that is so much more evocative, special, sophisticated.

Okay, last one in this round, Ferrari F40 or Ferrari F50. And why.

F50?

Ah, you want, he's an F50 guy. F50, okay. No, you're the guest, I'm going to listen.

F50, they built 349 cars compared to building over 1300 F40s. It is a manual V12 open top Ferrari supercar, which is pretty special.

Yeah.

The chassis on an F50 is so superior to an F40. An F40 was the raw supercar for the road. It was the first stripped out raw racer for the road to look at. I think you could say that more people would prefer an F40 because an F40 is such a sexier, just that icon. But an F50 has got really, I think it's got well balanced lines. I think it's got a little bit of a Batmobile type of look to it. But the idea of being a convertible V12, not just a limited production but limited edition numbered car. So a LaFerrari, for example. Ferrari states that they built 499 LaFerraris. Our database would suggest that they built a few more than 499Laferraris. Where on a Ferrari F50 it is actually numbered. You've got number one of 349, number of 349. So, you know, it is a real limited edition, limited production numbered supercar. And I have to say, stick a tuby exhaust on it and it sounds absolutely fantastic. And the chassis on it, as I say, is way superior to an F40.

And price wise, how do they compare.

F50 going back 20 years ago, an F40 and an F50 was exactly the same money. 20 years ago, exactly the same. And an F50 when they were first new, were not a loved supercar. So an F40 since the day it was a 288 GTO, an F40 and an Enzo since the day they were released new, they were selling from premiums. Since the first one that came out the factory, they've always been worth over list. An F50 when they very first came out was actually worth under list not long after they were delivered. And that's because people, some people describe them as a hairdresser's car, which. I don't know.

355.

Yeah. I didn't know any hairdressers that have an F50. But at the time, people were so. It was so. It was so close to being at the end of the F40 production run. And people had in their head the idea of an F40 being this raw supercar. And then an F50 came out with its leather interior and, you know, it was a much easier car to drive than an F40 and owners didn't like it. But now, as the years have gone by, people have really started to appreciate them and they are now worth more money.

So they're quite a lot more than an F40 now.

An F50 now would be worth something like 40% more. Wow.

This might not be easy for you, but I want to have a go at this. What do you reckon the total value of all the cars you've ever sold in your life is?

Billions and billions and billions. Billions.

Billions and billions and billions.

Billions of. I mean, yeah, like billions.

Wow. You seem so blase about it. Is it because it's just what you do and what.

You know, I love my business, I love what I do. And I don't actually, I hope I don't sound too blase because I'm one to instill in the rest of the team that they should pinch themselves sort of every day and realize what cars that they are handling, what cars that we buy and sell and the cool deals that we do and the fantastic people that we deal with, and they shouldn't take that for granted. Yeah. But for me, I've just built this business up from nothing. And you know, it's just every day or every week we're just selling a little bit more and we're getting more and more special cars. And you know, if I, if you took the time too much to, you know, what's the word? Celebrate, then we would potentially miss more deals where after we sell a car for £25 million. I know the team look at me like I'm some type of weirdo, but I'm then absolutely roasting them the next day. Why we haven't just bought the limited edition Land Rover Defender Because I think there was £3,000 profit in it and because we've been asleep. Why the hell have we missed it? Yeah, and I'm going bloody berserk in the office and I know everyone's looking, but that's the re. That's the, that's the push in, you know, trying to be the best at what you do.

Yeah. So right behind us here we have two very special cars, don't we? And maybe people will know how special these two are or maybe they won't.

Yep.

So could you just talk to us about these?

Well, these are the. This, those two are the two 288 GTO Evoluciones. So the, this is the car that was the absolute bridge between the F40 and the 288 GTO.

And you can see in the design language a bit of both.

Yeah, they were cars that were built to go racing group B on the tarmac and basically the series got called off before Ferrari had chance to show the car's capability. Ferrari built five cars. Five of them. Five.

And you have two there.

One of the cars stayed in a museum since it was new. One car went to Brunei from, from it being new. So there was only. Of the five, there was only ever three that was actually in circulation. And you have two of them and we have two of the three. Would you say you're greedy?

Well, that isn't this one here like 750 horsepower or something? Silly.

Yeah.

For a 30 year old car.

Yeah, it's like 600, about 600 horsepower. But it's a bit more than that. But it's light. Actually. We've done, we had put Jody kid, she came up on one of her wanted to do some filming and she asked if she could drive one and we put her in it and it blew her mind away. And it's. Yeah. Phenomenal thing to drive.

So how much are these?

They are just short of eight figures each.

Has anyone ever Offered you something weird in part exchange for a car?

I. We were offered property in part exchange for cars. All the time.

They give you houses.

Yeah, we've been offered property in central London. We was offered a very nice home in Beverly Hills, actually. And we get offered things like watches, and some people asked us to take crypto, which I consider that just. I can't even get my head around that.

So you say no one's ever bought a car off you in bitcoin?

No, I couldn't. I wouldn't. I don't have the faith, knowledge, or trust in it to be able to get my head around that. I'd rather stick to what I know. Yeah.

What's the most creative deal you've ever done or the craziest deal you've ever done?

I think we do. We do some very cool deals. And we. We can't really. We can't talk about all this is.

Do you know what I was just gonna say? I know this look.

Yeah, I get this look.

I've been doing this. I've done 1200. I know this look. There's something brilliant in your mind that you'd love to say and you're not gonna say it.

That's just. We can't really. But, you know, there's been so many different cool things. If I ever look back on it. I remember. I remember in 2017, I was offered or told about this delivery mileage, McLaren F1. It was yellow. Don't know if you ever remember seeing it. Had all the wrappers all still inside over all the interior. And somebody told me about it and said that it was in Japan. And over the years, people had spoken about this car, but I didn't know they existed because I just felt like it was Mickey Mouse brokers, bedroom brokers who, you know, mess us around a lot. And I never took anything serious, but this came from a really good source. And I said, you sure that car's out there? He said, it's definitely out here, Tom, and it's going to be sold. And I said, how do you know? And he said, because I know the owner. I said, you definitely direct with the owner? He said, tom, absolutely. I'm speaking to nobody else. I'm direct with the owner. If you're interested, you can buy this car. So this was a couple of days before my wife gave birth to our third child.

Now, we're going to tell a lot about you here.

So literally, I was think. I kept thinking about this car. I was also thinking about my son, by the way. I was thinking about him and I kept thinking about my son first and then.

But, well, your wife probably won't watch this, so just say how it is.

Well, whilst she was in labor and I kept thinking, how long is it going to take to have this bloody baby? And then, and then. Anyway, as soon as she had the baby, I said to her, I said, right, you, you're all good. So she said, yeah, yeah, it's okay, I'm a bit tired. I was like, no, no, you're in safe hands here. I said, you'll be okay. I said, look, I gotta, I've gotta go to Tokyo, but I'm gonna be back really quickly. So. And then I got on a plane, went to Tokyo, took a train. I think I took a plane again. I think I took a plane to Tokyo, then a plane to Hiroshima. And I remember being in Hiroshima and the guy who was taking me to go and meet the owner, he wanted to give me a tour of Hiroshima. And he was like, and this is where the nuclear bomb went off. And I was like, okay, just go F1, F1, yellow F1, please. And he's like, do you not want to see the site? I'm like, no, no, we'll see it later, don't worry about it. So, and then literally just when we bought the car and in the time that I was away, which was something like it was two nights that I was away for, and because of the jet lag, so it was actually like three days, but two nights. And because of the jet lag, I went over with a friend and in total I'd slept two hours, including the sleep on the plane on the way there and on the plane on the way home.

And you came back with the yellow F1.

Came back with the yellow F1.

So was it worth it?

Yeah, it's a car that's been very good to us. We sold that car a couple of times as well since delivery mileage. That's a. Yeah, it's a very good car.

And is that something that happens quite a lot? Because you handle rare cars, you sell them two or three times.

Well, we fail if we don't. Because ultimately if we, if we sell a car to a client, and I think this is where a lot of dealers are short sighted. Although I probably shouldn't say this because now I'm, I'm helping them. Yeah. Teaching my competitors to get better. But if we sell you a car and you ultimately sell that car to somebody else, we failed. Because if we sold your car and we were first in the door and we had a relationship with you, then why should you, when you're looking to sell that car or part exchange it for some of the girls, why should you be going somewhere else? You should be going only somewhere else if you're not happy with the service that you got or, you know, we just weren't good by you by making you a poor offer when you came to sell it. So, you know, I'm very comfortable here, that I think the service that people get when they deal with my business, just from the. The backup crew that I've got here, is. It's on a different level. You know, we. The only thing you ever need to worry about is sending us money.

Right?

You don't need to worry about anything else. We take care of it.

What's the youngest customer you've ever sold to?

We sold a couple of years ago a laferraria Aperta to a client that was still at school, and I think he was 18.

18. And he bought a LA.

A LaFerrari Aperta, which is the special one. LaFerrari convertible. Yeah.

Wow. And how much was that car?

I mean, like, look, let's just say what LaFerraria apertas are today. We can't talk about what we sold a car for like that, you know, so recently to a climb. But a LaFerraria Aperta today is about £5 million.

Do you do, like, a lot of research on clients or.

It's very important. We have a. We have a serious obligation under KYC rules. You know, we have to. We have to know our clients. We have to know the source of where the funds come from. Our business in 2018. But fortunate enough, we were awarded a Queen's Award for our international trade, and we took great pride in that. But at the same time, you know, we have huge obligations to make sure that the business is run properly. You know, you can't just turn up with a bag of cash and pay us for a car.

So when was the last time you took cash for a car?

I think if you said to me at the moment, how much cash have I got on me? I don't even think I've got a fiver on me. I can't even remember the last time I had cash on me. Which actually frustrates me because I say.

Don'T you think that's sad?

Yeah, because I hate going into. Go and buy a newspaper and have to pay for it on my credit card or every time I go for lunch. And, you know, it's 12 quid for a sandwich and I have to pay on my card. But I just, I can't remember last time we seen cash.

It's like years ago. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Wow.

Why did you not carry on working with your dad?

Well, it was my dad and brother, not just my dad, because at that time when I split away was 11 years ago and it was a partnership business between myself, my dad and my brother. And I think that it was a number of things. Number one, where for the last sort of 20 years I was more enthusiastic about the old car market, classic car market. And that was an area that sort of 20 years ago I wanted to explore more. And you know, it turned out to be a good decision. My father was never into old cars so it didn't interest him at all. And I felt that if you clicked on our website at the time and we were selling Porsche 911, Ferrari 360, a Range Rover and a Ferrari 250 short wheelbase, a 250 short wheelbase for 10 million looked a little bit out of place, didn't look right. So I thought the business needed to be sort of restructured. And then not saying which way is right and which way is wrong, but you know, the way my father and I do businesses, you know, not we would both probably get to the end, the same end, finish point, but we'd go around it very differently. And if you have two partners in the business that basically operate very differently and run a business very differently and they're both equal partners, that is never going to end particularly well over time. And then third thing, to be fair, is that my father and I, you know, unfortunately, really only had a business relationship from being a very young age when I left school, going back to what I spoke about when I left school when I was 11 years old, every time we would sit for dinner of an evening time, we'd talk about how much a car was worth, what the salesman was doing in the showroom that day, had the secretary been working, you know, what inquiries had came in. And it was suddenly, even from being a very young age, it was very much a working relationship. And don't get this wrong, by the way, I owe everything to my dad. You know, my dad's the one who taught me the fundamentals and started me off. You know, he's the one who took me out of school and taught me how to do deals. So let's be absolutely clear about that. But for me, I saw, had a slightly different vision and not being a short sighted vision and thought that what could I turn the business into. In five years time or 10 years time or 20 years time.

And how do yourself and your dad, Tom Senior, how do you do business differently?

You know, my, my dad's more. He has been buying and selling cars since the 1970s and you know, an older school car dealer he probably is. I've maybe taken a lot of his good traits and finesse them as well along the way and with old cars in particular, with old cars you need to spend so much time on research and you get nothing, you get no reward from it for quite a long time until you've actually crystallized the sale and sold the car. And you have to be extremely patient. It's not a case of just buying a car for. It's not as easy as buying a car for three million and selling it for three and a half million the next day. You know, it's a case of knowing exactly the chassis that you're buying and that you're not making a boo boo by buying a car that's got a bad story to it that you didn't really know about. And then once you've got the car, you want to make sure that no stone gets left unturned and present the car properly for sale. And that takes time and you know, I think I was probably more built for the old car world and you know, I think we're very good at what we do in old cars.

And how do you get on with your dad and Carl, your brother, now you're not working with them for 11 years. Is that relationship got better or worse?

Do you know, my dad called around a couple of two nights ago because he, he was, he was, he was pissed off because Carl had broken his Golf, his Golf carrier bag, whatever you call it, where you put it on the plane, the Golf hold all. And he said to me, do I have one? Because he was going to Barbados at five o' clock the next morning and the first time we spoken in 2025, not seen him in 2025, he literally called up and he's like, hey, have you, have you got a Golf hold all? Because Carl's broke mine. And he called Carl a few words, a few names and then he quickly came round and. But you know, the good thing is that I haven't also saw any of my family this year. Do you know, I haven't seen Carl this year, I haven't seen my mum this year. I've just been so busy traveling so much. It's been a real crazy time. We have a lot of fun Together. Our family's funny, though. We could have a lot of fun together, Carl and I in particular, where we can, you know, he could come around here and we could start. We could open a beer and think we're gonna have one beer and have 10 or 12 beers later and have to get a taxi home. And Carl is my friend, apart from being my brother. And we could also, if we get all the family together, it's like watching an episode. So proper with that. We can definitely all have an argument by the. You know, if you stick Christmas. We had a Christmas dinner together, and I was absolutely certain that there was going to be an argument by the end of the night. And there was. There was. There's always an argument. So we should. We should be together in small doses. Once a year is a good one.

Yeah. All right, great. So I had supercar blondie on the show recently. Yeah. And she.

She's still blonde.

Yeah.

I thought I saw her with, like, pink hair.

Yeah. I think that may have been a fad. I think she was blonde when we.

Were there, wasn't she?

Yeah. So she was quite scathing. A Ferrari. We were quite surprised. She said that she thought they'd lost touch with the brand. You know, they're still kind of like the old white male kind of brand. Lamborghini really modernized. Got the younger market. Even Rolls Royce, she thought they'd really modernize and got the younger market. What do you think about that?

I don't think Ferrari is a car. I don't think Ferrari is a car brand anymore. I think Ferrari are so on a different level that they are a luxury brand. They should be more associated with something that's within lvmh. It's, you know, their rival is more Hermes than maybe Lamborghini.

Yeah.

I think Ferrari do a tremendous job. And although I can understand and respect the point that she's trying to make, there is no car manufacturer in the whole world that wouldn't swap their performance figures for Ferrari. Like, if you look at the number of cars that Mercedes sell and the profit Mercedes make, and then you look at the value of their stock and the value of their business compared with Ferrari, that don't make a fraction of the cars that don't even make as much money, but the value of their business is so much more because Ferrari have done such a tremendous job of monetizing everything, like the merchandise. Their classic A program, I'll tell you, of all the manufacturers, Ferrari, their classic A program, which is like a certification process that you can go through for Any of their cars. They have just, just about nailed it where nobody else, no other manufacturer has been able to do that and has been able to get it right. So I gotta say, with Super, I.

You're still team Ferrari.

I am team. I'm team Ferrari.

I mean, I've got a very powerful brand.

It's not a car brand.

Yeah, I'd never thought of it like that.

The brands, it's a luxury brand. It's got, it's got more connection to Hermes or it should be part of the LVMH group more than it should be within Fiat. Like it's the merchandise. And if you went anywhere in the world and you showed anybody the Ferrari badge, they would know what it was, they would know that symbol, they would know what it stood for. And it's the heritage, it's the history. You know, this brand has been going since 1947 and they've been making so many wonderful cars. Where's Jaguar been for the last 70 years? Like, you know, where has Jaguar been? Realistically, where has Jaguar been for the last 50 years? So Jaguar had a real sweet spot of the, the 1950s and you could say some of the 1960s, but where have they been since? Where have Alfa Romeo been? The Alfa romeo in the 1920s and 1930s in Alfa Romeo 8C was the greatest car in the world for 20 years. For 20 years, nothing came out that could compete with an Alpha 8C. And today it would still be one of the greatest cars of all time. What Alpha would you long to own today? Like Alpha are not. They've never, they never continued that dominance. Ferrari have continued the dominance since the first day that they, that the company started. And you know, with the exception of maybe Porsche and Mercedes Benz, and Mercedes Benz still, they've, they've never had that, that allure of owning a Mercedes until recent times with their Formula one has started and Lewis Hamilton has started to make it cooler again to drive a Mercedes Benz. But Mercedes went for a lot of, since the turn of the century, right up until, you know, six or seven years ago, it wasn't a car, that was the car that you wanted to be seen in, where Ferrari has always, always had that appeal, that sex appeal.

So talking about Ferrari and sex appeal, you've got these absolute classics here and then you've got these modern ones that look like to me, like American design, that language. Do Ferrari still have it?

If you look at the F40, the.

F50, the GTOs versus these new Chrysler looking cars.

Yeah, I don't like modern Cars. So I'm not.

Full stop.

Yeah, I'm not the guy to ask about that because if you ask me about any type of modern contemporary sports car, I'm not really a fan of it. Like for me, maybe I'm just spoiled. But hypercars, supercars, they're the cars that really stimulate me.

Yeah.

The idea of the new modern Porsche 911 or the Ferrari 296 or the SF90 or the 812 competitione, like, you know, I just. You for me, an 812 competitione, you think about how much the money is you get in it. And again, you've got to drive it like a complete lunatic to get anything from it. Anything that the. Anything like to what the car is close to being capable of. And that's why I prefer older cars. So an SF90, it's an incredibly quick car to drive, but it's electric and it's, you know, it's not for me, it's not a car and we have one in stock. But that's me just being very open and transparent. You know, when people ask me what do I think of a Ferrari 512 boxer or a Lamborghini Countach or anything electric, I'll just give them my opinion and say I really dislike.

So. But you'll have it in stock. What, because there's demand for it?

Not so much because there's demand, because I can't help but being a trader and a dealer and we might have a client that we sell a Ferrari 250 GTO TO or McLaren F1, and I guarantee you this, I bet you he's got a Range Rover or I bet you he's got a Lamborghini Urus, or I bet you he's got some other modern cars within his stable. And why do I want him to sell his modern cars to anybody else? For us, it's money for old rope. Like, you know, I grew up in the modern car world. For him it's way easier because if he calls me, contacts my business and on the same telephone call he'll get an offer and within 15 minutes you'll get the money. Rather than have you ever tried to sell a modern car. Like when you try to sell a modern car and you call your local Audi dealer or Porsche dealer or Ferrari dealer, it takes you so many weeks to get anywhere. They need to find out if they've got the money, how many times, how many directors that they need to sign a check off, then how many the inspection that they need to carry out and they need to collect the car, get it back on the premises, get the V5, make sure things are changed over, and then they can somehow instruct the payment where with us. Because it's my business and we don't have anybody to answer to. We just perform particularly quickly. And I don't want a client selling any of his cars anywhere else.

No. I noticed when lockdown happened, it seemed that like a lot of cars that normally might normally depreciate a bit didn't and went up and everything was over list everything. And my business partner just bought the latest model 911 Turbo S and he paid 120 for it. And three or four years ago they were nearer 200. Has the market dropped a lot?

Modern cars, huge depreciation.

And is this just normal? The market was weird from lockdown or is it abnormal? It's dropping a lot more.

How old are you?

Have a guess. I'm 46. And you?

I'm gonna ask this question because do.

You know.

Something that frustrates me a little bit?

Yeah, about me?

No, no, no.

Okay.

Nothing frustrates me about you.

Oh, thank you. It would.

It would. Yeah.

It's normal.

I recall probably about. Do you know when the Range Rovers. When did the new Range Rover first come out? That was probably 2022, I guess. Yeah. So like 2023, I was trying to buy off of a client of mine and a good client, a his wife's Range Rover that was a supercharged Range Rover and she had done 12,000 miles in it. And I offered him his money back. So he paid new. I think it was like, you know, I don't sell enough Range Rover, so I can't recite this exactly. But he paid news something like maybe 185,000. His wife's done 12,000 miles. And I offered him his money back and I thought the car was probably 200,000 retail. And he laughed at me and he said, tom, are you taking the piss? And I said, no. He's like, tom, these cars are selling for like 220, 225. And I said, I'm telling you, that is a time bomb that is waiting to explode. That car is not 220. That car, we will ask 200 for it. But even the guy who pays 200 for that car today needs his head testing. It's done 12,000 miles. It's RRP. When it was new was 185,000. Like this shouldn't. This shouldn't be happening. And now you know, it has all corrected itself, but growing Up. I remember when I was first started in the car business, if anybody at all in the world bought a new car and they. And they could drive it out the showroom and the day that they drove it out the showroom, the day that they drove it, they lost their VAT, which the VAT in those days was 17.5%, not 20%. And if they could lose 17 and a half percent in the car, that was just the general acceptance that people knew that that's the depreciation that they was going to suffer. And then over the last sort of 10 years, cars, secondhand, nearly new cars have been performing quite well. And then in the COVID area it went bonkers. And people just didn't lose money in cars for like a year or two years. They were using Range Rovers and BMW X whatever they're called, and Cayennes and, you know, and they were just buying cars, using them and getting 10,000 profit buying Land Rover Defenders and making 10,000 profit on a Defender after using it for a year. And that's just not normal. The normal of a depreciation, if you lose on a new car, 20 in the first year on any new car, I think you've done pretty well.

Well, I bought, I bought a DBS310 new. It was. I paid 136 for it.

Four years old.

That's normal, isn't it, for an Aston Martin, that kind of car?

Yeah, I was going to say half price. So you probably bought it quite well, but it would normally be half price. But people just got. And they've just, they've just forgot what it was like to lose money in modern cars. You know, it's always been a case of the collectible cars have always proven to be a safe investment. You know, you buy a car, keep it for five years, 10 years, the car's not going down in price. You'll either should get your money back or you might make money. And then sometimes people have got stories of making millions, but you know, modern cars, if you buy a car and you lose 20% in a year, I think you've done well. And you know, too many people got too spoiled and thought that they could buy a car and there's nothing they did.

And then they were caught with their pants down.

Yeah, yeah, because.

So you. That's why you asked me how old I was thinking.

Yeah, when you.

Because remember the normal days.

Yeah, because it's been a decent run since for the last sort of 10, 12, 13 years. In modern cars, cars have been selling nearly new Cars have been selling particularly well, haven't they? You know there's been waiting lists on lots of stuff. Yeah. Interest. Because interest rates have been cheap. Been nothing.

Yeah. Do you think some of the car match manufacturers have taken the piss a bit though?

So the cost of new cars.

Well, the cost number one, I mean that new Revuelto is 250 grand more than the old Aventador. I bought that, that Now I hear they're doing that because they want to wipe out the grey market a bit or they want to have some the money for themselves. But also when they make you buy three, four, like you said earlier, hairdresser cars, roamers or whatever to get the limited one.

I don't agree with that. The reason I don't agree with it is because you don't agree with them doing it. No, because I don't agree with the client taking that choice. Because.

But if that's what the dealers are saying.

I know, but they take such a loss these clients. What people? They are starting to wake up to it now. But people take such, let's go Ferrari for example. Think about the loss you've got to have taken in an SF90. Think about the loss you've taken in a 296. We've got a 296 there that costs 335,000 new. That's done delivery mileage and you know, it's miles off of list price chunks. Miles off of list price. Yeah, an SF90 there that we've got for basically the best part of £150,000 off list price. It's done 2,000 miles and this is what we would be selling them for, not necessarily what we're buying them for. If you think about the loss that you've got to take in all of this new product and then when you do get your one car that's worth a premium if you get it and Ferrari, Ferrari or any other manufacturer tells you if you do sell it, you're never going to get another one from us. Then it's all this new car process is a bit of a one way street.

Yeah. So are these big.

You'd be better just to pay a premium. You'd be better to not take any of the losses in the cars that you, you don't want and the car that you do want. Just pay the premium when it comes out. Yeah.

Because part of me thinks these brands are taking the piss out of us. And part of me thinks, well actually if I had a brand and I could create that mystique, would I Do it too. Is it wrong for them to do it or they're just selling cars?

You know, I don't want to defend it too much, but I would just say, and I'm going to probably sound like Scrooge here, but don't you just think the cost of everything has just gone insane? I sit in a restaurant these days and I just, I get the bill in the restaurant, I just shake my head and I go, I just can't believe how much I've had one course and a glass of wine and I just can't believe how much is. And if you go out for a really big meal in a really nice restaurant, I just can't believe that there's, I can't believe there's enough people to fill those tables.

I got a black cab from central London to Heathrow where I was doing a speech.

Eight quid.

And so you said earlier about the, you thought maybe that's where I was going. Do you think the cost of new cars is just too high?

I think the cost of the cost of new cars is definitely too high.

Wasn't the SF90 like half a million pounds or something?

I bought my wife a purosangua and.

I, your brother calls them Purasaurus.

I love the Purosanga, actually. I think a beautiful looking car. I really like it and I bought my wife when she really wanted one and I, I thought, yeah, yeah, really good. And Ferrari were really good to us. They got us and gave us an allocation and I got the invoice through for it and I thought how much? It was about 450 odd.

And unlike nearly half a million quid for a 4x4. Yeah.

And you know, I just thought it's just a lot of money. Did you get it? Yeah. Is your wife happy? She, I really, I shouldn't say this but she actually, she loves with a passion the Urus. So she actually, she loves, she absolutely loves the Urus. She loved the Pura Sangre when she first took delivery of it, really liked it. She still thinks it's a very good looking car, but it's a very difficult car to live with. To be able to use all the infotainment system in there and you know, try and change the, try and change the radio. Ferrari need to, they need to change it, they need to, they need to be able to make it more user friendly. It's a must because a lot of their clients, you know, my wife isn't of an older generation, not married to an old bird and you know, she, she finds it difficult and I find it difficult. And I tell you like, I've grew up in cars. I know how to change a radio in anything. I can sit in any car with my eyes closed and I just know the idiosyncrasies of all the different cars. And I tell you I struggle to change a radio station in a pura sangra.

So how much has that 400, nearly 50 grand car gone down to?

I'm hoping it hasn't gone down anything, Rob.

I think, you know it has.

I'm hoping you might be a buyer for it today.

Yeah, mug me off. All right then, so we've got another little quick fire round. I don't get it. I'm like, when I last saw Carl, we sat in front of his purosangue and he just said they're 100 grand more overpriced. I mean if you've got an Urus, what are they? Are they still 250 or you get them less now than 250.

What you mean second hand or new?

Yeah, I normally think two or three years old.

Just. That's what I think, like a couple hundred thousand.

Okay, so you get 200 grand for an urus, but you're nearer what, 350.

For a. Yeah, but they're only a year older. Parasangra.

Okay. And also then you can get an RSQ8 for 100 grand and a tip.

I've heard the bottoms fell out of them though.

But it doesn't matter if you've paid 110 grand for it and it's your wife and she's gonna have it five years.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It's not really much bottom left.

Yeah, it's. No, I think better pursangua that they are. They're a special looking car. Like you know, it's a Ferrari. Why are you on Ferrari's case today? I have sad you're not going to be allowed to go to Maranello.

No. Then if they're gonna let a little runt like me with.

They're not letting you. They are not letting you go into Baranello.

I love the Ferrari for F40. If there's one car at the end ever I could have, it's the Ferrari. That's the best looking car that's ever been made.

Let me take with your low ball bids, you've got no ch. Okay, mom, you've already. You've already shared what you want. I'll go to your brother.

I'll go to your brother, he'll do me a deal. I'M not on Ferrari. It's just there needs to be value.400 grand for a 4x4 that doesn't even know that it's a 4x4 because it is sort of like. They don't even call it a 4x4.

It's actually not a 4x4.

So what is it then? It's a hybrid of a hybrid of a hybrid.

Yeah.

And I mean, the Urus is overpriced.

Give me a good value car, then. Good value modern car.

Audi RSQ8.

How much do they cost new?

I don't know. I paid. I paid car one. 110, 115, 120, I can't remember.

But they cost way more than that new.

Not much. It wouldn't be more than 150, surely.

Okay, well, 150 new for sprung with every option.

I bet you had 80 grams of thought options on your Ferrari, didn't you?

I think it was about 120.

Can see why you're in the classic car market, so. Yeah. So anyway, so let's say max 150 for a new RSQ8, which you said before we went on air, is the same car as the Urus, did you not?

Well, obviously it's not the same bloody car because one's a Lamborghini and one's an.

But they're made by the same.

Yes, they're very similar cars.

Okay, so what's wrong with that? I'm bearing in mind it's for my wife.

Do you know, an Audi RSQ8 is actually a very good car? I've got to say. I think that's a very good call. I think an RSQ8, the money you can pick one up for secondhand because they don't sell well new. I think the money you can pick one up for secondhand, I think it's probably a good car. Goodbye. But you know, you got to remember something, Driving an Audi isn't the same as driving a Ferrari.

No, but I have. I have a Ferrari because it's a sports car. But. So I don't need a Ferrari in a 4x4, which isn't a 4x4.

I know, but the person who's buying the Purosangua is because they want to be driving the Purosangua as a daily car.

I reckon the people who are buying the Purosangue are the wives of people like yourself. You wouldn't have one, would you?

It wouldn't suit my requirements, but it only wouldn't suit my requirements because at this moment, in Time with the projects we've got on the go, I'm living on a building site two days a week. So. Discovery, Defender.

Defender.

That's a good car.

Yeah. What about, I mean, daily Porsche Panamera Turbo S.

Panamera Turbo S, yeah. Good car.

Yeah, yeah. Actually get that three years old. You're gonna, you're gonna get that for sub 100, aren't you?

Not a pretty looking car though, is it? For a big ugly thing, for a.

Big saloon, it's quite pretty. It's better than the old ones with the big round. But are any big family cars pretty?

Rs6.

That's not pretty.

I think it's pretty.

It's good for your drug deliveries.

I think it's pretty.

That's what your brother said. So I'm just going to leave it there. All right, fine. You've got the Rs6, have you?

I have just sold my Rs6. Had an Rs6 in a pretty special color. I waited for it forever and then I just found that it probably at this moment in time, it doesn't suit my.

It's a great car. I got my wife the generation before in that very sort of unique blue that they made.

She loved that car. Yeah, it's good.

That was a great car. Okay, so we'll do the investment round. You got 10 grand? What classic could you get for 10 grand? That might go up a bit. 10 million. 10 million. 10 million.

I'm currently thinking of which. Which wheel can you buy on one of the cars that we sell?

That would be. That would be a great series to do to get to give you 10 grand. Who knows how to buy 10 million cars and find a car?

I'm thinking, I'm thinking like a quad bike. When you're saying 10 grand, I just can't, I can't. I can't think.

80S Merc, some of those 80s Mercs. Quentin Wilson.

You can't buy one of those. You can't buy one of those for 10 grand today. I mean, you know, and it's got. You mean as an investment it's got to go up? Yeah, hopefully 10 grand. Invest in an original toolkit for a Ferrari F40.

All right, is that what they are, about 10?

They sell for about 12. So you can get one for 10 and they're only going to go up. You'll sell it that car. That will do better for you than your £10,000 car. There we go. We got there.

What a great answer. Okay, so 50 grand. What car could go up in value for an investment?

Another Car that I've been buying, that I've been collecting is Porsche 993S and you know, you can still pick up a bit of a ropey993. Not the best of their type, but like, you know, something like a 50,000 mile 993 Carrera 2 coupe for round about 50 grand. And that car is a phenomenal investment. That is a great car to have own maintain. And that car will go up in value.

All right. 100 grand.

I'd still be looking at 993s or Ferrari 350s.

Okay. And you think they're going to go up?

Yep.

Yeah.

All right.

Half a million pounds.

Half a million pounds car. I think for half a million pounds.

Five, three, five, fives.

I think for half a million pounds a good car that's going to go up. I, for a bit more money, I think a Ferrari 599 GTO. They, they went all the way up, they've came down and I think they're probably got good potential still to go. Yeah, I think a Ferrari dino, a Dino 246 GTS. That's somewhere around about 350 to 450. I think those cars have always proven over time that they, they're good. Could give you another one. Now is the time to buy an Aston Martin. They are absolutely on their ass. They have lost so much value. Now is the time to absolutely nick a very good Aston Martin DB5. And if you can pick a very good Aston Martin DB5 up for that sort of price or a bit more, that's a good buy.

All right. £1 million.

Best investment. Can we stretch ourselves a little bit or is it exactly a million or is it like one to one and a quarter?

You are the guest to your rules.

I would be if you could buy something like a Porsche Carrera GT or you know, a Porsche Carrera GT for bit over a million pounds. McLaren P1 is a little bit more than that, but those are the two cars that I think we're going to see huge increases in value in the next five years.

Okay. And then any money. What car are you picking for a great investment?

Formula One Tower. Okay.

Any Formula one car.

I only like to. I only buy and invest in Grand Prix winning cars. Even if a car came second three times or and five, six place finishes, I would rather a car that had raced once and won once. A Grand Prix winning Formula one car is still very undervalued and I think is the best investment in the automobile world.

Wow. I was not expecting that when I came here. All right then, so we do a little quick fire round. What is the easiest car to steal?

I've never stole a car, so I don't know. Apparently Range Rovers are terrible to insure, though.

Well, that's the next question. What's the hardest car to insure?

I think a Range Rover, I believe. I mean we don't ever struggle with insurance, but I think I heard we also don't sell that many Range Rovers. But I heard that Range Rovers were. Had a nightmare. You couldn't insure one a couple of.

Years ago because they were so easy to knit.

Yeah. People just stealing them.

Are these classic cars easy to steal?

What would you do with one?

Yeah, I mean you can drive it, nick it, but.

But what would you do with one? So people who steal cars, they've got an agenda. So if you go and steal to ensure a classic car is very low premium because really the risk is more on fire related. Right. Because people don't nick them. Like if you, if you, if a Range Rover gets stolen, it's highly likely that it's on a boat on its way to South Africa. Yeah. The very next morning. And then it's sold in South Africa and it's being used.

Right.

I'm not singling out. Singling out South Africa, by the way. But, but, you know, but, but an old car, it's like nicking a Picasso or a Rembrandt. What do you do with it? Like you can't sell it. Everyone knows the cars. Right. You can't go and steal an old Ferrari 250. And what you go do with it, if you steal it. It.

Yeah.

You can't drive it. You've seen it on the road, you're getting. That's when you're going to be arrested.

Yeah.

And you can't sell it.

What does it cost you to insure your whole fleet?

I mean, we spend hundreds of thousands of pounds a year on insurance.

Wow. A specialist type, I guess. Yeah.

We've got a policy that's basically tailored just for us. Wow.

How do you sell anything to anyone?

You have to be an expert in your field. The one thing that frustrates me about other people in my industry and about people I've employed in the past is that I can't believe that people think it's that easy. Like, is it that. Do they really think it's that easy to buy and sell these type of cars and to make good profits you have to be an expert. I wouldn't want to If I was interested in collecting art or buying art and I walked into a shop or spoke with an auction house, I would flush that individual out very quickly. I'm thinking, this guy has. This guy or girl has no idea what they're talking about. Like, he just said one thing, and then he's contradicted himself with something else. And I wouldn't buy anything from them. Like, I would only deal with experts in their field. If I want some landscaping to be done around our new house, I want to deal with expert landscapers. And if we're buying and selling the world's greatest cars, we have a responsibility that we have to be experts with everything that we're operating in.

Tell us a secret you've never shared or a story you've never told.

I couldn't do that. For me, discretion is very important in.

Our world and really boring for podcasts.

It'S boring for podcasts, but discretion is very, very important, which we respect. And we respect the level of trust that so many of our clients put in us. And. And for that reason, we would never abuse that. Yes, we've got some very cool, interesting, crazy moments, but there must be one.

That you can share. Someone who doesn't mind.

I can't think of for our world. We just, you know, we buy and sell the world's greatest cars, and whether we. Whether we do just get too blase in the moments, but I just can't think, I can't think of something that I can share with you that would interest me.

True. Okay. All right. What about a really famous client you've got that you can share the name of? I mean, obviously we said Bernie Eccleston. That's publicized. But you must have some really interesting clients.

Yeah, I mean, we sell, you know, a lot of cars to. We have so many high profile clients where, you know, we sold Eric Clapton a car recently. Eric's a really cool guy. I went to hand deliver it in to his house in the south of France. We went out for a drive in it together. We had lunch together. You know, Eric's a super cool guy. When you're having evening time and he's messaging you and you look in your phone and you see Eric Clapton's texting. It's quite cool. I remember buying. I remember buying five cars in 2003 off of Rod Stewart. And I went to his house and that was quite cool, actually. I remember in his. No, I can't really share that. I can't really share that. So he wouldn't want me to. So I can't share that.

I respect your discretion. It's just a bit of a shame, you know, we've driven a long way. We are done. I've really enjoyed this. Thank you. Tom, thanks for allowing us into your amazing. Well, it's not a showroom, is it? There's so much more. And thanks for being really open about what you do.

Pleasure. And yep, I'm very pleased to be on your podcast. Heard lots of good things about it and I know we've been speaking about it for a while, so I hope it goes well for you.

Thank you very much.

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