It's indeed quite bizarre that a car has been sold at auction for $143 million. But that's how it is. Despite absurd price tags on some sales during this year's luxury-drenched Monterey Car Week, there was no rarity there that even came up to a fifth of the amount that the 1955 Mercedes-Benz 300 SLR Uhlenhaut Coupe cost the happy collector who seized it during a Sotheby's auction in the summer of 2022.
The car was based on the W196 GP racing car that Juan Manuel Fangio drove in the early 50s and won multiple Formula 1 titles in. The world's second most expensive car is also a Mercedes, in fact, and more specifically a 1-of-1 version of the legendary 1954 Mercedes-Benz W196 which sold this year for $53.9 million. Third on the list is a 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO by Scaglietti which cost the private buyer just over $51 million.