It’s only April 2025, but chatter about Monterey Car Week

in August is already starting. An opening gambit is coming from RM Sotheby’s with a car the auctioneers will be selling – a 1995 Ferrari F50 in immaculate condition and only 5,400 miles on the clock. According to the listing, this one of two US-specification F50s in Giallo Modena (yellow) is being offered via a collector that’s owned the car for 22 years and has not shown or displayed it since 2009. With 5,400 miles on it, he likely didn’t drive it, either. The car was originally ordered and owned by the fashion luminary and enthusiastic car collector, Ralph Lauren.

Ralph Lauren Ownership Isn’t All That Makes This F50 So Valuable

The Ralph Lauren connection isn’t going to be the main pull of this car by a long shot, although he was responsible for the color combination of Giallo Modena paint and Nero (black) interior. The Ferrari F50 was a limited production F1-based supercar (349 were made) with a 4.7-liter V12 engine making 513 horsepower, featuring Ferrari’s first road-going carbon fiber chassis, and sculpted in a wind tunnel. However, the performance was much more accessible than the F1 car, as, for example, it doesn’t feature the era’s non-synchromesh racing transmission that needed to be rebuilt every 300 miles.

What the Ferrari F50 does have, and why people would sell their kids on eBay to drive one if it were legal, is no electronic driving aids with a phenomenal engine and chassis not bogged down by modern safety and emissions standards, let alone power steering or anti-lock brakes. It’s a pure enthusiast’s driving machine for those who use phrases like “connection between man and machine.” Unfortunately, this one seems to be destined to remain an investment piece for collectors whose value will be impacted negatively if driven, let alone driven hard.

The Giallo Yellow Ferrari F50’s History

As far as history goes, Lauren sold the yellow F50 in May 2003 through an auction, having put 3,300 miles on the car. Sotheby’s thinks it was sold to a dealer in Miami. The owners of a Ferrari dealership in Virginia bought the car, now with another 100 miles added, in the winter of 2003. It wasn’t for the dealership to sell, though. The husband-and-wife team were enthusiasts and entered the Ferrari Challenge series with separate Challenge cars. The F50 wasn’t raced, but occasionally taken to show events and displayed at the Cavallino Classic in 2009, which was the last time it was seen publicly.

According to the RM Sotheby’s listing, it’s expected to go for around $6,500,000-$7,500,000. It’s had all the necessary maintenance handled, and its Ferrari Classiche Certified book was reviewed and renewed last year. Sotheby’s assures that it will have a new Red Book by the time it goes on sale. If you’re not familiar, the Red Book is the height of Ferrari snobbery, issued by a professional committee in Maranello that inspects the car and decides whether it deserves to gain the prestigious certificate.

If it’s not deemed unworthy, Ferrari will, for a price, of course, replace any non-authentic parts and, if they are no longer available, re-manufacture them for you. Derision aside, of course, for this level of Ferrari and the multi-millions of dollars being spent, it needs to be 100 percent authentic.

Source: RM Sotheby’s