Tom LaPointe's Exotic Car Lifestyle Notebook

Ramblings on exotic cars, the car market, and things with wheels overall. We especially love Rolls-Royce, Ferrari, Lamborghini and Porsche, and all the events where you find them.

About Me

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Location: Dunedin, Florida, United States

I currently publish iParent Magazine in the Tampa Bay area and work as a freelance writer for Affluent Page Index, in NYC. I grew up in Michigan near the Motor City and finished high school in Fernley NV. After attending the University of Nevada as a music major, I joined the Marine Corps as a combat correspondent. As a writer and editor, I won many publishing awards for photography, writing and editing. What led me to the auto industry is simply this: I love cars. I have raced stock cars and sports cars and competed in Land Rover off-road competitions in Vermont and Colorado. I have been a pit official for the 24 Hours of Daytona and 12 Hours of Sebring, and a pit crewman for Indy and a Hooters Pro Cup races. I've served as a manager of both sales and service for one the largest luxury car groups in the world. I'm still active as an off-road instructor for Land Rover and HUMMER dealers and owners. I enjoy crawling an off-road vehicle through the most severe obstacles as much as heel-toeing sports cars into hairpin turns! I am also a freelance writer for several automotive publications.

July 25, 2008

New Mercedes-Benz / AMG SL65 BLACK is a monster - so is the price!


For those of you who feel remiss in not shelling out the half million dollars for a SLR Roadster before the breakup of MB and McLaren, Mercedes is bringing its über SL down the pipeline to a showroom near you...at a projected price of $320,000 USD. Now I know the dollar is weak, but totally collapsed? I mean this SL is definitely a monster of performance, with a pounding 661hp propelling a stiffened chassis (sans folding hardtop) at supercar speeds, and it has vicious looks combined with all the requisite hardware upgrades, but they may have a hard time getting Ferrari and Lamborghini prices for a Benz that sits next to a C Class in showrooms.

If you MUST have this next to your S-Class in the garage, by all means give us a call, and we'll make all the arrangements, but we make no guarantees regarding resale value. Check out more pix and desktop wallpaper at Automobile Magazine.

I've said for years that Mercedes should package all their six-figure AMG cars with Maybach to create an ownership path for their super brand. The fact that you can get the 'base' car version of this Black Series for 1/3 the investment makes it hard to retain value...but the good German doctor didn't ask me my opinion!

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posted by Tom LaPointe | 10:31 PM