Leno's McLaren Investment Soars

Doug DeMuro shares a story about Jay Leno's incredible investment in a McLaren F1 supercar.

"Jay told me the most unbelievable story about this car. He bought it for $600-700k, and he's driving through LA - there's only 64 of them in existence. He sees another one just street parked in front of a house. He goes up, rings the doorbell, meets the guy, and they exchange info since they both have McLaren F1s in LA.

The guy calls him a year later and says 'Jay, you'll never believe it - I sold mine and got $800,000, I made $200k!' Jay's response was 'I think I'm gonna hang on to mine a little longer.'

Now it's worth 40-50 million dollars. That's a lesson in regret."

The car has become such a trophy that when I asked Jay about the other owners, he gave a very measured response. Reading between the lines, he was trying to say they're just rich guys who want trophies rather than true car enthusiasts. When it was $600-800k, actual car people could afford it who would get into the mechanics themselves, which Jay values heavily. Now it's just wealthy people who want to brag.