Buyers flipping a Rolls-Royce Spectre won’t be tolerated, company says

The act of flipping cars — that is, buying a limited or highly desirable model and then reselling it for big profit — won’t go unnoticed, or be tolerated, by Rolls-Royce.

Specifically referring to the new Rolls Spectre — the first electric car from the brand — Rolls-Royce

CEO Torsten Müller-Ötvös told Car Dealer that any customer who sells or try to sell one will be blacklisted for life if he attempts to buy another from a dealer .

Speaking at the launch of the new car in California, he said: ‘I can tell you we are really sanitizing the need to prove who you are, what you want to do with the car – you need to qualify for a car and then you might get a slot for an order.” But those who violate the policy and resell the vehicle at a higher price are “going immediately on a blacklist and this is it – you will never ever have the chance to acquire again.’

The super-luxe Spectre is to open its order books soon with deliveries to start in the autumn. Base price in the UK is about $425,000.

The response from some dealers in Britain, who say the inflated price resales are legal, was resentment at Rolls. London

dealer Tom Hartle, known for selling secondhand Rolls-Royce models, said that he has already agreed to collect £50,000 ($65,000) premiums for two Spectres. He said he will have a Spectre for sale at his used-car dealership “within two weeks of it being launched.”

”I do not think it is fair for carmakers to tell customers who have spent close to half a million pounds on a car what they can do with it,” he told Car Dealer.

Last year, General Motors said i

t would ban flippers “from placing future sold orders or reservations if the vehicle is resold within the first 12 months of ownership.” Those high-demand products were the Corvette Z06, the Cadillac Escalade-V, and the GMC Hummer EV. And years ago, Ford famously sued wrestler and actor John Cena, who flipped a Ford GT in violation of his purchase contract.

At Rolls, the company maintains that it has paid close attention to Spectre’s specifics while in development. “To do this, “ Müller-Ötvös said, “we have conceived the most demanding testing program in Rolls-Royce’s history. We will cover 2.5 million kilometers – a simulation of more than 400 years of use for a Rolls-Royce, on average – and we will travel to all four corners of the world to push this new motor car to the limit,”