Historically, weird things have happened when automakers launch cars that seem entirely out of their wheelhouses. The Toyota Century is Japan’s highly-revered answer to Rolls-Royce, but the Volkswagen Phaeton was a rolling monument to depreciation intended to compete with the Mercedes-Benz S-Class. The ball can break either way, which resulted in one big question when GM pulled the sheet off the Cadillac Celestiq: Was the world ready for a mid-six-figure Cadillac?
A different beast entirely from an Escalade, the Celestiq is an ultra-luxury EV built by hand in extraordinarily low volumes. As Motor1 reported, the marque planned to build just 25 in 2025, far fewer than the annual capacity of 250 cars. As such, second-hand ones don’t come up for sale often, and putting a value on one is difficult. While a couple have been listed at dealerships, the asking price on traditional classified ads isn’t the best way to put a real value on a car like this for one big reason.
Firstly, just because a dealership asks a certain price for a car doesn’t mean they actually get it. It’s fairly common for buyers to seek a lower price than advertised and dealers to have some margin within which a deal can happen. How much do used cars actually sell for? Only the selling dealer and the buyer know. Through a traditional model, the actual transaction price remains opaque.
Although online auctions can be problematic in their own ways, everyone with an internet connection can know the ultimate top bid on a lot. It’s a public data point that can help determine what a car is actually worth rather than just what a seller hopes to get for it. We just saw a Cadillac Celestiq cross the virtual block on Bring A Trailer, and the result was interesting indeed.
How much did the original owner pay for this Celestiq? Well, the window sticker shows a base price of $362,690, including a stiff $5,650 freight charge. However, it would be surprising if any Celestiq left the factory without any options. In the world of cars that cost as much as single-family homes in many cities, buyers layer on the options like they’re fro-yo toppings.
The first buyer of this particular Celestiq ticked the option box for the “Bespoke Interior,” specifying shades of red and black on particular components for a cost of $26,710. From there, the specially patterned seatbacks were another $25,700, matching console inserts were an extra $4,000, carbon fiber tray tables ran an extra $8,400, and carbon fiber-accented wheels were another $4,000. The leather headliner was $3,000, the patterned electrically dimming panoramic roof was $2,000, storage compartments lined in a particular shade of black were $1,000, and special floor mats ran an eye-watering $1,520. The total sticker price? A strong $439,020.
Unsurprisingly, bidding immediately crossed the $100,000 mark, with the first bid landing at $150,000. Four days later, the $200,000 mark was finally breached, and that’s when things really started to heat up. The $250,000 and $300,000 mark came next, and when the auction finally ended, the top bid stood at $381,111. Despite this, the Celestiq didn’t sell. It hadn’t met its reserve.
On one hand, an effective $57,909 difference between sticker price and the high bid after covering just 119 miles is some monumental depreciation. $486.63 per mile, equivalent to crashing a structurally-rotten 2006 Chevrolet Cobalt into the ditch and writing it off every two miles. On the other hand, $57,909 in depreciation isn’t bad compared to a comparable Rolls-Royce Spectre. The last one of those to hit Bring A Trailer in near-new condition failed to meet reserve, falling $70,650 short of its exact sticker price.
I’d call this a rather good result for Cadillac, partly because the marque hasn’t offered anything like the Celestiq in absolute ages. Thirty years ago, Cadillac was a pigeonholed cliche, a brand for mobsters and retirees, one that simply couldn’t hold a candle to Mercedes-Benz or Lexus, let alone Rolls-Royce. This was pre-Escalade, for what it’s worth.
Even five years ago, things weren’t all roses. The XT6 was categorically embarrassing, a cynical attempt at dressing up a Chevrolet Traverse with some entirely unconvincing “stitched” plastic trim and then sending well-spec’d examples out the door for Volvo XC90 money. It rode as if it had blown dampers, the interior had some properly nasty whiffs of cheapness at such a high price point, and I genuinely feel bad for anyone who bought one without driving any of its competitors, or even some loaded retail-brand three-row crossovers like the Kia Telluride SX Prestige and Toyota Highlander Limited. Those people were taken advantage of.
Now though, there are people who want to pay more than $375,000 for a second-hand example of an ultra-luxury Cadillac. That’s an enormous win for the brand, even if it’s early days. While this is currently just one point, don’t be surprised to see more Celestiqs popping up at auction as the years tick by.
Top graphic image: Bring A Trailer
Sure it’s ugly, but it’s exciting to be able to order a car exactly how you want it and it’s an absolutely amazing drive as evidenced by them having driven it less than half the range on a single charge!
I’m scrolling directly to the comment section to post my guess: $109,000.
Okay. Back to the reading.
[edit]
Huh. That was a far stronger showing than I anticipated.
The specially patterned seatbacks cost more than the most expensive car I’ve ever bought.
It’s hideous.
AGREED ! I said this to the grumpy auto extreme guy and he insulted me and zapped me from his twitter a gram . The car is foul
I keep trying to find some appreciation for the design I am constantly being told by folks on the internet is bold and good, but… it’s just so, so ugly.
It seems quite possible to me that the owner purposefully set a high reserve so they could see what it got to, and then may be trying to make a deal with the highest bidders on the backend. that provides him real interested parties, but also keeps the final value of the sale out of the public eye.
If Cadillac wants to put the Sollei into production I might pull a Walter White to find the money to afford one. But I could not imagine paying for one of these monstrosities. It looks like a Lyriq went through a taffy puller.
did you just say the lyriq medusa is fugly? agree.
…they sweated every single minor detail of this vehicle to make the ultimate ultra-luxobarge, and the best thing they could come up with for the dashboard was GIANT SCREEN????
What better way to distract people while they drive?
The worst is the hvac control screen, its really low on the dash which makes it even worse to see while driving.
I’m surprised they even bothered with a reserve. I figured the type of person buying something like this would simply see $100K depreciation as a reason for taking the Cessna Citation instead of busting out the Gulfstream G700 on their next couple of outings to the McDollarsburg Fancywine Falconry Tournament.
Btw, can the used Celestiq value-watch be an ongoing feature? I’ll be following it right up until I can put one out in my garage. I unironically love these things and won’t even care if it runs at that point. So long as the stereo works I’ll be more than happy to crank some tunes and enjoy a cold glass of Garage Champagne, aka Miller High Life while contemplating my next unwise project-car idea.
These fugly rolling turds with an exceptionally silly name seem to have been made as trophies to be “bought” by top gm execs and shareholders. There’s no other real rational cause I can think of that would lead someone to drop that kind of money on one of these, especially at more than double the cost of an escalade.
I would put their actual “value” around that of an escalade EV, which itself is also grossly overpriced.
I’m not at all shocked it didn’t sell.
I don’t get selling a car with that low of miles. You never drove it.
They got bored with it.
Or absolutely hated it
They got to show off that gm thinks they were special enough to “buy” one, and now want to unload it. They wildly misjudged the appeal, though, especially being overly customized.
My favorite line in the comments comes from the seller:
Uh, the Cadillac Celestiq can be purchased new right now. Why would anyone pay window sticker for a used car when they could just order one new with the exact options they want?
The whole point of this car is to customize it to YOUR liking, so buying uses sounds silly unless there was a big cost savings.
“I know what I got!”
Uhh yeah…so do we…
He could have saved himself the keystrokes by just saying “No Lowball Offers”
That line reads best in the voice Cameron used to chew out Ed Rooney in Ferris Bueller’s Day off.
It would be better if the seats didn’t look like giant tongues.
funny-top marks.
EV depreciation curves come for them all.
It has nothing to do with being an EV.
Phantoms, Mulsannes and S-Classes have the same depreciation curve.
Yes they do, but EVs have this depreciation curve at every price level.
A $120-150K Blackwing doesn’t have this depreciation, to name another Cadillac sedan at random.
The Blackwings near me are in the $80-95K range – even the one with just over 3400 miles is at under $92K.
Oh – but there’s two with just over 300 miles – and they’re priced at 116K and 131K. And a few more in that 120-130K range that Carvana are saying are overpriced.
Meanwhile the majority on BaT are selling in that 80-95K range unless it’s ultra special in some way, shape or form – and a few have been bid up to the 120-130K range and not sold because of reserves.
Wonder what they’ll actually sell for?
What are the stickers on those cars?
A 22-23 was typically under $100K new. MSRP has gone up by a lot.
Somebody thought they could flip it even though its custom. Like houses, the builder boasts that, but maybe I don’t like you taste…..
The seller of the Celestiq and Spectre clearly misses the point of the Celestiq and Spectre purchase experience.
When one orders new, one gets to select their own options, colors, enhancements, etc – and has the choice of dealing directly with the design people in Michigan/England to commission this object – up to being able to drive it off the factory floor.
For the people with this kind of money to spend on such an object – $60 or 70K for that kind of experience and truly bespoke personalization is nothing.
So to eliminate that experience and ability to personalize what is intended to be a bespoke object – the discount should be expected.
Yeah, your taste isn’t mine
This is crazy! It’ll never be a Rolls Royce.
Couple years down the road be lucky to get
$200k for one?
Used Rolls-Royces tend to have substantial depreciation
Even $200K is more than double what I would expect. These have no cachet, are fugly, have a dumb name, and who knows what ownership experience secondary owners can expect, especially from a company like gm?
I bet these will be $100-150k in 3 years or less.
I was honestly expecting a “look at the 75% depreciation on this dumb Cadillac” article. The fact that people bid almost $400k for that thing is shocking.
As was I. Maybe the owner ghost-bid on it to inflate the price.