Since 1966, Hertz and Shelby have worked on some very cool Ford Mustangs and many are worth a pretty penny today. Hertz is now trying to offload some of its latest Shelby Mustangs as we speak. Unlike most ex-rental cars, don’t assume you’re going to get a great deal.
It’s no secret that sports cars designed for Hertz can carry a premium. Examples of the Shelby Mustang GT350 Hertz from the 1960s regularly garner six figures. Beyond that though, the rest of the Hertz sports car family tends to trade for five figures. That’s what makes this trio of GT500s look like a pretty bad investment. (Disclaimer: Do not take financial advice from me as I have a habit of buying cars that require far too much money to maintain.)
For example, this 2022 Shelby GT500 coupe has an asking price of $150,000. For that cool $150k, the buyer will get a car with over 22,000 miles on the odometer, a lot of gold accenting in the cabin, and (I wish I were joking), some Mucho Macho tires at each corner.
Don’t get me wrong. This is unquestionably a potent sports car. It still has a 760 horsepower supercharged V8 under the hood (with a gold-painted intake plenum), a seven-speed automatic gearbox, and rear-wheel drive. At the same time, there is zero accounting of how renters treated it for the 22,000 miles it’s lived.
Notably, all the cars we’re seeing here are “Hertz Certified” so they come with a 12-month 12,000-mile limited powertrain warranty on top of whatever factory coverage could remain. Still, how many people want to see how ragged out a rental Mustang can be after just 22k miles? Now, how many of you with your hand still up are willing to drop $150,000 to find out?
If Hertz wants $150k for this car then shouldn’t it in theory want more for the other ones it’s selling with less mileage? One example has 15,142 miles on it and the other features just 12,346. Maybe I’m just being pessimistic about Hertz-branded Mustangs. Let’s take a look at valuations from third parties.
Over on Cars & Bids, it would seem that the general value of a Shelby GT500 from similar years is lower than $150,000. More specifically, the last time that a GT500 of this ilk went for that kind of cash was… never.
The closest happened back in early 2023. That particular example, a Heritage Edition Shelby GT500 with the Carbon Fiber Track package, featured just 70 total miles at the time of sale.
Since that example, only two others have even reached six-figure bidding but neither sold. Interestingly, one is of special note. It’s a 2022 Ford Mustang Shelby GT-H Coupe. That’s right, it’s a Hertz-edition Mustang and bidding reached $105,313. If it went that high then surely a GT500 version is worth more right?
Well, no, not necessarily. First, this auction happened back in January and pricing is different today. Secondly, that car had just 750 miles which inherently adds significantly more value.
Perhaps the issue with these values is that we’re talking about Cars & Bids though. Maybe another auction website will garner higher bids for such a car. If you’re thinking of Bring A Trailer then you’ve come to the right paragraphs.
Alas, values aren’t much different there though. For example, the last GT500 to come anywhere close to $150,000 or more was a KR with just 443 miles on the odometer.
The most expensive late-model Hertz-branded Mustang to sell on the platform traded hands in April for $126,313. It had 3,400 miles on it and was allegedly one of two factory-supercharged examples.
Circling back to the Mustangs on Hertz’s website, let’s take a quick look at one more detail. The KBB plugin that Hertz uses to entice buyers that they’re getting a good deal is broken for these three cars. Well, it says that the range is “unavailable.” That said, when you hover over the little blue “Why?” nothing happens. At least, that’s the case for me. Maybe you’ll get different mileage there.
Considering all of this weirdness, I went ahead and reached out to Hertz to ask if they could explain their pricing strategy here. First, the company shot me a message telling me “Vehicles are selling quicker than usual because of our great offers!” I hereby promise to follow up on this claim by checking on these Mustangs in the not-too-distant future.
Really though, what I wanted was some reasoning for how they came to this specific figure. Perhaps the cars have some special lineage or features? When pressed, a Hertz employee just told me that “We do not negotiate on pricing. All our cars are marked with a no-haggle price that is often below market price.”
Suffice it to say, if you’re in the market for a Shelby GT500 Mustang, now you know what the market looks like.
It is priced that way for the same reason the headline exists – it drives customers/consumers to the site to gawk at it and then continue browsing over to find a hopefully reasonably priced car for commuting, a first car for their kids, etc.
I wouldn’t touch one with a 10 foot pole.
Saw a fella at the Hertz in Orlando who was renting one open the trunk, throw in 3 bags, start it up and rev the piss out of it after what I’m assuming was a long sitting period. He then proceeded to keep it in 1st until he floored it out of the rental terminal.
Ridden harder than a mule and put away wetter than a whale.
Replacing the quality tires on a performance rental car, with low-performance tires is not that uncommon. Back in the ’80s, the father of one of my friends was responsible for having the maintenance of both the National and the Avis rental fleets at the airport in Killeen, Texas. National had a Camaro RS in its local fleet equipped with Goodyear Eagle GT+4s from the factory. The man eventually replaced those GT+4s with Kmart whitewalls!! Then there’s the story repeated in Car and Driver a few years ago, about a rented Caprice that had all four factory tires replaced, one at a time, by someone who rented the car over a few weekends (reported by a rental agency manager).
Is any newish Mustang really worth more than $75K?
I don’t think so.
I even think the Dark Horse is pushing it price wise. Once a Mustang costs as much as an M2 or a base Corvette I really lose interest.
Yeah – it’s ridiculous – especially with that low-rent interior.
I’m pretty sure you can buy a base spec GT and build your own Dark Horse equivalent for way less money.
I’m going to guess you haven’t spent much time in a recent generation Mustang. Obviously a base model it going to be fairly low rate, but the upper models like the GT500 are actually pretty well appointed.
Oh – are the interior plastics better on upper grade models nowadays?
Are the Ginza By Night Billboards unified/better integrated?
Do the seats not squeak against the console when adjusted anymore?
What’s the difference between a rental car and a Jeep?
There are some places you just can’t go in a Jeep.
Looks like they are hitting the pipe and asking a price that just Hertz…
These are rent-a-racers… lol… everyone that rents them beats the tar out of them. Why else would you rent it?
To impress hookers.
I rented a GT500-H once. Absolute riot and brother, lemme tell you. I was NOT kind to it.
Buying one that a Shelby guy hasn’t gone through with a fine tooth comb is just asking for trouble
Save the money and don’t buy the rental desk special. Just wait for the GTD to drop. Those are expected to retail around $150k.
A GTD for $150k? You’re about halfway there.
I had no idea this was an actual tire brand.
So thanks for the education.
Apparently they are made in Thailand and typically used for drifting competition/displays.
50k is more appropriate
Those look like a perfect choice of tires to waste doing burnouts.
Yeah cannot fathom thinking this is a good idea.
Maybe your privately owned GT500 (or any other performance car) is flogged every now and then when the owner lets their hair down a bit. But in general, most people won’t be too hard on their own car.
The rental? Every single person rents one of these purely to redline the thing and smoke those Mucho Machos.
Normally I would downgrade a used performance car if I saw Mucho Machos on there instead of a reputable tire. In this case, Hertz made the right move since it probably needed to be replaced every other week. And I’d never buy it anyway.
Just to add, it is shockingly reasonable to rent one of these monsters. Looked up the Ft. Myers Florida location for an upcoming weekend. $55/day.
In contrast a Chrysler 300 (or similar) is $42/day. A Chevy Equinox (or similar) is $54/day. An “Elite Sports Car” described as a Challenger or Camaro is more money! $61/day.
So the barrier to entry for any horsepower fiend to get one of these to beat the tar out of is pretty low.
Hell why not rent one and take it straight to the track? Who gives a shit
Not on those tires.Maybe a drift track.
Don’t come at me with logic. I’m here for a good time, not a long time.
Actually, yeah, those tires do have some fans in the drift scene.
Not that this makes a used Hertz rent-a-racer worth anywhere near $150k, but the GT500-H was tuned to produce 900+ HP, not the standard 760 HP.
Mucho Macho man, I wanna be a Macho man. Mucho Macho man.
I think these were on the Mustang convertible I was upgraded to last month in Houston.
I got one of the earlier Shelby Mustangs as a rental upgrade once. I can assure you that every single one of them was hooned to within an inch of it’s life, just like every performance rental car.
I am probably the exception, in that I don’t drive rented cars any differently than I drive my own. And in the case of that Mustang, given it had nearly bald rear tires (shocker) and it was raining the whole time I had it, it would have killed me if I had tried to hoon the thing.
900 hp, bald tires. I wonder how many of these are downright unsafe, especially in weather.
IMHO, ALL of them are unsafe in the hands of untrained drivers. But this was one of the older Shelby Mustangs that *only* had like 550hp. Even with modern traction control and a light foot the thing was squirrelly as hell given the conditions.
You’re not the only one, and I’m not just talking about myself. Most people don’t drive rentals “like they’re driving a rental (or they stole it)”. This is especially true when rented for business or family vacations since those have added professional and familial concerns…and most rental fleet cars aren’t much fun for hooning.
And the experts actually recommend purchasing used cars from rental companies since that old adage is (mostly) untrue, and the car rental companies tend to do a pretty excellent job of upkeep and maintenance in between rentals.
But like others have said, performance car rentals are the exception. I would absolutely by a nice boring Toyota Rav-4 from a car rental company if it’s a good deal… but Mustangs, Camaros, anything drop-top. No f-ing way. Those are, indeed, being driven like rentals.
Spot on.
For the most extreme example – buddy of mine rented a Camaro to take *autocrossing*. And roasted the engine in the process – turned out the car was rather low on oil. Developed a rather unhealthy sounding rod-knock. Returned it without saying a word…
My DD is a formal rental I bought 12 years ago. I have found no ill effects from its previous life.
I’ve seen how rental Mustangs are driven. They need to move the decimal place to the left on these prices, big time.
Don’t be gentle, it’s a rental. I absolutely beat cars I rent into the ground and you should too. As a result, I’ve always been quite hesitant to consider a pony car that used to be a rental. You just know several idiots like me on vacation flogged it within an inch of its life.
Also, even as one of our resident pony car enjoyers I’ve personally never really understood the appeal of the GT500 unless you’re a diehard Ford fanboy. They are extremely expensive for what they are and they hold their value quite well. I can’t really imagine buying a new one over a Z06 but that’s just me.
Something else to note is the similar flagship pony cars from Dodge and Chevy actually do depreciate. You can get into a decent Hellcat these days in 50s/60s and the same can be said of the one of these you REALLY want which is the ZL1. If you’re going to go to the track that’s far and away your best option and it’s not particularly close. I’d definitely prefer to daily a Hellcat or GT500 but no one is daily-ing these anyway.
For me the takeaway here is if you buy a rental car you probably are gonna get what you deserve.
Especially anything performance oriented, and available for 55 bucks a day.
I am seriously tempted to drop that cash for a day of fun. Without consequences.
Seinfeld used to talk about how a rental car is just begging you to beat the living crap out of it…I agree, and feel the same way.
But not surprised Hertz is being totally anal about the asking price.
Just the same, they are fucking nuts.
Apparently, the Mucho Machos are among the cheapest UHP tires you can get in these sorts of sizes. Seems likely that the first renter shredded the OEMs (why not?) and it’s been Mucho Machos all the way after that.
I’d buy it, but you know Hertz will just report as stolen.
You win the internet today.
“Drive it like you stole it” is rather literal with Hertz.
Beat me to it
I won’t be surprised they will bill you overmileage fees on a car you own.
At least some of this is likely the “Star Wars action figure” phenomenon.
Original new in the box action figures from the late ’70s/early ’80s are worth so much now precisely b/c there’s so few of those left – nobody collected them back then, we just opened them up and played with them like you’re supposed to.
People see that and think “Ah ha! I’ll be so clever for saving these brand new The Rise of Skywalker ones b/c they’ll be worth a fortune later on!”
Trouble is, others think that too, so your collection of hey I’m improbably back b/c lazy screenwriting Emperor figures ends up not being worth that much later on. But refusing to believe it b/c just look at the originals!, you keep the price high, waiting for that buyer who just has to have one.
Like when you think buying and saving all Hess Toy Trucks as an investment is a good idea.
Esp. if Hess itself is holding back a ton of them in warehouses with the idea of selling them later for big bucks. Trouble will probably be when Gen Delta or whomever is like “wait, I don’t get it; what did these things transport?”
Brother in law passed away and he had a HUGE toy collection, these were mostly tractor and truck models and he had spent close to 180k on them over the years- he had multiples of models with tiny differences that supposedly made them super rare. The auction had book values of about 300k on them all- after the fees the total was in the 28000$ range that they got. I suspect the values were based on somebody buying them drunk at night online
That is why I don’t bother collecting as an investment. I’d rather collect stuff cause I like it, and if my daughter and I wanna play with my stuff, we do. Investors should thank me, I’m doing them a favor
Im sure a rental gt500 was very gently driven by responsible people for those 22k miles, very low chance of finding pieces of innocent bystander stuck in the undercarriage.
Warranty complaint states the customer reports the smell of burning flesh once operating temp has been reached…
We may not know how exactly the renters drove the car, but we know what Hertz was expecting if they put on a rando brand tire that you can get off Amazon for $273 per set of four.
$150k and they’ll still mark it as stolen after the check clears, what a deal!
You wanted a fast car, right? Getting chased by the police just means you get to let her off the leash!
Black market prices, maybe.
Black heroin tar prices…