{"id":85627,"date":"2026-05-25T12:36:31","date_gmt":"2026-05-25T16:36:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/autosector.com\/?p=85627"},"modified":"2026-05-25T12:36:31","modified_gmt":"2026-05-25T16:36:31","slug":"rarest-bmw-m1-gray-brown-interior-villa-deste-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/?p=85627","title":{"rendered":"The BMW M1 Nobody Wanted \u2014 Until It Became Priceless"},"content":{"rendered":"

There are about 450 BMW M1s in the world. Most are red, white, or black. A handful are gryy. And exactly one has the cognac brown cloth-and-leather interior that everyone at the factory apparently thought was hideous. That car was at Concorso d\u2019Eleganza Villa d\u2019Este 2026. And it has a story.<\/p>\n

The Color Nobody Ordered<\/h2>\n

\"BMW<\/a><\/p>\n

When BMW offered the M1 to customers in the late 1970s, grey was on the options list. So was the brown interior. Nobody ordered either. According to Tom Plucinsky, Head of BMW Group Classic USA, the color combination sat unsold in a showroom until someone at the company decided the car had to go somewhere. The man who took it was Jochen Neerpasch<\/a>, then head of BMW Motorsport, who was largely responsible for the M1 existing in the first place. He has since told multiple people he wishes he never sold it.<\/p>\n

The current owner, a Munich-based collector who also has a 507 and a 3.0 CSL Batmobile, bought it at auction after a stranger chapter: a Chinese collector had kept the car in a private Hong Kong museum until a dispute with Chinese authorities forced him to liquidate the entire collection. The M1 ended up back in Munich. He bought it knowing it was a one-of-one spec. It was his second M1 \u2014 he\u2019d previously owned a blue one.<\/p>\n