AFTER years of neglect, a 1957 feather white BMW 507 that previously belonged to Elvis Presley has been fully restored - and is now the most 'valuable' of its kind in the world. Elvis owned the car when he posted in Germany as a US Army Sergeant, but later sold it when he returned to the US. Nobody knew what had happened to the famous car up until 2014, when automotive journalist Jackie Jouret discovered that it had been sitting in a pumpkin warehouse on the outskirts of San Francisco for over 30 years. Its new owner, named Jack Castor, had no idea about who the car had previously belonged to. Jackie said: “I got the feeling that he wasn’t a fan of Elvis in the slightest. We take the tarp off, and the car is in-tact but rough shape. An ordinary 507 is really a $1.2-1.5 million car, but with the Elvis association it suddenly becomes the most valuable 507 in the world.” After finding out about the car’s history, Castor sent the BMW to be restored, but he sadly passed away before it was completed. The car now features at the BMW Museum in Munich, mere miles away from where it was first manufactured.
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MotorTranscript
00:00 Mysterious, alluring, the most valuable 507 in the world.
00:07 The car is an icon for the BMW history.
00:18 Mysterious, alluring and valuable.
00:22 Its appearance, it's breathtaking.
00:25 It may be hard to believe, but this beauty spent decades rusting in a California pumpkin shed.
00:32 Now, thanks to its previous owner, it's the most valuable BMW in the world.
00:39 And just whose car was this?
00:43 That's right, the king himself, Elvis Presley.
00:50 Elvis bought this 1957 BMW 507 from a racing driver while on military service in Germany.
00:58 When Elvis left the army in 1960, he sold the car to a drag racer in the United States and it returned to the track.
01:10 In 1968, the now battered BMW found itself in the care of car fanatic Jack Carster, who had no knowledge of the vehicle's famous previous owner.
01:22 Jack doesn't care about Elvis whatsoever.
01:25 I got the feeling that he wasn't a fan of Elvis in the slightest.
01:30 Jack takes it off the road with the intention of restoring it.
01:36 He accumulates a BMW V8 engine for it, he accumulates the proper ZF transmission for it, all kinds of little details.
01:43 But Jack never got round to restoring the car.
01:46 He put 70079 in storage in a pumpkin warehouse in Pescadero and it sat there for 30 years.
02:00 The story of Elvis's missing 507 became somewhat of a legend and automotive journalist Jackie was determined to find it.
02:09 An ordinary 507 is really a 1.2 to 1.5 million dollar car, but with the Elvis Association it suddenly becomes the most valuable 507 in the world.
02:22 Jackie got her break when a friend of Jack's read about the quest to find the missing car.
02:28 Jack sends me an email and we go down to the pumpkin warehouse where he has the car stored.
02:34 It was a moving experience. It was the thing that I had been looking for at this point for four years.
02:41 But this 507 had seen better days.
02:44 We take the tarp off and the car is in intact but rough shape.
02:52 You can see that the car had been white, overpainted with black and then red again.
02:58 And why repaint it red?
03:01 Elvis had the car repainted in red. Girls of course were crazy about him and they would leave lipstick messages and lipstick kisses all over his white car, which of course drove him crazy trying to keep it clean.
03:16 Then the news Jackie had been waiting for.
03:20 BMW confirmed that it had been Elvis's 507.
03:23 With the previous owner confirmed, Jack was offered a staggering 9 million dollars for the car.
03:33 But instead of taking the money, he decided to return to Senda.
03:38 The state of the car when it came to the restoration was pretty bad in nearly all aspects.
03:48 The framework was rusty, the body itself was rusty itself.
03:51 In fact the engine bay was empty when we got the car. Before there was a Chevrolet engine installed.
03:57 On the back of the car we had a big dent and the trunk wasn't even able to be closed.
04:03 The interior of the car and especially the dashboard have been considered as very beautiful all the decades long.
04:14 There was an energy that was present when that car rolled out for the first time and no one had seen that car effectively since 1960 something.
04:23 Sadly Jack passed away before restoration was completed, but he left the BMW to the museum.
04:30 So now car fans and Elvis fans alike can pay homage to the king of 507s.
04:38 Thanks for watching!
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