The 1993 G-Class was custom-ordered by a Saudi prince and carries just 15,072 miles on the clock.
One hundred and forty-three thousand dollars. That is what RM Sotheby's fetched last month for a 1993 Mercedes G-Class 500 GE V8 AMG with 15,072 miles, custom green paint, and a Saudi royal on the original registration. The production run was capped at 446 units. Not 500. Not close.
The 500 GE V8 was the first G-Class fitted with an eight-cylinder engine and arrived when AMG was still an independent Affalterbach tuner rather than a Mercedes-Benz subsidiary. According to RM Sotheby's auction catalogue, published July 2025, initial planning called for roughly 500 units; the actual tally fell 54 short. That shortfall, combined with a named first owner and a factory-specified colour, is precisely what pushed the hammer price past six figures.
How a 1993 G-Class Became AMG's First V8 Experiment
Mercedes-Benz launched the G-Class in the late 1970s as a hardened, terrain-focused utility vehicle. By the early 1990s the brief had shifted. The brand was pulling the model toward performance and luxury, and AMG — then operating independently from its base in Affalterbach, Baden-Württemberg — supplied the muscle. The result was the 500 GE V8 AMG, introduced in 1993 and the first G-Class to carry a V8 under the hood. The 5.0-litre unit produced 237 horsepower, a figure that looked incongruous in a truck built around differential locks and a ladder frame. Mercedes-Benz and AMG completed chassis on July 28, 1993 for the car that would eventually reach Saudi Arabia. It was first registered there in February 1994. That gap — six months between build completion and first registration — is documented in the RM Sotheby's lot notes and points to time spent on the factory customisation described below. The broader shift toward industry restructuring through performance sub-brands was already visible in decisions like this one, years before AMG was formally absorbed.
The Numbers Behind a $143,000 Bid
Production shortfall arithmetic first: Mercedes-Benz planned approximately 500 units; 446 were completed, meaning the run ended 54 cars — or 10.8% — below the original target. That alone narrows the surviving pool. At auction, the car sold for $143,000. Using a standard collector-car appreciation metric against the original German market list price of roughly DM 185,000 in 1993 — equivalent to approximately $112,000 at the period exchange rate of 1.65 DM per dollar — the RM Sotheby's result represents a nominal gain of about $31,000, or 27.7% above the inflation-adjusted purchase price before restoration costs are factored in. Mileage is the other number: 15,072 recorded miles across 32 years calculates to an average of 471 miles per year — less than a typical weekly commute. The 2025 mechanical restoration at Obsessive Car Workshop in Jeddah covered at minimum eight discrete items including the fuel pump, fuel filter, front-axle oil leak, and differential, according to the RM Sotheby's lot record.
What the Factory Build Sheet Actually Confirms
According to the RM Sotheby's auction catalogue, lot documentation July 2025, the vehicle carries chassis number 1669 and was finished in Avantgarde Green — a colour described in Mercedes-Benz's own order paperwork as a specific client request rather than a standard catalogue option. The factory record also lists a wider track with enlarged fender flares fitted to clear larger AMG alloy wheels, a specification deviation from production-standard 500 GE V8 examples. Interior options noted in the same documentation include black-and-grey leather upholstery, walnut wood trim, automatic climate control, heated front seats, cruise control, and a power sunroof — a specification sheet that reads more like a 2005 luxury SUV than a 1993 off-roader. The documentation does not confirm whether any other units in the 446-car run share the Avantgarde Green paint code, which is the one question the catalogue leaves open. No Mercedes-Benz factory production ledger entry for colour distribution across the 500 GE V8 run has been published.
The Mileage Figure That Doesn't Quite Add Up
Fifteen thousand miles in 32 years is not impossible — it is roughly 471 miles annually — but it demands scrutiny in any pre-purchase context. The car spent its early life in Saudi Arabia, where summer temperatures routinely exceed 45°C and storage conditions for rarely driven vehicles can be punishing on rubber seals, coolant systems, and brake hydraulics. The 2025 restoration at Obsessive Car Workshop addressed brake fluid, an oil leak, the heating system, climate control, the fuel pump, the fuel filter, and the differential. That is a wide scope of work for a vehicle supposedly used at walking pace since new. It does not invalidate the mileage claim — Saudi royal households routinely maintain large fleets of rarely driven prestige vehicles — but the restoration scope is broader than the mileage figure alone would predict. RM Sotheby's lot notes do not include an independent odometer verification report, and no such document has been published separately. Comparable low-mileage examples of the rare-model collector market increasingly carry third-party verification as standard.
$143,000 Against the Modern G-Class Benchmark
Context matters here. A new Mercedes-Benz G 500 in the German market carries a base price of approximately €142,000 as of the 2025 model year — nearly identical in dollar terms to what this 1993 example fetched at auction. The modern car produces 422 horsepower from a twin-turbocharged 4.0-litre V8, versus 237 horsepower from the 1993 car's naturally aspirated 5.0-litre unit: 78% more output for roughly the same transaction cost. The collector case for the older car rests entirely on scarcity and provenance, not performance parity. By comparison, a standard 1993 G-Class in sound condition — without AMG specification or royal ownership — trades in the $30,000 to $55,000 range at specialist auctions, according to Hagerty valuation data published in its 2024 collector price guide. That puts the premium attributable to the 500 GE V8 AMG designation, the royal commission, and the Avantgarde Green paint at somewhere between $88,000 and $113,000 above a comparable non-AMG example. Whether that premium holds in a softening collector market is the open question. The performance-SUV segment has seen auction results compress since late 2024.
The 500 GE V8 AMG was never sold through standard Mercedes-Benz dealerships in most markets — allocation went through AMG's own network, which at that point operated 30 authorised service centres globally, none of them in North America. Prince Sultan Bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, the first owner, served as Saudi Arabia's Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Defence from 2011 until his death in 2011. The complete Mercedes-Benz G-Class model history and specifications are catalogued in the Global Auto Index manufacturer database.
