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Article snippet: For one evening early this month, the gravity of Manhattan’s auto marketplace shifted crosstown, from the dealerships on the northern reaches of 11th Avenue to the Upper East Side. While many of the same brands were offered — BMW, Jaguar, Mercedes-Benz and Porsche among them — the selling prices realized on the 10th floor of Sotheby’s New York auction house were on another scale entirely. So were the cars, for that matter. Classics from Aston Martin and Rolls-Royce, available alongside modern exotics from Bugatti and Pagani, were the focus of spirited bidding. By the time the auctioneer’s gavel went silent, $45.5 million worth of cars had found new owners. The sale, titled “Icons,” was held during RM Sotheby’s “A Life of Luxury Week” series, which also included events for watches, jewelry and fashion. It was the third such auction held by the company, after a 2013 sale that brought in $63 million and one in 2015 that rang up $73 million. It was also evidence of RM Sotheby’s interest in making New York — and Sotheby’s — synonymous with high-end car auctions. It’s reasonable to ask whether it makes sense to hold an auction of important collector cars in New York, perhaps one of the least car-compatible cities in America. And why in December, when shoppers are not likely to be searching for a classic sports car for their weekend sortie to the Hamptons? “New York is a hub for luxury buying,” Jake Auerbach, a cars specialist for RM Sotheby’s, said before the sale. Dec... Link to the full article to read more