MotorTrend’s “Chasing Classic Cars” is a show hard to ignore if you’re a fan of the automotive classics. With Wayne Carini as its lead, the show has premiered 17 seasons so far and is now known worldwide, inevitably turning everyone into an old-car lover.
While “Chasing Classic Cars” keeps itself away from drama plots and controversies, it’s a different story for Wayne’s F-40 Motorsports, as in recent years the business got caught in a lawsuit involving a classic car worth dozens of thousands of dollars and which put Wayne’s reputation as a dealer in doubt. On top of that, the rise of negative comments against his business has also put Wayne at the center of controversy.
So what’s the truth about Wayne Carini’s lawsuit? How did it affect his businesses and net worth? What about the other issues he has been involved in? Stay here to find out!
To explain the lawsuit involving Wayne Carini and his businesses F-40 Motorsports and Carini Carozzeria, we have to go back to 2010. Back then, an Australian car collector named Robert Richmond contacted the American-based car restorer Gary Dicso to purchase, restore, and ship a Pierce Arrow that he had seen in the US.
The deal went well, eventually resulting in the purchase of the aforementioned car for $98,000. However, by the time Dicso filed for bankruptcy in 2016, his business relationship with Richmond had already gone downhill and the latter still didn’t have the Pierce Arrow in his possession.
For some reason, in 2017 Dicso contacted a company named Gullwing Motors, Inc. to sell the Pierce Arrow without the permission or knowledge of Richmond. Gullwing contacted Wayne Carini to estimate the car’s price, which turned out to be $120,000 at most. Not long after the company bought the car from Dicso, Carini also became interested in the Pierce Arrow, buying it from Gullwing for $110,000. Throughout that process, Disco obtained a certificate of ownership which he later transferred to Gullwing and then to Wayne.
Not long after Wayne Carini purchased the Pierce Arrow, a company named RM Auctions, Inc. grew interested in the car too. Despite Wayne’s intent of not selling the car by increasing its price to $250,000, RM Auctions owner surprisingly accepted the offer and purchased the car from him. Not long after, RM Auctions sold the car for $275,000 to a client.
However, things went south when Dicso told Richmond about the sale of the Pierce Arrow, leading the collector to contact the person who currently had the car, claiming his ownership of it. That person returned the car to RM Auctions, which agreed alongside Wayne and Gullwing to return the money, including the restoration work that the client had already spent on the car.
Nonetheless, Richmond was still unable to retrieve the car from F-40 Motorsports, which was still the titleholder of the car and had it stored, according to court papers. In the end, Richmond sued Wayne’s businesses F-40 Motorsports and Carini Carozzeria, and also Gullwing Motors to reclaim his ownership of the Pierce Arrow, which was granted in June 2020. According to the judge, Disco had acted in ‘virtue of embezzlement’ but everyone else had acted in good faith.
It’s safe to say that the ordeal regarding the Pierce Arrow purchased and later sold by Wayne Carini through F-40 Motorsports affected his net worth. Following Robert Richmond’s discovery that his former associate Gary Dicso had sold his car without permission, the client who had last purchased the Pierce Arrow from RM Auctions asked not only for the reimbursement of the $257,000 they had purchased the car for but also the money they had recently spent in restoring it.
Those restoration costs were reimbursed by Wayne, RM Auctions, and Gullwing Motors, so it’s clear that all the parties spent extra money on the deal. Besides that, Wayne Carini and the rest of the parties sued surely had to pay court costs, though the exact amount each of them paid is unclear.
All in all, the whole Pierce Arrow ordeal made everyone spend time and money.
The lawsuit against Wayne Carini over a Pierce Arrow wasn’t the first time that he had been involved in some type of controversy. Back in 2011, a user named Joe3112d from the Lamborghini Talk forum accused Wayne of bad business practices over the purchase of a 2007 Lamborghini Gallardo.
According to this user, the car he bought was advertised as including a ‘luggage package’ worth $8,000 but said item was allegedly nowhere to be found when the person picked up the car at F-40 Motorsports. Though Wayne and his salesman Mike Roberts had apparently promised to solve the issue, the person affirmed that the men hadn’t contacted them again, leaving no option but to send them a legal notice. By the time this person posted their message on the forum, they were one week away from filing a lawsuit against Wayne and his business.
The person reporting this case also described Wayne as a ‘classless dealer’ and affirmed his business was a fraud. However, the issue was apparently solved not long after that, when Wayne sent the luggage package to the car owner.
While this case could have been a misunderstanding, it’s also worth noting that the identity of the person posting this information is unknown and that leaves plenty of room to not trust the source. However, it’s up to everyone to believe if it’s true or not.
Wayne Carini has an estimated net worth of $20 million resulting from his decades-long career as a car dealer and his less extensive but just as impressive career as a TV personality. He owns several businesses in the automotive industry, starting with F-40 Motorsports, a company specializing in buying and selling classic cars. There’s also Continental Auto Ltd., which focuses on repairing high-end cars, including those which fit into the ‘exotic’ category, such as sports cars.
Carini Carozzeria is the place where car repairs and restorations take place. Last but not least there’s Carini Consulting, a management consulting agency which is vastly less well-known than Wayne’s other businesses. On top of that, it’s fair to assume Wayne made money out of his TV show and from the merchandise listed on his website WayneCariniTV.
All in all, Wayne Carini has had a very profitable journey when it comes to cars, to the point that his success has by far over-shadowed any controversy thrown his way.