Did Elvis pay $44,349 for this Cadillac Seville?
We all know Elvis loved cars, especially Cadillacs. He was still buying cars toward the end of his life, and this 1976 Cadillac Seville is one of the last vehicles he purchased. At the time the all-new, downsized Seville was downright revolutionary for the Cadillac brand, and clearly found an audience with The King himself. But the Seville’s asking price was an astronomical $12,479 with very few options available to jack up the price. The little four-door Cadillac was so exclusive that only the Series 75 Fleetwood was more expensive. So how could a dealership sell a Seville for nearly quadruple the price, much less to someone as famous as Elvis Presley?
Let’s first show that Elvis did indeed pay $44,349, because the Mecum auction has a copy of the check in their documentation. There has to be more to this story, because the Seville is clearly not stock, but none of the upgrades look terribly expensive.
Period upgrades of the era included aftermarket chrome trim, bigger grilles, and genuine wire wheels: There was little else that a car dealership would add to ensure the factory warranty remains intact, and that the repair costs they’ll eat (to insure the quality of their cars to customers) should be minimized. So let’s focus on what this Seville can tell us in its current state.
There’s a switch below the stereo that’s likely for the aftermarket Marchal fog lights mounted inside the front bumper. The Vogue tires are probably newer than the car, but we can expect the dealer upgraded the factory tires for bigger-than-OEM whitewalls. There is a big chrome grille and gold emblems aplenty, neither of which came cheap. But look at little closer at the documentation and you notice there’s a discrepancy between what you see and what was on the VIN.
Actually two things stand out when scanning that document. The first is this Seville was sold for $17,927 and not $44,349. That price is far more palatable, especially when considering the second outstanding item: this particular Caddy left the factory in a single shade of Crystal Blue Firemist. There was no two-tone option for the Cadillac Seville in 1976. Or 1977, but that year introduced a steel roof without a vinyl covering. We are building up to 1978, when the premium Seville got downright opulent elegant.
The first two-tone Cadillac Seville was the 1978 Elegante, and it only came in black/silver or brown/light brown. It seems like Elvis’ Cadillac was a precursor to what Detroit had in mind just a coupla years later. And this custom two-tone paint job explains why this example was $17,927 and not $12,479 like a run of the mill Seville.
Clearly the dealership had a body shop (presumably in house, for maximum profit) give the custom treatment to some of the Sevilles on their lot. Have a look at the photo on the left, and note the dark blue overspray where the light blue fender meets the cowl and hood hinge. Compare it to the 1978 Elegante on the right (a low mile original) and the top color was integrated into the engine bay well before assembly. Many factory two-tone jobs are like this, including Project Valentino.
Open the doors and look at the door jamb differences: the factory Elegante paint work suggests the whole car was painted in the top color (black) and the lower was added after the doors were installed. Project Valentino was painted at the factory with a cut off just like Elvis’ aftermarket Seville, sadly that’s not how Cadillac did things in 1978. This is a shame, but shows how the folks at the Cadillac dealership in Denver went above and beyond when two-toning this Seville.
But there’s still the matter of that Denver dealership and the $44,349 check they took from Elvis. That’s a lot of money for one car, especially when the documentation suggests it was “only” marked up $5448 over an unmodified Seville. It took a bit of digging, but apparently, Elvis went on a bit of a buying spree when he was in Denver.
Elvis wanted to thank members of the Denver Police for being his bodyguards when he was visiting. Elvis being Elvis, that meant buying cars, including a visit to a Lincoln dealer for a Continental Mark IV and a visit to Jack Kent Cadillac. Legend has it he bought three Cadillacs on that occasion, one for Denver Police Detective Petrifaso and two unnamed women in the party. This two-tone blue Seville might be the detective’s gift.
And that was only one day of car shopping for The King, as he reportedly bought more Caddies for Denver cops during this period. It’s been said that Elvis has owned over 200 cars himself, but that doesn’t include all of his touring, and the automotive gifts he bestowed upon people who took care of him while he was on the road. This Seville is just one of them, and while Mecum estimates it will sell for $30,000 – $40,000, the story behind it makes it priceless.
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Buying multiple cars made more sense than paying nearly 4x the price on one car.
I think Elvis could afford it.
I’m not a fan of paying $10,000, $20,000 and even more for a car simply because it was formally owned by a celebrity. But in this case I could see a sales price of $30,000 for a car Elvis Presley bought is very possible.
A really staunch Elvis fan would pay over $100k for an Elvis owned car if it were to have been driven by him, this one maybe $75k.
Why?
Colonel Tom Parker could really afford it since he was taking approximately 60% or more of Elvis’s earnings. If Elvis had millions of dollars then Parker probably would have 10’s of millions.
From what I understand, he doesn’t even deserve the “Colonel” title, even if that’s the title people often knew.
To quote: “he received the honorary title of ‘Colonel’ in 1948 from Jimmie Davis, the governor of Louisiana.”
Parker justified his confiscatory commission because Elvis was his only client.
It always seemed that stars didn’t make as much money “back in the day” as today, but certainly, Elvis made far more than he could figure out how to spend. Giving away cars left and right sure adds up. One would expect that family and close friends might be the beneficiaries of his generosity, but seeing how far it extended is impressive. I guess municipalities didn’t have any laws that prohibited this kind of gifting back then. This story also highlights how even documentation doesn’t tell the whole story by itself!
Can anyone explain why we would possibly give a flying what an ultra rich “star” paid for a car??
Can anyone explain why we would possibly give a flying **** what some ultra rich “star” paid for a car??
Taylor,
If I have to tell you, you still won’t understand.
So do us all (and yourself) a favor, and skip the articles that will always be a puzzlement to you.
At least, don’t post them twice.
Amen, some just know how to criticize!
That’s a lot of money for a glorified Chevy Nova. And that’s exactly what it was. I had a lot of customers with these cars in my repair shop years ago. The first time I put one up in the air I couldn’t believe it was a Nova.
Nova/Skylark/Omega frame, some Skylark parts such as a fuel tank, Oldsmobile fuel injected V8, but not a Nova.
It was new in ’75, and a huge upgrade over the 68-74 model you are probably thinking of.
Elvis did indeed purchased many Cadillacs for his friends and even for people he didn’t know, including my father (they never met). Sometimes Elvis apparently purchased several at a time. My father who was a newscaster in Denver, probably received the last one of Elvis’ gifted cars in 1976. I have a copy of Elvis’ check that paid Jack Kent Cadillac for ours and it was at about sticker price.
Our 1976 Seville [which I have insured by Hagerty] is nearly identical to the all-blue one in the photos, but without the wire wheel covers and has a standard Seville grille. It smells brand-new and has less than 30,000 miles on it and the 8-track player still works well.
In 1975 and 1976 Elvis spent a lot of his time in Vail. His bodyguards, mostly off-duty Denver police officers, were his friends. Elvis occasionally sang in the church choir at Holy Family Church in NW Denver and was apparently occasionally spotted doing ride-alongs in patrol cars dressed in uniform! Elvis wanted his friends to drive his kind of car. He purchased a couple Dodge Ram pick-ups, some Lincolns and quite a few got Cadillacs too.
There is a good article in the 1/8/1985 Denver Post about the cars on what would have been Elvis’ 50th birthday. Phil Goodstein, a Denver historian, has written about the Elvis spottings and the fancy cars too.
Steve Kinney – very cool! What a memory and so glad you still have the car – great story. Thanks for sharing. I believe, overall, it is well-documented that Elvis was gracious and generous to his friends, family and fans, and the people who looked after hiim became family. So sad his ‘manager’ took advantage of him and controlled so much of his life. I truly hope you are RIP Elvis.
Back in the day when I was in college, our next door neighbor was the GM of the area’s sole long time Cadillac dealer.
He was always trying to get mom to buy a car…he loaned us one of the first Sevilles in town.
IIRC, all the early cars were silver with silver vinyl and red leather…something to do with getting n the factory and workforce up to par.
I later read somewhere that the teal reason was GM had to tool a trim piece for the interior…they made the full rest batch silver to hide the fact it was missing…it would have appeared too obvious on other colored cars.
Also, virtually all the Refilled they sold had the dealer installed aftermarket top grille piece (to make them look more like a Lincoln Mark?). It is rare to see a Seville today without one.
I enjoyed driving the Seville…mom was afraid to..it was a very nice car.
Yes, the underpinnings were the new ’75 Nova/Phoenix?/Skylark/Omega but it had vastly superior NVH protection and a great interior.
Come on, for the demographic the car was aiming for, it did not need a anything fancy.
It was a great car for its market.
Mom did eventually buy a car from him, a one year old Mark IV…she traded our 5 year old LTD when I was abroad studying. If I had been around, I would have steered her towards a Seville.
Nova
Omega
Ventura
Appalo
I’d love to drive this car around, I’d have to get that front end down about an inch though, just rides too high. Neat car!
Elvis handed out cars rather than cash because he wanted people to view the cars as gifts, not charity. That’s class.
I’ve heard stories of the Memphis Mafia sliding into a 7/11 parking lot at 3am for Slurpees and Elvis would leave a $100.00 tip. Or he would rent Libertyland for overnite and ride the roller coaster all nite. The world was a lot more fun when the king was around
On one of his trips between LasVegas and LA he stopped in Victorville and supposedly brought 3 new Caddies from Heikes Oldsmobile Cadillac dealer. I was assured the story was true and these stories kinda confirm it. His generosity was overwhelming.
Hey, I get it why Elvis wanted that car.
Most comfortable car I ever owned was the ’78 Seville. That car was like riding in my living room. It was so comfortable. The only downside to the car was the computer. It had a mind of its own. Everything else was awesome. It stood out in a crowd and basically was a real beauty. Miss it still…