How much would you pay for a Toyota hot hatch? One buyer has paid twice as much for what was already the most expensive Yaris on sale.
A 2022 Toyota GRMN Yaris has set a new record, selling for more than $AU200,000 at a Japanese auction.
The hammer fell on the high-performance Toyota hatchback at ¥18,165,000 before fees – or around double the car’s original cost, at $AU201,395 – with the GRMN Yaris rumoured to be on its way to its new owner in Hong Kong with just 66km on the clock.
Revealed in January 2022, the all-wheel-drive GRMN Yaris is limited to just 500 vehicles – all of which were sold exclusively to the Japanese market.
The GRMN – which translates to ‘Gazoo Racing, tuned by the Masters of Nurburgring’ – is both lower and wider than the GR Yaris on which it’s based, as well as being 20kg lighter thanks to a carbon-fibre bonnet, roof, and rear wing.
Weight was also saved thanks to the use of lightweight fixed Recaro racing seats, and the deletion of the second row of seats.
MORE: GRMN – the story and cars of Toyota’s skunkworks
While there’s no extra power from the 200kW 1.6-litre turbocharged three-cylinder petrol engine, torque has increased by 20Nm to 390Nm compared with the GR Yaris, with ratios inside the six-speed manual gearbox also changed to improve acceleration.
Toyota offered the GRMN Yaris in two different packages – Rally and Circuit – with the vehicle sold at auction being the latter.
The original price of the limited-edition Yaris was between approximately $AU88,000 and $AU101,000.
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