A first-generation iPhone sold for over $190,000 on Sunday after receiving a rush of bids for the item in the last hours of its availability.
The iPhone is factory-sealed, has 4GB of memory, and was originally released in 2007. Back then, the phone was sold for $499. In 2023, the phone would cost around $700.
LCG Auctions, the host of the sale, told USA TODAY that original iPhones have jumped in price and demand in recent years.
“They’ve been kind of a high-end collectible for a while now, but about a year ago, they started really kind of setting record prices,” said Mark Montero, the founder of LCG Auctions.
Montero said the $190K sale is the third unopened, original iPhone to sell for major amounts this past year. A first release 8GB model sold for $39,340 in October 2022 and a second 8GB model sold for $63,356 in February.
The bidding period for this iPhone was from June 30 to July 16. Montero said going into the final day of bidding, bids were around $60,000.
“That morning, we’d just broken the previous record of $63,000 by like a little bit and it went from that to $190,000 which we certainly did not expect. That was almost double the high estimate,” he shared.
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