US man who crashed his dream supercar finds it 8 years later and wants to buy it back but the new owner makes him splash out
Published on Apr 09, 2026 at 4:24 PM (UTC+4)
by Alessandro Renesis
Last updated on Apr 09, 2026 at 2:31 PM (UTC+4)
Edited by
Mason Jones
This guy bought his dream supercar – an Audi R8 – twice.
This didn’t make a lot of financial sense, but then again people who buy supercars don’t necessarily do it based on rationality, and that’s the beauty of it.
The problem is he expected a fellow ‘car guy’ to factor this into the price.
But that backfired.
Buying back your first supercar is an expensive idea
YouTuber Tanner Braungardt did the thing a lot of car people want to do: he bought his first car back.
Technically, that’s his first supercar, not his first car in absolute sense, but that’s beside the point.
Tanner originally bought the car nearly 10 years ago, modified it with an out-there wrap and then added a supercharger.
And then he crashed it.
In 2018, after crashing it into a fence, the car ended up at a salvage auction after becoming a write-off in the eyes of Tanner’s insurance company.
In 2026, Tanner was somehow able to track the car down.
What happened next was interesting because it was the exact opposite of what Tanner was expecting.
After locating the car, Tanner began negotiating with the owner. And there was something that was said in the video that backfired spectacularly.
“If he’s a car guy, he’ll understand that you’re trying to buy your first supercar back,” Tanner’s friend told him.
And he did.
But not in the way Tanner thought.
The sentimental value ended up adding a few zeros to the price
The sentimental value, coupled with the fact that the owner of the Audi R8 didn’t really want or need to sell the car, ended up backfiring.
It became much-appreciated leverage for the seller, and Tanner ended up buying his car – a salvage-title vehicle, lest we forget – for $100,000.
That’s nearly what he’d originally paid when it was new.
But, to be fair, he was still pretty happy about it.
“It’s the sentimental tax,” he admitted.
And some people still think these are just bits of metal.
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After beginning his automotive writing career at DriveTribe, Alessandro has been with Supercar Blondie since the launch of the website in 2022. In fact, he penned the very first article published on supercarblondie.com. He’s covered subjects from cars to aircraft, watches, and luxury yachts - and even crypto. He can largely be found heading up the site’s new-supercar and SBX coverage and being the first to bring our readers the news that they’re hungry for.
