1998 Lotus Esprit V8

This example is from 1998, the year the range was split into the GT and the SE, the latter being more luxurious and a little better equipped. John Hassard, the vendor, tells us this one is an SE – there is air conditioning and a lift-out roof panel that can also be left in position but popped at the rear to admit fresh air…or possibly to suck out all the gasps of excitement, depending on the speed you’re doing.

John bought the car in 2014, having spent quite a while trying to find a nice V8 and ideally one in this colour. It turned up at a Toyota dealer in John’s native Northern Ireland, where it had been traded in by a man of 74 who wasn’t finding it as easy to jump in and out of the Esprit as he once had.

John was able to contact this gentleman and find out all about his time with the car. He had imported it from the mainland around five years earlier and had completed a cambelt change during his ownership.

When John bought the Esprit it was showing around 53,000 miles and it’s still only showing 56,600, with one year revealing only 200 miles between MoTs. John has another Esprit, a 1988 model that’s been soaking up some attention and expenditure as a restoration is completed, and he feels he is not using the V8 enough.

It has only the smallest cosmetic defects in a couple of places, no known mechanical or structural issues at all and John says it drives beautifully. In short, it can be enjoyed immediately and needs nothing, beyond a tiny bit of attention to detail to satisfy a perfectionist.  

There are just two areas John draws our attention towards: a small touched-in scrape on the rear spoiler and a crack in the lacquer under the driver’s door handle. Neither appears to be anything more than a minor blemish. The rest of the paint, which is a medium silver-grey with a rich metallic content, is glossy and consistent.

A couple of the alloy wheels show kerb marks, but nothing that would challenge a refurbisher, while the low-slung front spoiler and side skirts are free from damage, though the plastic or rubberised deflector that hangs lowest of all at the front has a bit of allowable gravel rash. Panel gaps on Lotuses were getting better by the late 1990s and they’re still commendable even on this car, with no inconsistencies around the headlamp pods to suggest it’s ever had a nudge, though there’s a slight wobble in the top line of the front bumper.

More subjectively, the car’s stance and general poise just looks right – compare the gaps between the tops of the tyres and the wheel arches – and it could be taken for a 2 year-old car, never mind 22.

Exterior plastics, rubber seals and glass are all in excellent condition and the lamp lenses are undamaged. Headlamps rise and fall on command and the Lotus is shod with Michelin Pilot Sport and Bridgestone Potenza tyres in 235/40/17 at the front and 285/35/18 at the rear, in an appropriate speed rating: W, for 168mph…

The red leather bucket seats are much more civilised than the banana-like items found in the first Esprits, which were seemingly designed for people with rubber spines. Here, the leather is worn-in but not damaged. There is perhaps some sign of feeding or recolouring around the areas of the side bolsters that would see most attrition from regular use.

The door cards and door furniture all looks almost as new – there are tiny Alpine tweeters in the doors to help the four other speakers fed by the Alpine CD head unit give of their best and the dash itself doesn’t even show a finger-mark. It’s really very, very smart in here, from the ‘Esprit’ script on the rugs to the same lettering on the shiny sill plates.

The Lotus alarm and immobiliser requires you to lock and unlock the car with the button on the fob if you stop the engine and then wish to re-start again; welcome to the world of 1990s alarms. Every electrical function does indeed function, from windows to central locking to dash displays and in-car entertainment. The air conditioning works but with little gusto, suggesting that a re-gassing would get things ice cold again.

Starting at the front compartment, we have a space-saver spare along with the brake servo, washer bottle, fuse board and sundry bits of loom, all looking very smart. What appears to be a receiver-dryer for the air condition system is showing some surface corrosion. There is a nifty little plastic briefcase containing the car’s tool kit, which looks as though it’s never been used. A single hydraulic strut holds the lid up.

There are two of them to do the same job for the lid at the rear, revealing a clean, dry-looking engine that’s only showing its age in the paint loss from here and there on the scarlet inlet manifold and cam covers. And you can only see this when you’ve raised the engine cover itself; the bulk of what the rear lid reveals is a surprisingly generous boot for a car of this type, with carpets in excellent condition.

What can be seen of the underside of the car suggests a slight oil mist near the engine; not enough to get anything wet, but just enough to get dust to stick to certain surfaces. John says that if the car is left for several weeks it can sometimes smell as though oil is touching hot exhaust soon after start-up, possibly the result of a very slow weep from a cam cover gasket. But it soon clears.

On the road, John describes being shocked not by the performance or handling, which we assume he was expecting, but by the comfort – he says it’s a fabulous place to be and has only one minor shortcoming if you’re used to modern cars that turn over at 2000 rpm at 70mph, and that’s the lack of a sixth gear. But remember it will pull to somewhere past 170mph, so you’re not exactly straining it on the motorway in fifth…

As for that famously blistering acceleration and standard-setting handling? Present and correct. John has another word, uttered with a sense of wonder: ‘unbelievable!’

There is a fair bit of printed history in the file going at least as far back as two owners before John, when the car was residing in Portsmouth, back in 2008. The service book was stamped annually, firstly from Lotus Cars themselves. After a busy year or two, the Esprit must have been used rather less and the car’s mileage lagged behind the mileage marks in the book, which is expecting the Esprit to have hit 78k miles after this many services.

The last stamp is from 2012 at 52,372 miles – since then, John has serviced it annually with oil and filters, using a local dealership connected with his position as operations manager for the dealer group.

There is a scribble from 2010 at 51,579 miles to the effect that the turbos were refurbished and timing belts renewed; we didn’t see bills for this work in the folder but assuming this represents the last cambelt change, the car is still a long way from the 24,000 mile life of a V8’s cambelt, but rather beyond the supposed time limit in years.

It’s pretty dazzling, isn’t it? A Ferrari 355 in equivalent condition would be around £20,000 more and a 360 perhaps another £20,000 on top of that. And neither is any quicker. We estimate that this Lotus will sell for between £26,000 and £32,000.

There’s no doubt you need to be an understanding sort of soul to own most Lotuses more than a few years old, and although John is keen to point out that this car has never let him down or shown any kind of mood, that’s largely because it seems to have been beautifully looked after by each owner. The next owner should be able to commit to doing the same. Compared to a Golf GTI it’ll cost a lot to run; compared to a Ferrari it’ll be peanuts.

The Esprit V8 shows what can happen to even the wildest efforts of small companies if given time – the Esprit grew up, becoming not only fiercely quick but even luxurious. If you like your supercar motoring to be both affordable and comfortable, you need to give this car serious consideration. And we haven’t even mentioned the surging prices of the older Esprits, have we?

Viewing is always encouraged, and this particular car is located with the owner in Northern Ireland. To arrange an appointment please use the ‘Contact Seller’ button at the top of the listing. John is very happy to answer questions and to help with shipping to the UK mainland. Feel free to ask any questions or make observations in the comments section below, or try our ‘Frequently Asked Questions’.

If needed, please remember we have a network of trusted suppliers we work with regularly and can recommend: Classic & Sportscar Finance for purchase-financing, Thames Valley Car Storage for storing your car, AnyVan for transporting it, and Footman James for classic car insurance.

BORING, but IMPORTANT: Please note that whilst we at The Market always aim to offer the most descriptive and transparent auction listings available, we cannot claim they are perfect analyses of any of the vehicles for sale. We offer far greater opportunity for bidders to view, or arrange inspections for each vehicle thoroughly prior to bidding than traditional auctions, and we never stop encouraging bidders to take advantage of this. We do take a good look at the vehicles delivered to our premises for sale, but this only results in our unbiased personal observations, not those of a qualified inspector or other professional, or the result of a long test drive.

This vehicle is not with us at The Market’s HQ near Abingdon, which means we have had to rely on the owner’s description of it, in conjunction with the photographs you see here, to compile the listing. 

With this in mind, we would encourage potential bidders to contact the owner themselves and arrange to view the car in person, or to arrange a dedicated video call in which they can view the car virtually and ask questions.

Also, localized paint repairs are common with collectable and classic cars and if they have been professionally carried out then they may be impossible to detect, even if we see the car in person. So, unless we state otherwise, please assume that any vehicle could have had remedial bodywork at some point in its life.

Please note that most of the videos on our site have been recorded using simple cameras which often result in 'average' sound quality; in particular, engines and exhausts notes can sound a little different to how they are in reality.

Please note that this is sold as seen and that, as is normal for used goods bought at auction, the Sale of Goods Act 1979 does not apply. See our FAQs for more info, and feel free to inspect any vehicle as much as you wish.