Bought for £900, now worth £1m: this restored DB5 is the best thing you’ll see today

Welcome to the finest Aston Martin DB5 you’ll see. Not because it’s a low-mileage artefact that’s been preserved in a temperature-controlled garage, nor because it was once owned by the Queen of so and so.

No, it’s positively brilliant because before this gleaming restoration occurred, this particular DB5 was absolutely, positively… terrible.

It was purchased by a Welshman named John Williams back in 1973 for the princely sum of £900 (around £15k today). Williams, a welder and garage owner, saved up for a year for his DB5 dream, and at 19 years old hopped on the train to London to buy it.

And then use it. It was his daily driver – a DB5 as driven by That Secret Agent, driven every day! – for over four years, and the only reason he stopped driving it was because this agent was sent on a mission to the Middle East. New job, innit.

So the car sat on his driveway. And got comfortable. So comfortable, it began to rot. And peel. And rust. And fall apart. “The neighbours’ kids used to come round to play,” said Williams’ wife Sue, “and they’d play on her. Bouncing on the bonnet. One balanced on the exhaust pipe and snapped it off.”

Fairly ignominious end to one of the world’s most famous cars. But Williams was determined to revive his beloved DB5. “Being a garage man, I was a bit ashamed that I’d let her get into that state,” he said. “I worked hard to buy her, and we’ve worked hard to get her repaired.”

The ‘we’ is the bit in the story where Aston Martin Works comes into frame. The specialists stripped the rare DB5 – one of just 39 with the higher output Vantage engine spec, right-hand-drive and Silver Birch paint – back to bare metal and spent 2,500 hours bringing it back to speed. Hard, glorious and possibly enormously gratifying hours, no doubt.

“Although the car was in a profoundly run-down condition when it arrived, we always relish a challenge,” said boss of Aston Martin Works, Paul Spires. “After more than 2,500 hours of dedicated work by our teams in the panel, paint, trim and heritage workshops, along with vital support from our in-house parts department, the car is now finished.

“While it might be uncouth to speculate on values for the car I think it’s reasonable to suppose that if it ever were to be offered to the market once more, a value of up to £1m would be in order,” he added.

Williams was understandably chuffed. “It's probably almost 50 years since I have driven this car, but the experience is phenomenal. It's just... unbelievable. My girl's back and up and running! Back to her former glory.”