An unopened first-generation iPhone from 2007 has sold for $54,904 at auction, another massive sale of original sealed iPhones. The $54,904 price tag includes a 20% buyer's premium fee, meaning the seller received around $43,900.
Last month, the same model of iPhone, sealed in its original packaging, sold for a record-breaking $63,000. While this sale is slightly lower than the previous one, these purchases are likely for long-term investment in a collectibles market that is often volatile in the short term.
The 8GB A1203 iPhone was initially released back in 2007, and this particular iPhone, as noted by RR Auction, is from the earliest production phase due to the "twelve icons on the screen" of the box.
The auction included an AT&T bag and a leaflet regarding rate plans and iPhone activation to get the full 2007 experience. The seller was an Apple employee at the time and therefore received an iPhone at launch, keeping the spare sealed for over 15 years.
Another massive iPhone sale
Sealed vintage Apple devices have taken the collectibles world by storm in recent years, with collectors wanting to own the tech of their childhoods from iPhones to original Apple-1 computers.
The eye-watering sum of money for the boxed original iPhone is unsurprising, looking back at the meteoric rise of Apple over the last two decades. If you purchased $1000 of AAPL shares back on January 9, 2007, the date of the iPhone reveal, those same shares would be worth $53,000 today.
Who knows where the world of collectible technology will go, but it wouldn't be a surprise to see original iPhones reach the $100,000 mark at some point in the future. This kind of purchase is a dream for Apple fans and those nostalgic for the early days of the smartphone, although most of us will never be able to afford a $50,000 iPhone.
