5/2025 – The Carmax Unicorn Blog

Last week, a West Coast CarMax offered a rare 2016 Mercedes-Benz Maybach S600 for $51,998. Wrote about it here. This week, an East Coast CarMax makes available this stunner, a 2015 Mercedes-Benz S600 (non-Maybach) unicorn that I think is a far better deal as a beautiful daily driver. Slightly lower price. Ridiculously low miles. Same performance.

The “vanilla” S600 is above, the Maybach below. There is a subtle difference. The Maybach is stretched a good eight inches over the standard S600. Of course, the Maybach is far more exclusive and the benchmark for “driving rich.” Both cars are selling for about the same as the average new car price for 2025 and are anything but average.

Back to the 2015 S600. It’s got an unblemished cream interior and looks like a Designo, but I cannot tell for sure. It’s got everything: heated, cooled, and massaging seats, a heated steering wheel, automated cruise control, night vision, Bang & Olufsen audio, and rear seat entertainment. It has a heads-up display, although it is not listed in the features.

The backseats are the same, but different. Both have footrests and rear seat entertainment, but you can see the extra legroom in the Maybach from the extra eight-inch wheelbase. Otherwise, with reclining and massaging rear seats in both, they are quite similar.

No dummy/blanks in the dashboard feature section and two keys! The Maybach only had one. Edge to the vanilla S600. And the mats in the trunk of the S600 below look pristine. This car has hardly been driven (or somebody threw in some new mats?)

Both the 2015 S600 and the 2016 Maybach S600 share the same motor – a smooth as silk 6.0-liter V-12 that makes 523 horsepower and 612 ft-lbs of torque. Because the “base” S600 is lighter than the Maybach by 300 pounds, it sprints to 60 mph in 4.5 seconds, a hair quicker than the 4.7-second Maybach. Both are governed to a top speed of 130 mph. For the record, I was surprised rolling through Texas in my former 2010 S600 when I went for top speed to learn that it was also governed at 130! Times have not changed.

At the moment, this 2015 Mercedes S600 is reserved here, at my very own Dulles, Virginia dealership. I have signed up for an email alert should it become available again. I may want to drive it. The Maybach sold new for nearly $200,000, and this 2015 S600 for maybe $170,000. The Maybach has 55,000 miles and is selling for $51,998. The S600 is priced at $49,998 and only has 17,000 miles. MaxCare is available for five more years and up to 125,000 miles. The Maybach is more exclusive, and the rear seat condo is nice if you want to coddle your passengers. However, the 2015 S600 is a very nice sleeper and is just as fine up front for the driver. Honestly, if the S600 had Apple CarPlay and self-driving, I’d seriously consider jettisoning my GLE63 and buying this car. It’s gorgeous. And a bargain.

Stock No: 27275187 VIN: WDDUG7GB8FA192287

It’s been a dozen years since I bought Guenther, my first Mercedes unicorn, and 7 1/2 years I’ve been blogging about CarMax cars, and in all that time, I’ve never seen a Maybach for sale by CarMax. Imagine my surprise to see this one for just over $51,000. Beautiful, rare, 2016 Mercedes-Benz Maybach S600. A V-12.

The 2016 Maybach sold for around $200,000 new, which also surprised me – I had presumed it was much more than a vanilla (if there’s such a thing) S600 or even an S65 AMG, both high-end V-12 S-Class Mercedes models, too. It’s tough to find production numbers, but estimates on the web suggest that 10% of Maybachs are sold in the USA, which translates to 500-600 per year. More unicorn credentials.

The Maybach has almost everything I want in a big Merc. Automated cruise control, heads-up display, seat massagers, heated and cooling seats, heated steering wheel, Burmester audio, and automated parking. The sedan even has the business-class footrests in the back, which I’ve never had. I sat in a CarMax S65 once that had them, and I was too tall to fully extend the seats and sit comfortably. It doesn’t matter – I got no chauffeur and my wife would refuse to drive my S-Class cars anyway. The Maybach has rear seat entertainment, which I had in my S600, and no one ever watched a DVD in the years I had it.

You can see from the panel below that the car is equipped with night vision, which I loved having in my S600, even though it was pretty useless other than as a novelty. Cool to show friends at night. What the car doesn’t have, which I now must have after owning a GLE63 AMG, is autonomous driving and Apple CarPlay. You could probably add CarPlay, although I’d be reluctant to putz with the Burmester. It also has ONE KEY. Still bullshit, CarMax.

The bonus beyond the exclusivity and luxury appointments is the big V-12. It’s a 6.0-liter twin-turbo engine making 523 horsepower and an impressive 612 ft-lbs of torque at just 1,900 rpm. The Motor Trend review gushed at a 0-60 mph sprint in only 4.8 seconds, but I’m not terribly impressed. That’s about the same as Guenther, my 2004 S55 AMG, and my 2010 S600 ran. I expected more. On the other hand, handling at 0.90 lateral G for a 2 1/2-ton sedan was quite good. I can’t imagine rear-seat passengers finding that acceptable. That’ll get the chauffeur fired.

This nine-year-old Maybach has had three owners in Houston, Las Vegas, and El Cajon. It’s accident-free. MaxCare is available up to 125,000 miles and for another five years. And you don’t want this Maybach without MaxCare! I suspect it will cost around $7,000, and I expect you’ll recover that at least three times over. Find this beautiful car here in Murrieta, California. It’s currently reserved, and you can track it using the stock number or VIN below as well. I predict it will sell very quickly, or linger around for a long time, like the 2016 S65 AMG coupe that I swear has been moving from CarMax dealership to dealership for over a year. Time will tell.

Stock No: 27270523 VIN: WDDUX7GB0GA199946

Category: 5/2025

Quick Hit – A “Vanilla” Mercedes S600 V12!

A First! A “Bargain” Maybach S600 at CarMax. 1 of 500?