The Most Expensive Wine in the World $500,000? 

The Most Expensive Wine in the World is yet to be determined. Attempting to find the most expensive bottle of wine in the world is not easy. There are numerous contenders, each with a story behind them that makes them worth mentioning.

The world’s most expensive red wine is the 1878 Chateau Lafite, a Bordeaux with a hand-etched bottle that sold for $160,000. This very bottle was once owned by Thomas Jefferson (once the United States Ambassador to France), and was sold for this exorbitant price to find a place in New York’s Forbes Collection.

The most expensive bottle of white wine ever sold went for 100,000 British Pounds (almost $200,000 by today’s conversion rate). This bottle was sold in 2006 to an American wine aficionado. This nameless purchaser bought a vintage 1787 Sauternes from Chateau Yquem. At over 200 years old and approximately the age of the United States itself, this wine is doubted to be tasty. In fact, there is a high possibility that a glass of it might make you sick. Thus, it’s for bragging rights only.

As far as truly drinkable wines go, a 1978 Montrachet from Domaine de la Romanee-Conti was sold in New York’s Sotheby auction house for almost $24,000 per bottle. Not a cheap drink at almost $5,000 per glass.

The most expensive bottle of wine that was never sold was a 1787 Chateau Margaux. The bottle was priced at $500,000 but had no offers. The owner of the bottle took it to dinner at New York’s Four Seasons where it broke after a collision with a waiter. Luckily, the bottle was insured for $225,000.

There is nothing unusual in these prices. Rare wines are auctioned off for high prices simply because of their scarcity. Like an old baseball card, the longer time goes by, the more these wines are worth. Many auctioneers believe that the day is not far away when a bottle of completely undrinkable wine will sell for half a million dollars. The drop in the value of the American dollar versus the Euro and the British Pound make this even more likely. A mere $500,000 for a few glasses of 200-year-old grape juice may one day seem like a bargain. Please feel free to comment below if you have more information about the most expensive wine in the world.