Collector loses Tesla, Bentley in house fire
FORT LAUDERDALE – At least four luxury cars, including a Bentley and a Tesla, burned during a raging fire in Fort Lauderdale’s tony Rio Vista neighborhood, officials said.
The home is owned by a carcollecting enthusiast who splits his time between South Florida and Canada and frequently posts about his cars on his Instagram account using the handle “hapyhipi.” The entire ground floor of his home is specially designed to hold up to a dozen cars, according to online accounts.
As day broke on Wednesday, the extensive damage to the home became evident: most every opening was charred and burned out debris littered the property.
No one was hurt in the Tuesday night blaze. The residents of the two-story home in the 1600 block of Southeast 12th Court apparently were out of town, said
Battalion Chief Stephen Gollan, spokesman for Fort Lauderdale Fire Rescue.
“There’s a lot of exotic cars in this garage,” Gollan said from the scene, counting at least four.
The home is valued at more than $1.7 million, according to Broward County property records and is owned by Timothy Schmidt, a luxury car enthusiast and collector who also resides in Ontario, Canada.
Calls reporting the fire came in at 8:52 p.m., Gollan said.
“This was a very, very, very heavy fire,” he said at about 9:40 p.m. “We’re just getting the fire out now. It’s been a pretty extensive fire.”
Additional crews had to be called in. By the time the fire was extinguished there were about about 50 firefighters on scene.
Upon hearing of the fire, Schmidt took to social media to express his “shock.”
“We are fine, just have broken hearts,” the posting read.
It also indicated that among the vehicles burned up were luxury vehicles including a Tesla, a Harley Davidson, two golf carts and two jet skis.
The posting said the Lamborghini, normally kept in Fort Lauderdale, is currently in Canada.
As recently as February, Schmidt was featured in a Florida Fine Cars profile of his car collection, specifically his $3.8 million Bugatti Chiron on display at the Cars & Coffee Palm Beach car show in January.
Schmidt was described as a seasonal resident who has a two-bedroom house with a 12-car garage in Fort Lauderdale and who owns 35 collectible cars. Some cars are in Florida and some are kept on his 200-acre ranch in Ontario, the profile stated.
The Schmidt family made its millions from manufacturing plastic auto parts through its worldwide ABC Group of Companies. His father, Mike Schmidt, started the business in 1969 and his mother, Helga, took over after his father’s death in 2009, a Canadian publication, the King Weekly Sentinel reported in a 2014 family profile.