As the curtains parted, the frenzied car aficionados raced to get out their smartphones to capture the moment for posterity. Several of them cheered.

They had come to see Lot No. 362, the much-heralded Porsche Type 64, a swooping Nazi-era car that was built by the automaker Ferdinand Porsche nine years before he founded his car company.

The bidding on the avant-garde coupe, referred to by some car collectors as the “first” Porsche, had been expected to open at $13 million during an RM Sotheby’s Auction on Saturday night in Monterey, Calif. But something went awry, and the bidding started much higher than planned.

“When they mentioned 30 million to start, I thought that’s quite a strong starting price,” David Lee, a car collector and businessman from the Los Angeles area who was in the audience, said in an interview on Sunday. The auctioneer had an accent, he said, “and didn’t say the teens well. Is he really saying 30 or 13?”