Dashaansafin is right in his own way; everywhere outside of NA the exec-class sedans are just viewed as big, black EWB chauffered cars, so I guess if you've been anywhere else long enough, the image starts to set in. The cars are cheap, in relation to owning them in other parts of the world. $5-10/hr parking, gas that costs 2-3-4X more, the inevitable small fender benders that you sometimes settle in cash, an S/7/A8/LS460 is a nice car, but a 'work' car in my eyes as well. Out here in Asia, it's so much about the packaging and nothing about what the car really does, because they'll never need it, they sell tons of 728i/730i models, S350's, front-wheel drive A8L's with the 3.7L and sometimes the 3.2L, they can start to look unglamorous after awhile. You do see the higher-performance models like the S8, S63/65, I've seen the M kit on the new 760i already as well as a new Alpina B7 biturbo, but those are typically owned by yakuza types.

on topic though, I imagine prices for the S class are dropping like flies or will be any day now, it's past halfway in it's life cycle now that they've had the facelift model out for a bit and model cycles are shortening; I'd say the current model only has a year or two left before they show the new generation.