Secondhand car price crash? (Vol. 2)

[e-honda]

ACCYSTAN said:

I was at a evans Halshaw branch and they still use price boards.

I asked about QR codes and the sale guy told me it’s a gimmick, no one walking past is going to scan a QR code, they want to see a price.

QR codes are saved for exotic cars where price is a secondary consideration, not a 4 year old Vauxhall crossland

It's a gimmick if you think it's for the customer benefit
But when you realize it's for the sales and marketing teams benefit to get that data they need it's not a gimmick.

[AlexNJ89]

I wonder how often people do see a car and the price as they walk past and decide that it matches their criteria,

For me I look online and already know the car I'm looking to buy before I get to the dealer.

However, I also know people who's car broke down so they drove to a MINI dealership and just picked one from the forecourt and drove it home the same day so maybe I'm in the minority.

[Kerniki]

AlexNJ89 said:

I

However, I also know people who's car broke down so they drove to a MINI dealership and just picked one from the forecourt and drove it home the same day so maybe I'm in the minority.

Did they though?

or did they catch a taxi, someone else drive them, they arrived in a plume of smoke? Maybe perfect timing and they arrived as their car broke down?


So many unanswered questions, one needs to know

[NRG1976]

So after all the nonsense spouted by posters saying that cars would be plummeting to zero by end Q1, what’s their view on what we’ve seen?

People been crying wolf since 2020 - 4 years on always best to reflect and think about all the fun you’ve missed out on !

[Deep Thought]

AlexNJ89 said:

I wonder how often people do see a car and the price as they walk past and decide that it matches their criteria,

For me I look online and already know the car I'm looking to buy before I get to the dealer.

However, I also know people who's car broke down so they drove to a MINI dealership and just picked one from the forecourt and drove it home the same day so maybe I'm in the minority.

The minority are those who walk in blindly and buy the car they see at sticker price. And they would be a very small minority.

[Deep Thought]

e-honda said:

ACCYSTAN said:

I was at a evans Halshaw branch and they still use price boards.

I asked about QR codes and the sale guy told me it’s a gimmick, no one walking past is going to scan a QR code, they want to see a price.

QR codes are saved for exotic cars where price is a secondary consideration, not a 4 year old Vauxhall crossland

It's a gimmick if you think it's for the customer benefit
But when you realize it's for the sales and marketing teams benefit to get that data they need it's not a gimmick.

Agreed.

I'd be very surprised if it wasn't gleaning data in some way, or at least offering to forward on more info to an email address or set up a chat or call.

[Deep Thought]

ChocolateFrog said:

So what's the reason for the slide in the bottom of the market?

Not much has changed from what I can see. I doubt people coming off fixed rates is having a huge impact on £1-5k cars.

Maybe everyone who wanted or needed to get off the lease/pcp gravy train has already done so.

Has there been a slide in prices (Apologies if this has been explicitly demonstrated and I've missed it) or just a lull in sales, which may be a seasonal blip?

[e-honda]

Deep Thought said:

Has there been a slide in prices (Apologies if this has been explicitly demonstrated and I've missed it) or just a lull in sales, which may be a seasonal blip?

I think the bottom end of the market is a bit hard to get data on, the bulk of the value is in the new more expensive cars, plus there is much more variation between price and quality, eg the number of £2k cars for sale and how well they are selling could stay roughly the same but they move from rolling scrap to reasonable cars. It's probably going to be much more anecdotal in this area.

[av185]

Seattaken said:

av185 said:

True DT as posted many times before and the conflation of demand for new and used cars is also perfectly illustrated by the thread about niche/manual ice cars becoming worthless ££ simply because manufacturers are ceasing production when in fact the exact opposite is is true prices will remain robust due to a reduction in the supply used.

In the next 5 to 10 years ICE cars will increasingly become worthless, due to the combined effect of punitive local taxing (ULEZ and banded resident parking), closures of fossil fuel service stations and manufacturers throttling supply of new ICE, parts and support.

Short term there will of course be pricing blips but the overall trend will be as above.

Throttling supply of new ICE in broad terms will clearly result in increasing not decreasing prices of used ICE.

We have seen this many times before causing increased used prices and not just through the pandemic and supply chain issues etc.

Fossil fuels and alternative fuels for ICE will be around for along time yet as will dealer support.

[AlexNJ89]

NRG1976 said:

So after all the nonsense spouted by posters saying that cars would be plummeting to zero by end Q1, what’s their view on what we’ve seen?

People been crying wolf since 2020 - 4 years on always best to reflect and think about all the fun you’ve missed out on !

Someone said that would plummet to zero?

[Deep Thought]

av185 said:

Seattaken said:

av185 said:

True DT as posted many times before and the conflation of demand for new and used cars is also perfectly illustrated by the thread about niche/manual ice cars becoming worthless ££ simply because manufacturers are ceasing production when in fact the exact opposite is is true prices will remain robust due to a reduction in the supply used.

In the next 5 to 10 years ICE cars will increasingly become worthless, due to the combined effect of punitive local taxing (ULEZ and banded resident parking), closures of fossil fuel service stations and manufacturers throttling supply of new ICE, parts and support.

Short term there will of course be pricing blips but the overall trend will be as above.

Throttling supply of new ICE in broad terms will clearly result in increasing not decreasing prices of used ICE.

We have seen this many times before causing increased used prices and not just through the pandemic and supply chain issues etc.

Fossil fuels and alternative fuels for ICE will be around for along time yet as will dealer support.

+1

Spot on as usual AV

[r3g]

Question for the full-time traders here :

This thing with the date being in the AT URL telling you how old the ad is... in another thread someone said that dealers had become aware of this 'problem' and were now deleting the ad once it became 'old' and were relisting it to give it a fresh date URL, making it appear like the vehicle was new in stock. But wouldn't the dealer incur fresh listing fees doing this? Any traders here with insights ?

[buyerandseller]

I gave up my Autotrader account a few years back but then we had an agreed number of cars we could list and it didn't matter how many times you added or deleted a car the monthly fee was the same so it wouldn't make any difference to the cost.

[e-honda]

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/car-details/202304146...
This one has been up for over a year
They probably paid about £2k for the car, typical monthly fees are around £100 so if they were paying that they've already made a loss.
I suspect they paid a fixed fee for that ad but I think auto trader have backed away from open ended advert deals so you'll probably see it a lot less really long adverts as these all drop away.

[ChocolateFrog]

e-honda said:

ACCYSTAN said:

I was at a evans Halshaw branch and they still use price boards.

I asked about QR codes and the sale guy told me it’s a gimmick, no one walking past is going to scan a QR code, they want to see a price.

QR codes are saved for exotic cars where price is a secondary consideration, not a 4 year old Vauxhall crossland

It's a gimmick if you think it's for the customer benefit
But when you realize it's for the sales and marketing teams benefit to get that data they need it's not a gimmick.

I'd walk past without asking or scanning.

I'd like to think I'm not the only one.

[ChocolateFrog]

AlexNJ89 said:

I wonder how often people do see a car and the price as they walk past and decide that it matches their criteria,

For me I look online and already know the car I'm looking to buy before I get to the dealer.

However, I also know people who's car broke down so they drove to a MINI dealership and just picked one from the forecourt and drove it home the same day so maybe I'm in the minority.

I often wonder this too. I think anyone who cares about cars looks for a specific one but a significant % of people much go down to the local used car dealer, maybe one they have a existing relationship with and just browse what they've got.

[Deep Thought]

e-honda said:

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/car-details/202304146...
This one has been up for over a year
They probably paid about £2k for the car, typical monthly fees are around £100 so if they were paying that they've already made a loss.
I suspect they paid a fixed fee for that ad but I think auto trader have backed away from open ended advert deals so you'll probably see it a lot less really long adverts as these all drop away.

I would imagine they are paying for a set number of slots per month so not costing them specifically to list that car.

But yes, after a couple of months I'd be getting tired looking at that and have started to reduce the price accordingly.

[Deep Thought]

buyerandseller said:

I gave up my Autotrader account a few years back but then we had an agreed number of cars we could list and it didn't matter how many times you added or deleted a car the monthly fee was the same so it wouldn't make any difference to the cost.

Yeah I never used AT as UsedCarsNi have the biggest presence here in NI but they were the same, set number of cars you were paying for. You could swap cars in and out on the system so you didn't have to redo the advert each time.

I think it was a tickbox as to whether it was visible on the site or not.

[ChocolateFrog]

There seems to be plenty of new cars knocking about.

The dealer overflow carpark I often drive past is still full.

Makes me wonder if people realise their brand new i7 or iX has been parked nose literally into the bushes with the new weeds now growing up above the cills in the damp end of a gravel carpark getting covered in rail dust.

[ChocolateFrog]

Deep Thought said:

ChocolateFrog said:

So what's the reason for the slide in the bottom of the market?

Not much has changed from what I can see. I doubt people coming off fixed rates is having a huge impact on £1-5k cars.

Maybe everyone who wanted or needed to get off the lease/pcp gravy train has already done so.

Has there been a slide in prices (Apologies if this has been explicitly demonstrated and I've missed it) or just a lull in sales, which may be a seasonal blip?

Maybe I was getting slow down and prices conflated.