Will Coronavirus hit used car prices?

[VonSenger]

Butter Face said:

This isn't advice it's an opinion. I assume this is still a forum?

There are people on PH who have admitted that they are dabbling in stocks due to a forced closure of their business, giving investment advice. Crazy, especially as you can clearly see they have no clue of what they speak.

[Inky81]

av185 said:

So said:

av185 said:

The very fact that GDP drops could well mean used car prices rise as we are currently seeing across all sectors atm.

The rises you are seeing at the moment are short-term supply and demand aberrations. It won't continue.

The smart money says it will as punters see value and downgrade to cheaper residually robust and reliable quality used stock.

Time will tell. Not everyone would agree.

[VonSenger]

In terms of price rises and sales, I'm fairly certain its coming. Believe it or not, this is a honeymoon. Just MHO off course.

[Inky81]

VonSenger said:

This isn't advice it's an opinion. I assume this is still a forum?

There are people on PH who have admitted that they are dabbling in stocks due to a forced closure of their business, giving investment advice. Crazy, especially as you can clearly see they have no clue of what they speak.

They're only playing with you VS. Most people can tell the difference between personal financial advice and general economic predictions.

[So]

av185 said:

So said:

av185 said:

The very fact that GDP drops could well mean used car prices rise as we are currently seeing across all sectors atm.

The rises you are seeing at the moment are short-term supply and demand aberrations. It won't continue.

The smart money says it will as punters see value and downgrade to cheaper residually robust and reliable quality used stock.

Who is "the smart money"?

[jgrewal]

Deep Thought said:

A tricky one to sell privately as people in that market will generally have a trade in and want finance.

Also, A/T is not the place it once was for expensive private sales.

And if your car isnt £1,000+ lower than all the dealer cars, theres going to be little incentive for people to bother.

Although you'll get a lot of "Is this still available?" messages, Facebook marketplace is surprisingly good these days for private sales. I sold a £16,000 year old Cooper S for the asking price from it last year, and a £9000 Focus ST also went a few months ago with no issues.

Assuming the spec and colour combo is right, price is key, but at that likely price point it may be a bit of a waiting game no matter where you advertise it.

Thanks for the advice mate and agree Autotrader doesn't really feel like the right place to sell a car over 10k during the current crisis. I am not overly desperate to sell it quickly. Just thought see what happens as my new car doesn't arrive until September. It might be just taking the hit and selling via Wizzle, WBAC or Motorway directly to the trader network (which of course means I will get trade in price at the most)

Patience is a virtue..

[Butter Face]

VonSenger said:

Butter Face said:

This isn't advice it's an opinion. I assume this is still a forum?

There are people on PH who have admitted that they are dabbling in stocks due to a forced closure of their business, giving investment advice. Crazy, especially as you can clearly see they have no clue of what they speak.

I’m just fking with you. Everyone should realise that to take any post from anyone (never mind some of the proper, proper muppets) on PH as sage advice is just silly.

[anonymous-user]

OddCat said:

Just out of interest then, what are you planning to do now?

I moved my whole pension into cash pre UK election in September 2019 but (unfortunately) re-invested wholly back into equity funds in November 2019 once things were clearer (geographically spread - but with 40% UK as I felt UK stocks were better value). Value peaked in late February 2020 then dropped 40% during the first 3 weeks of March. Has now recovered so am now down only around 10% from the February peak. Am planning to liquidate half tomorrow and let half run as I have a feeling that the recent share surge might turn quickly and a second big leg down might be round the corner. By liquidating 50% to cash I'll be hedging my bets (although liquidating all holdings might be a better bet but I've always been terrible at timing the markets)

Sorry for continuing the Off Topic here !

Only thing i plan to change is let the QE++ backed surge in equities in the Eurozone play out then i'm dumping everything from the continent, it's fooked.

[jjr1]

jgrewal said:

Its going to be a long tough road ahead - there should be no illusion about that. We had been due a recession after 10 or so years of growth after 2008 credit crunch. This has just been the excuse the economy needed to collapse.

Put my 2017 Mercedes C Class on for sale this week has just 8k on the clock and not a single call so far on auto trader. Not even a tyre kicker making a silly offer! Thought I priced it well but seems like there is lack of market..

Your car is £800 above Cap Clean in a market that is saturated with C Class Mercedes coming back off lease.

White is also not as common as the Black, Grey, Silver and Blue ones available.

Whilst your price is not dreamland it is also not jumping off the page asking people to call you.

[A1VDY]

maz8062 said:

HTP99 said:

Auto810graphy said:

fridaypassion said:

Arriving on a bike with socks/sandals/notebook and a tape measure? Might as well not even bother.

We have a mid 30s chap that looks at our cars every now and again who matches this description.

Over the past few years he had been to look several cars as he’s local but did not buy. Last time was a really cheap Dacia Sandero, he checked his bike fitted, noted tyre depths and lots of other stuff, said he was buying but last we heard he was asking his mum to borrow some money (serious).

He was on the phone Monday wanting to look at a 1 Series. Was politely told him we would need a holding deposit to view and he told us he would take his custom elsewhere.

LOL, similar thing happened to us over the weekend.

Local old guy who's given us the runaround for years, he's always ages on the phone too, always looking for a car for his daughter who's not local, he's enquired about almost everything that we sell which is auto and small, was definately buying a new Twingo auto a couple of years ago, he rang in on a used 2 Series that we have, same spiel on the phone about his daughter.

Wants to drive it, not sure if it is right for his daughter though, was told no test drive until his daughter can also see it, she's 100 miles away so will be difficult apparently, oh well, no test drive then.

It's interesting that you both find this funny. As is the way these days, people use extreme examples of a practice to introduce rules that impact everyone. If you make the buying process difficult for everyone i.e pay a deposit before you can test drive a car, in the end, your footfall will dry up to be replaced by those virtual showrooms that the likes of SEAT use.

By insisting on a level of commitment before even test driving a car, you are putting pressure on the buyer. In this day and age of virtual shopping, customers have a lot of choices. Some will succumb to this pressure others will find alternative ways of buying.

For your sake I hope your method is the best.

We have a take no prisoners policy.., be polite but when the time comes not to be polite any more they're off the site.
Far too much time can be taken up talking to goofy losers who are there specifically to try to waste our time. It's something that comes with experience of human fkwittery but can 90% tell the type of person turning up just by the way a text is worded or phone call.
We sold 173 cars to April this year, always sell honest straight cars even though they're all cheapies. All come with a full service, cambelt if required, full wet valet and 12months mot.
We don't make big profit on every car but have turnover (pre C19). Even since last week though (June 1st) we've sold four cars with no test drives.
Time wasters go that way>>>>>

[can't remember]

HTP99 said:

LOL, similar thing happened to us over the weekend.

Local old guy who's given us the runaround for years, he's always ages on the phone too, always looking for a car for his daughter who's not local, he's enquired about almost everything that we sell which is auto and small, was definately buying a new Twingo auto a couple of years ago, he rang in on a used 2 Series that we have, same spiel on the phone about his daughter.

Wants to drive it, not sure if it is right for his daughter though, was told no test drive until his daughter can also see it, she's 100 miles away so will be difficult apparently, oh well, no test drive then.

Offer him £200 trade in on his X-Type (he's bound to have one). Should offend him enough to get a couple of months peace.

[Scootersp]

A1VDY said:

We have a take no prisoners policy.., be polite but when the time comes not to be polite any more they're off the site.
Far too much time can be taken up talking to goofy losers who are there specifically to try to waste our time. It's something that comes with experience of human fkwittery but can 90% tell the type of person turning up just by the way a text is worded or phone call.

It would be interesting to see what leeway you give them, I'm sure the goofy losers drove there and buy cars occasionally and just need time a push a nudge etc. They might not act according to the norm, and perhaps aren't worth you time investment but they must buy cars from somewhere? perhaps they go private sales or change their ways next time?

I really struggle to believe people go round test driving mundane cars as a hobby with no intention of buying?

[Algarve]

Scootersp said:

I really struggle to believe people go round test driving mundane cars as a hobby with no intention of buying?

My friend works at a car dealers here in Portugal. They're tied to a hire place so nearly all of their stock on the premises is 6-12 month old relatively mundane stuff that's been hired out to tourists from new.

He was telling me over a pint that its unreal how many people he gets in who are just blatantly wasting their time, and his. Going through finance options on cars they clearly can't afford etc.

Its hard to imagine how pathetic your life must be to spend your Saturday afternoon lying to someone that you can afford to finance a 208 or a Polo Maybe it makes a bit of a change to getting bullied or treated like st in some restaurant kitchen for 600 euros a month. He's got to be nice to them, and his boss won't allow him to throw them out.

[Deep Thought]

Scootersp said:

It would be interesting to see what leeway you give them, I'm sure the goofy losers drove there and buy cars occasionally and just need time a push a nudge etc. They might not act according to the norm, and perhaps aren't worth you time investment but they must buy cars from somewhere? perhaps they go private sales or change their ways next time?

I really struggle to believe people go round test driving mundane cars as a hobby with no intention of buying?

Dont forget its not just about whether or not they will commit, its the fact it may take a disproportionate amount of time to get them to commit in which time you could have sold cars to several other people.

[The spinner of plates]

Deep Thought said:

Scootersp said:

It would be interesting to see what leeway you give them, I'm sure the goofy losers drove there and buy cars occasionally and just need time a push a nudge etc. They might not act according to the norm, and perhaps aren't worth you time investment but they must buy cars from somewhere? perhaps they go private sales or change their ways next time?

I really struggle to believe people go round test driving mundane cars as a hobby with no intention of buying?

Dont forget its not just about whether or not they will commit, its the fact it may take a disproportionate amount of time to get them to commit in which time you could have sold cars to several other people.

Exactly. A sales organisation isn’t a public service to please everyone, it’s designed to sell x units a week. And if the organisation is successful enough to generate x+1 leads, it can now make choices about who to invest in time.

[av185]

So said:

av185 said:

So said:

av185 said:

The very fact that GDP drops could well mean used car prices rise as we are currently seeing across all sectors atm.

The rises you are seeing at the moment are short-term supply and demand aberrations. It won't continue.

The smart money says it will as punters see value and downgrade to cheaper residually robust and reliable quality used stock.

Who is "the smart money"?

The general market i.e. buyers.

They are rarely wrong.

[Sheepshanks]

Scootersp said:

I really struggle to believe people go round test driving mundane cars as a hobby with no intention of buying?

I know a guy who, with his wife, will go for a drive out most Sundays with the focus being a visit to a distant car dealership. What's particularly bizarre about it is he owns a shop and works in it 6 days a week and his missus works in retail too. They bought both their cars new and have had them for about 10 years.

[Nefos]

I was planning to buy a car soon (July) but as I was watching Autotrader, many cars got sold which means it is more of a sellers market than buyers.
Should I wait more to buy a used car, so the market can be "refilled" with more cars?

[av185]

Scootersp said:

I really struggle to believe people go round test driving mundane cars as a hobby with no intention of buying?

Nothing surprises me when it comes to saddo timewasters across most purchases who really have nothing else in their lives and essentially nothing else better to do with their time.

The British consumer really is programmed to shop irrespective of whether or not they buy more tat they don't need or nothing at all.

Just look at the number of folks, individuals and whole families who pre covid would spend a whole day and a perfect summers day at that, driving miles and queuing in desperation to walk round some godforsaken shopping centre to have 'lunch' at some stty crammed to the rafters McDonalds then traipse round the usual braindead retailers found on any high street to buy more tat they might want but definitely don't need.

This mentality of the timewasters inevitably extends to cars and showrooms just as much as it does to new housing developments where those with empty lives and nothing better to do with their time are perfectly happy wasting others time viewing and testing cars and homes they have absolutely no intention whatsoever of buying.

[rallycross]

jgrewal said:

Its going to be a long tough road ahead - there should be no illusion about that. We had been due a recession after 10 or so years of growth after 2008 credit crunch. This has just been the excuse the economy needed to collapse.

Put my 2017 Mercedes C Class on for sale this week has just 8k on the clock and not a single call so far on auto trader. Not even a tyre kicker making a silly offer! Thought I priced it well but seems like there is lack of market..

Market for good cars sub £5k is currently very very strong, no supply of new stock, plenty of buyers looking, supply and demand is what affects used car prices it has nothing to do with new car sales or the headlines for the economy - if people lose their jobs and have to hand back their £399 month Audi/Merc/BMW rental deals - they will need a cheap runner - prices are going up.

Who's going to buy a 3 year old Merc privately unless its mega cheap? they will buy one on finance with a warranty from a dealer, not risk buying privately