The coronavirus outbreak will finally accelerate the growth of online purchases within the automotive industry. Today, the march to digital is still taking place at a surprisingly restrained rate. Over the last few weeks, I’ve spoken with 50 car dealerships and only three felt that their digital efforts were meaningfully driving online sales results. The […] [Read More]

While some industry metrics are moving more significantly, Swapalease.com is seeing only modest changes in approval rates for consumers using its site to secure a short-term transportation solution. Site officials reported earlier this week that lease credit applicants registered a 65.1% approval rate in July, a slight decline from the June rate of 67.1%. Swapalease noticed […] [Read More]

Understandably, dealerships and finance companies are currently at the point of the month when they’re likely focused on sustaining sales momentum generated during the first half of the sales period or looking to rebound before the calendar turns the page. However, two surveys originating from the real-estate world might provide some optimism about the longer-term […] [Read More]

In the initial quarantine period of the COVID-19 pandemic in March and April, the rush to move vehicles off lots caused dealers to shy away from certified pre-owned (CPO) strategies. As a result, CPO sales dropped by 39.5% in the first quarter of 2020. Sales did climb back to finish the first half of the […] [Read More]

It was another record for the Manheim Used Vehicle Value Index. This metric measuring wholesale used-car prices has now hit all-time highs for two straight months, as a near 6% sequential lift in wholesale values pushed the index to 158.0, according to parent company Cox Automotive. That reading beats year-ago figures by 12.5% and is […] [Read More]

Our friends from Black Book join us for this episode of the Auto Remarketing Podcast. We talk with Susan Moritz, Alex Yurchenko and Laura Wehunt about the ebb-and-flow of the retail and wholesale used-car markets, the COVID-19 impacts on the ancillary services piece of the industry and current projects at Black Book. To listen to this […] [Read More]

While some “details were generally encouraging,” experts are continuing to project that it will take some time before dealerships and finance companies see the amount of gainfully employed workers making vehicle purchases as they did back in February. Those experts dissected the July jobs data from the U.S. Department of Labor, which reported on Friday […] [Read More]

The recovery in pre-owned sales continued in July, with Cox Automotive’s 13-month rolling used-vehicle SAAR climbing from 36 million in June to 38 million last month. The company estimates in a Data Point report released Thursday that there was a 4% year-over-year decline in used-vehicle sales for July and that the month’s SAAR fell from […] [Read More]

People are getting back to work, but not at the pace experts are projecting for the economy, tangible consumer metrics and other intangible household conditions to improve quicker. Just a small fraction of expectations, private sector employment increased by just 167,000 jobs from June to July, according to the July ADP National Employment Report, which […] [Read More]

More evidence of a shift in demand from new vehicles to used: average listing prices for used vehicles jumped more than $700 from June to July, a period in which they normally would see a depreciation-fueled decline, according to Edmunds. Specifically, used vehicles had an average listing price of $21,558 last month, which was up […] [Read More]