Yuner Gao/staff reporter
Randy Prier, the owner of Riverbank Auto Sales on 104 Port Watson St., said the increase in price for used cars — 37% nationwide — would continue into 2022.
Cortland used car dealers expect used-car prices to continue to rise, following a significant increase over the past two years.
“In the last year, we really started a dramatic increase in the price of the cars,” said Randy Prier, owner of Riverbank Auto Sale on 104 Port Watson St., which sells only used cars.
The price for new vehicles rose 11.8% in 2021, the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics reports. The price for used vehicles soared 37.3% in the same period.
Prier said it’s mainly due to the reduced availability of vehicles at the auctions — just 20% to 25% of the normal volume.
“One of the big auctions around here where I go to buy cars pre-pandemic would have 2,000 cars every Friday,” Prier said. “Today they have like 500. That’s about the average for the last year.”
The Marbles, the owners of the MGM Auto Sales of 48 years on 4002 West Road, have seen a sharp increase in prices for used cars.
“If we were buying something for $4,000 wholesale, that same car now is $7,000 wholesale,” Martin Marble said. “There is no inventory.”
The skyrocketing prices make it even harder for sales, which have been already hindered by the pandemic. “We were still busy when the pandemic first hit. We still maintain pretty good businesses,” said Martin Marble’s wife, Terry Marble. “But now it’s slowed down, partly because of the pricing of the cars.”
“They just cannot afford them now,” she said. “It’s a tough market.”
But for Joe Reagan, owner of Royal Auto Group in Cortlandville, the number of used vehicles sold hasn’t budged much.
“The price of used cars doesn’t impact us,” he said.
“The main difference in the usedcar market is the new car dealers are not doing the volume they historically did pre-pandemic,” Prier said. “And that’s because of the shortage of semiconductors, which were mostly manufactured in Asia.”
However, the reduction in the number of vehicles has not reduced people’s demands for them.
“Before the pandemic, when I went to the auction and tried to buy a car, I was against one or two other dealers,” Prier said. “It turns out 10 to 15 dealers (now) try to get the same car.”
Both dealers are expecting to see the climbing prices for used cars in the future.
“We got two years of this and it continues,” Marble said.
“Probably $2,000 to $3,000 more than normal for another year,” Prier said.
However, Reagan thought the used-car market would cool down gradually.
“Because the new cars are starting to become more available, the usedcar prices will go down,” he said.
But this is not expected to happen for a couple of months.
“The rental car companies have been big suppliers on the used-cars market for a long time,” Reagan said. “But the rental companies don’t have many inventories. I think it’s a couple of years away.”
Source: https://cortlandstandard.net/2022/02/09/with-inventory-down-used-car-prices-soaring/