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Guide blames fleets for poor RVs

Date: 07 May 2008   |   Author: Nick Gibbs

Price guide experts at CAP have laid the blame for a sharp fall in prices for used small executives at the door of fleet managers.

Most models have been hit in a tough market, but particularly the BMW 3-series range, which dropped around 4-5% from the CAP Clean target price last month, compared to a market fall of 2.6%.

CAP attribute the fall to the high volume of low-spec cars entering the auctions, and suggest fleet managers should be doing more to prevent user-choosers from picking the lowest-rung cars.

"Fleet managers need to be very careful about the specs," said Robert Hester, Black Book valuations relationship manager at CAP. "That's particularly true with the 3-series: the ES is not too bad in itself, but put it out in a non-metallic you're going to suffer at the back end." Particularly bad are cars in Doom Blue, as it's known in the CAP offices.

"Typically what happens is that on somebody's company car list, the choice is between a reasonable-spec Mondeo or Passat, or a basic model 3-series or A4," said Hester. "They're always going to go for the base model executives."

"It's mainly the big fleets, the leasing companies. Smaller fleets can control it more, especially if the purchasing manager works closely with the disposal manager," said Hester. He singled out ALD Automotive as one company that kept a good tight control on specs.



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