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Sellers should opt for December instead
Date: 04 December 2013 | Author: Will Stretton
While many vendors looking to defleet eagerly await the New Year in order to maximise car values, vehicle auctioneer Manheim has presented data that shows that waiting for this January bounce in the current market could be a risky strategy.
According to the company, wholesale values achieved at auctions have fallen from £5361 in December 2012 to £4786 in January 2013, while the average CAP clean values fell from £5699 to £4980 over the same period.
Daren Wiseman, valuation services manager at Manheim, said: "There are many reasons to sell before Christmas, but perhaps the most important is that the costs involved with holding on to stock will be minimised and unnecessary interest charges can be avoided.
"This, in turn, will provide a strong balance sheet at the end of the year and can enable volume targets to be reached. Relying on the January bounce could, therefore, be a risky strategy, especially as the market is so strong at present," Wiseman added.
Meanwhile, Alan Senior, head of car valuations at MyCarCheck, also cautioned against waiting for the January bounce. Although Senior stated that values have "only taken a slight fall as the year comes to a close, much less than normal at this time of year", he warned that "there are more than the usual numbers of cars being advertised in the classifieds, and at auction, that are in poor condition, with little or fudged service history."
