Ostfildern (17 November 2015) – In the course of its continuous market monitoring efforts, Deutsche Automobil Treuhand GmbH (DAT) has yet to identify any negative impacts on used vehicle prices due to the manipulations of emissions values. This applies for both the affected diesel vehicles from Volkswagen and for the market as a whole. Valid findings on the developments in the wake of the most recent revelations in connection with the CO2 values won’t be available for at least the next several weeks.
“At this point, the used vehicles market seems to be amazingly unmoved by the media coverage of the manipulated emissions values. Our market research shows that from late September to early November 2015, the sales figures for the diesel vehicles in question didn’t vary from the normal market developments. That’s a very clear indicator that dealerships have not been selling the used vehicles in question at major discounts. An impressive performance on the part of the dealerships, in my opinion, especially since there are several questions concerning the concrete future of these vehicles, questions that hadn’t yet been resolved in October, and indeed some of which still haven’t been answered today, at least not for consumers or dealers. That shows once again how invaluable a trusting relationship between dealerships and their customers truly is, which is why I feel any investment into that relationship is worthwhile, including and especially investments from Volkswagen,” says Jens Nietzschmann, Speaker of DAT’s Managing Board.
Despite the stable prices for used vehicles, DAT recorded a minor drop in sales for VW’s diesel passenger cars outfitted with the EA189 motor in October; precise numbers will soon be released by Germany’s Federal Motor Transport Authority (KBA). However, these figures should also be compared with last year’s numbers, given the fact that there is a drop in sales every autumn, making it a normal phenomenon. If the KBA ultimately confirms that fewer of these diesel vehicles are changing hands, it can safely be assumed that the dealers are willing to accept longer-than-usual turnover times in order to avoid lower sales revenues. By doing so, they directly contribute to stabilising the prices, even if this policy most likely usually involves additional costs for the financing of their inventory. This situation could worsen, now that the bad news has also spread to VW’s petrol motors.
“In particular, smaller dealers have reported that they have a hard time convincing their banks of the stability of their used car inventory’s value. This is especially true when their financing doesn’t come from what are referred to as captive banks, like Volkswagen Financial Services AG, one of its subsidiaries, or other credit institutes specialised in automotive financing,” explains Nietzschmann. “We offer these dealers an up-to-the-minute overview of the facts concerning the values of used vehicles following recent developments, free of charge. All they need to do is send us an email at gfz-expertise@dat.de, regardless of whether they’re a DAT customer or not. If they also need a key date valuation of their entire inventory, we’re also glad to help, though in this case we have to charge a small fee to cover our own expenses. Further, all dealerships that use SilverDAT to monitor their inventory can evaluate it themselves at just the touch of a button, without the need for our help.”