An age-old and elusive question in the used car business is, “what’s the right money for a car?” I would submit that, in most dealerships and used vehicle departments, no one has a good answer....
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It’s encouraging to see some OEMs reduce MSRPs on incoming 2025 models to help address one of our industry’s top challenges—with an average transaction price for a new vehicle north of $47,000,...
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Across the country, most dealers have seen their used vehicle gross profits decline this year to essentially land where they were in 2019, before the pandemic. Back then, the front-end gross...
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On our way home from dinner the other night in Austin, TX, my son, Samson, and I did a double take as we stopped at a red light along Cesar Chavez Street. A car pulled up alongside us that made us...
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As I talk to dealers week after week about their aged and distressed inventory, it doesn’t take long to uncover a distinct pattern: Someone is pretending the vehicle deserves a shot to make gross...
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This week, Cox Automotive reported that retail sales of used vehicles, while trending above last year’s sales volumes, have tapered off in recent weeks. The report also notes that the days supply...
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If you haven’t read former dealer Todd Caputo’s post on how the confluence of Hurricane Helene, the longshoreman strike (which, thankfully has been tentatively resolved), the escalating conflict...
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Since the dawn of the used car business, it’s been true that dealers make their money when they buy a car. This enduring truth was the first bit of advice my Dad passed onto me when I took over...
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Last week, I shared a post that outlined a somewhat odd moment in the used vehicle market, wherein wholesale values have risen steadily for the past two-plus months while retail prices have...
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I have a suspicion that the month of August will look pretty good for dealers as far as used vehicle sales volume, but their month-end gross profit tally will likely be less-than-satisfying if not...
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One of the most persistent topics of conversation with dealers of late has been the difficulty they experience working with customers who want to trade or sell a vehicle that’s saddled with an...
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A recent report from Cox Automotive highlights a pain point many dealers will know all too well—if you want to stock one- to three-year-old vehicles, it’s almost impossible to acquire them without...
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Regular readers of my blog know I’ve embraced a “Variable Management” strategy for used vehicles and built a software system, ProfitTime GPS, to support the strategy. The strategy itself flows...
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Tim Hlavenka, national sales director for the Rick Case Auto Group, says the adoption of ProfitTime GPS and the ROI-minded Variable Management strategy it supports didn’t come easy or happen...
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As I work with dealers, I’m seeing the return of a practice that largely went away in the past few years as dealers were hungry for new vehicle inventory and consumers were willing to pay MSRP or...
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I’ve run into a consistent theme in recent conversations with dealers: What do you make of systems that automatically price used vehicles? The question has also led to requests that we change...
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With April in the books, I thought I’d take a moment to highlight a feature of the current used vehicle market that, judging from recent conversations with dealers, appears to have been misread or...
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Over the past several weeks, it’s become clear to me that many dealers need to think more deeply about the composition of their used vehicle inventories. By composition, I mean the right number...
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I appreciated a dealership GM’s comment the other day that he views Bronze vehicles as the equivalent of vanilla ice cream. That is, like vanilla ice cream, Bronze cars are common, available from...
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I received the following note from a dealership manager that I thought I’d share: I have a GM and a used car manager who are stuck in 1980 or Covid, take your pick. We are inverted in ProfitTime...
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