Pre-owned cars; sold as ‘like new’ (including the price)

[thieuster]

Dutch car dealers showrooms: filled with not-new cars. I had heard about it. But today it was confirmed by a local dealer.

Someone here in the neighbourhood had his RAV4 in for a service and I offered to pick him up for the ride home.
We ended up in the showroom. Filled with all sorts of small Toyotas, one RAV and a Highlander. The sales person told us that none of the cars was new. All were pre-owned and inported to the Netherlands from Germany.
“We cannot get new cars. At least one year waiting!” When we talked about the eyewatering prices on the cars: “Next year, cars will be even more expensive! So these are realistic prices!”
When home, my neighbour sent me a WhatApp message. He’d looked it up: his 2 y/o (then brandnew) RAV4 was then cheaper than the late 2021 RAV4 with 15k miles on the clock that’s now for sale at the dealer’s.

I wonder: we can get cars from Germany.
That’s a big ‘lake to fish’. But how about the limited numbers with RHD like the ones in the UK?

[gingerboy]

Dutch car dealers showrooms: filled with not-new cars. I had heard about it. But today it was confirmed by a local dealer.

Someone here in the neighbourhood had his RAV4 in for a service and I offered to pick him up for the ride home.
We ended up in the showroom. Filled with all sorts of small Toyotas, one RAV and a Highlander. The sales person told us that none of the cars was new. All were pre-owned and inported to the Netherlands from Germany.
“We cannot get new cars. At least one year waiting!” When we talked about the eyewatering prices on the cars: “Next year, cars will be even more expensive! So these are realistic prices!”
When home, my neighbour sent me a WhatApp message. He’d looked it up: his 2 y/o (then brandnew) RAV4 was then cheaper than the late 2021 RAV4 with 15k miles on the clock that’s now for sale at the dealer’s.

I wonder: we can get cars from Germany.
That’s a big ‘lake to fish’. But how about the limited numbers with RHD like the ones in the UK?

I was looking for a car this time last year. Some dealers had more stock than others but you could see that stock was drying up gradually. I bought my current car for £15k, it was up for slightly more than that. Later thay year my friend was after the same model and year, you struggled to find cars below £18k and they were rough examples. Prices continued to rise in to 2022. However, it does appear that things have improved slightly to an extent. The current situation with Russia and rising costs has knocked consumer confidence and many people are being more measured about their lifestyle choices.

The resultant effect appears to be cars that are £8k+ are becoming a little easier to get hold of and prices have dropped slightly in that bracket. Sub £8k is more competitive and stock is there but prices are way over what they should be. sub £2k is horrendous, you've got cars that would have been £500-£750 bangers now selling for £1,250-£2k. My 17 year old daughter is looking for her first car and everything we have looked at has been a turd :-(

I deal with some of the main manufacturers and new cars is a nightmare, stock is scarce of most new models with build windows continually moving due to shortages of chips, electronics etc etc.

[hilly10]

I went to look at the Skoda Enyaq EV yesterday they had a 18 month old one that was it. I got talking to the Salesman who informed me waiting time is about 18 months as the wiring harness is made in Ukraine.

[Gareth-W]

I wonder: we can get cars from Germany.
That’s a big ‘lake to fish’. But how about the limited numbers with RHD like the ones in the UK?

What does this mean (your point or question) please? Thanks.

[thieuster]

What does this mean (your point or question) please? Thanks.

Indeed, that was not very clear.

'Big lake to fish': the German car market is very big. Germans tend to tick all the boxes on the option list. And Germans tend to buy another car every year or so. The big companies like Audi, VW have a lot of employees driving 'one of their own'. After a year, they're sold as 'Jahreswagen' (Car for a year). For us, that's a big lake with many fishes to catch. I was thinking about the relatively small RHD market(s). If it's nearly impossible to get a new car on the Dutch market, but you can buy a 'as new' German car, then how's that for the UK market: with no other countries close by where the have RHD cars.

[thieuster]

I went to look at the Skoda Enyaq EV yesterday they had a 18 month old one that was it. I got talking to the Salesman who informed me waiting time is about 18 months as the wiring harness is made in Ukraine.

Japanse brands (this afternoon Toyota) mention the shortage of chips and semi-conductors.

Off-topic: the Ukraine angle: we bought new bathroom wall tiles the other day. The supplier had tons of white tiles in storage. All sorts, all sizes, all white. I asked him why he had so much of that single colour in store. He told me that there are two factories in Europe producing the colouring top layer product that makes a tile white. One of them is in the Ukraine.