Sentiment on the upswing for independents
Dealers mostly positive about used-car sales environment
Monday September 18, 2017
Article Highlights
- Dealers, overall, most often identified “market conditions” (37 percent), “limited inventory” (34 percent) and “competition” (31 percent) as the top factors limiting their business.
- For franchised dealers, the top three were market conditions (38 percent), competition (36 percent) and expenses (21 percent).
- For independents, limited inventory (40 percent) topped the list, followed by market conditions (36 percent) and credit availability for consumers (30 percent).
After being asked how they would describe the current used-vehicle sales environment, the view is a bit rosier for franchised dealers than for independent dealers, but overall, the view leans toward positive.
And sentiment is on the upswing for independents.
That’s one finding in the debut edition of the Cox Automotive Sentiment Index, a new quarterly study from the company.
This first edition covers the third quarter and is based on data from an online survey Cox Automotive conducted between July 31 and Aug. 7, which included 1,033 dealer respondents. Second-quarter data – gathered between April 24 and May 1 – is also included in the report.
Cox Automotive weighted dealer responses by dealership type and sales volume to represent the overall dealer body.
The survey touches on a variety of areas of a dealership’s operation, including the used-car operation.