Electric Car Values in Free Fall as Second-Hand Prices Halve in Two Years

[markjay]

Agreed but the issue is that sales aren't really going up by much, whereas hybrids are.

If looking at "BEVs" though that includes vans, where sales are actually going down:

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I was referring to the fact (and rumours) that car manufacturers see a decline in EV sales. I don't doubt them, just curious to know which markets are affected. Clearly the UK is not a contributor to the declining EV sales described by car manufacturers.

 

[Bobby Dazzler]

Quite a few pre-reg / nearly new ICE and PHEV cars about as well as presumably BEVs.

If we are seeing pre-reg BEVs then that might seem bad - but in some respects it would be a route for the normalisation of BEVs into the private market.

Agreed, it will make BEVs and all new cars more accessible to private owners.

The market as a whole is being corrected and normal service is resuming. All cars - and fleet cars especially - are being substantially discounted and pre-registered regardless of powertrain, just like they had been for several decades prior to COVID.

I suspect that those discounts will be even larger than they used to be as it will need to offset some of all of the attempts to increase profit margins by manufacturers, and it will need to offset the sharp increase in borrowing fees.

That will mean that there will likely be some killer deals on prerefistered cars for those who can pay in full without borrowing (because the market price will be set by the majority who will have at least some borrowing in the car).

 

[Bobby Dazzler]

I watched a YouTube video by Mark McCann last night, in which he specced a new Lamborghini Temerario, a car launched a month or so ago at Monterey Car Week. It’s a 900 BHP V8 hybrid with similar performance to the Ferrari SF90 for much less.

He buys lots of Lamborghinis and has pre-ordered this car so his will be one of the first into the UK. Carl Hartley from Tom Hartley Cars - who buys and resells new-to-market supercars - said the most he would offer is 10% less than list price.

Whilst that’s not a problem shared by the man in the street, it’s insightful because at this end of the market there are zero $hits given to price if it means you can jump the queue on an in-demand newly launched supercar.

He doesn’t expect to be able to sell one for any more than list price. This part of the market has existed in a bubble for a decade now and so there will be lots of existing supercar owners who get exposed to brutal depreciation in the next few years.

 

[Bobby Dazzler]

On the premise that unsold new cars are not sent to the breakers.... then all it does (pre-registrations) is shift sales figures from one quarter to the other, because eventually all cars get sold, even if not in the same quarter when they were registered. It's therefore irrelevant to the question whether car sales are going up or down overall.

Agreed and hence as I said it’s a good indicator of sales, but not a measure of sales.

 

[Bobby Dazzler]

Wi

I was referring to the fact (and rumours) that car manufacturers see a decline in EV sales. I don't doubt them, just curious to know which markets are affected. Clearly the UK is not a contributor to the declining EV sales described by car manufacturers.

thout data it’s difficult to be sure, however it may not even be a decline, it could be that sales are lagging behind projections. There are many words used - especially by journalists - which aren’t technically true.

 

[MikeInWimbledon]

I have a plug in hybrid company car, I had a choice of petrol, diesel, plug in, non plug in and EV.

BIK is heavily incentivised to go pure EV with little thought about high business mile users, like me, where a diesel makes more sense.

The current car (Volvo V60 T6) goes 45ish miles on electric then over to petrol. With no charge I get 35-38mpg, I worked out pence per mile is the 11p EV and 19p petrol.

My last car was a C220 cdi, and that got 58 mpg or 13p per mile…

Company and government sense has gone out the window, keep a diesel for 5 years or build a new EV every 3…

Are you suggesting that the diesel is scrapped after five years, while the EV is scrapped after three?

Or that they just disappear in a puff of smoke?

 

[MikeInWimbledon]

But in contrast hybrid car sales are up by 18%, and plug-in hybrid by 25%.

In fact the whole new car market increased by 5%. So the market share for BEVs went from 16.4% in 2023 to 17.2% in 2024 ... an increase of just 0.8%.

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You have to be pretty daft to think that BEV sales are going down in the UK.

Not only is the annual rate of BEV sale going up,

but also BEV's have now reached the used market, dramatically increasing the level of BEV usage, spreading them out to the biggest market of them all: second user.

At 2p / mile for anyone with a driveway - call it £200 a year for someone driving 10,000 miles a year - EV ownership is a no-brainer for anyone young enough to be able to plug a car into a three pin socket four times a week.

 

[markjay]

Are you suggesting that the diesel is scrapped after five years, while the EV is scrapped after three?

Or that they just disappear in a puff of smoke?

Not scrapped... just sold off, and then going into the second hand private car market.

 

[markjay]

You have to be pretty daft to think that BEV sales are going down in the UK.

Not only is the annual rate of BEV sale going up,

but also BEV's have now reached the used market, dramatically increasing the level of BEV usage, spreading them out to the biggest market of them all: second user.

At 2p / mile for anyone with a driveway - call it £200 a year for someone driving 10,000 miles a year - EV ownership is a no-brainer for anyone young enough to be able to plug a car into a three pin socket four times a week.

The best argument in favour of buying a BEV is 5 minutes spent on the Mercedes Benz website getting servicing quotes for the next 3 years..........

(Paraphrasing Churchill)

 

[MikeInWimbledon]

Not scrapped... just sold off, and then going into the second hand private car market.

Which is where the complaint of switching from diesel to EV falls down.

We're not switching from cars with a five year life to EV's with a three year life.

We're giving an enormous tax break on EV purchase over Fossil fuel. Obviously it's not "real" money,

it's "we're not going to take a huge bundle of tax off you" money

 

[MikeInWimbledon]

The best argument in favour of buying a BEV is 5 minutes spent on the Mercedes Benz website getting servicing quotes for the next 3 years..........

(Paraphrasing Churchill)

Don't forget the repair bills. Especially for diesel. Lorksamercy, there are a lot of urban low mileage diesel owners around with real horror stories of maintaining their Diesels.

On the other hand, the look of an MB BEV, and the driving experience is still a bit of an issue.

 

[markjay]

Don't forget the repair bills. Especially for diesel. Lorksamercy, there are a lot of urban low mileage diesel owners around with real horror stories of maintaining their Diesels.

On the other hand, the look of an MB BEV, and the driving experience is still a bit of an issue.

Korean car manufacturers always had long warranties (my 2010 Kia Diesel had 7 years warranty, my Hyundai IONIQ 5 has 5 years), and with Hyundai and Kia now becoming mainstream EV manufacturers, this will help overcome second hand buyers' worries.

I.e., in terms of potential repair costs, would you prefer a 3 years old Diesel Merc that's out of warranty, or a 3 years old EV with a couple of years of manufacturer's warranty still left on the car?

 

[ALFAitalia]

I think I've said this before.....but our bank at work refused to fund our new vehicles at work (all vans and pickups that are mainly used for towing).......Why?.....because we would not buy a certain % of them as EVs......They could not even provide a good reason why we should.....some nonsense about ethical banking. Solution?....we bought them via a car leasing company....not leased though. Banks loss.

 

[MikeInWimbledon]

I think I've said this before.....but our bank at work refused to fund our new vehicles at work (all vans and pickups that are mainly used for towing).......Why?.....because we would not buy a certain % of them as EVs......They could not even provide a good reason why we should.....some nonsense about ethical banking. Solution?....we bought them via a car leasing company....not leased though. Banks loss.

Bureaucracy.

 

[markjay]

I think I've said this before.....but our bank at work refused to fund our new vehicles at work (all vans and pickups that are mainly used for towing).......Why?.....because we would not buy a certain % of them as EVs......They could not even provide a good reason why we should.....some nonsense about ethical banking. Solution?....we bought them via a car leasing company....not leased though. Banks loss.

Banks don't seem to care. As [well known UK Politician] can testify.

 

[almichie]

Are you suggesting that the diesel is scrapped after five years, while the EV is scrapped after three?

Or that they just disappear in a puff of smoke?

Just that the company’s out there that suggest green credentials have a lot of cars built when they need not.

 

[Doodle]

Not scrapped... just sold off, and then going into the second hand private car market.

Or IME, sitting in a field for a year before being exported god knows where. So some other country's second hand market, in theory.

 

[clk320x]

It does seem that the most bothered people about EV values are those who don’t even own one.

 

[SmartAmg]

It does seem that the most bothered people about EV values are those who don’t even own one.

Totally agree.

 

[markjay]

Or IME, sitting in a field for a year before being exported god knows where. So some other country's second hand market, in theory.

Never heard of pre-registered UK cars being SORNed then exported and sold-off en-masse as second-hand in other countries, but you never know....