There has been an upswing in the age and mileage of vehicles sold which highlights the scarcity of younger cars, says Dealer Auction.
In Q1 2023, the average mileage for a vehicle listed was 67,744 miles with an age of 8.7 years. In Q1 2024, average mileage was 72,832 with an age of 9.2 years.
Kieran TeeBoon, Dealer Auction’s marketplace director, said: “The statistics tell an interesting story about the continued scarcity of younger vehicles filtering into the used market.
“More than three million fewer vehicles than expected were registered in the UK between March 2020 and the end of 2023 and we’re now feeling the impact of that volume loss in the used market.”
TeeBoon suggested that averages have increased due to customers keeping cars for longer because of cost-of-living pressures and pricing. Uncertainty for fleets may also be caused by stock availability.
Over a quarter of a million bids were logged on Dealer Auction in Q1 which is a 19% increase on figures for Q4 2023, reflecting an active used car market.
Sales performance and days to sell were strong in Q1. The total number of auctions increased to 34,000, 1,000 more than the end of 2023. On average, cars took four days to sell while CAP clean performance rose by over 1% compared with Q4 2023.
Q1 also saw a 3% drop in the sale of diesels while hybrid sales increased 3% and EV sales dropped by around 2%.
TeeBoon said: “It’s been a largely positive start to 2024 with a considerable rise in the number of auctions ending and more than 253,000 bids placed. We saw a marked increase in vehicles listed and active buyers versus Q4 too.”
