“Stand like lead in the trade”
The price decline for used electric cars continues
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Buyers of used electric cars can currently find bargains. But there aren't many interested parties and the dealers can't get rid of the vehicles. According to experts, used SUVs in particular are a problem.
According to an analysis by the management consultancy Berylls, used electric cars are very difficult to sell and can be sold at high discounts. An average battery car (BEV) with a new price of 43,600 euros currently costs 18,800 euros after three years with 60,000 kilometers of mileage and has therefore lost 57 percent of its value. There is no change in sight: “Young used BEVs are on the market like lead, the service life is increasing and residual values are in free fall,” said the industry experts in Munich.
The reasons for the price drop are, on the one hand, the stagnating demand for electric cars in general. On the other hand, new models with more range and at lower prices would come onto the market. This makes reselling used electric cars hardly possible, not just in Germany. Residual values are also on the way down in France and Great Britain. In addition, many used electric cars are large, expensive SUVs and are uninteresting for many used buyers.
Industry experts calculated a total residual value loss of almost three billion euros for the 524,000 newly registered electric cars in Germany last year. They see “hardly any hope for the current BEV generation on the used car market. All that can be done here is to minimize the immense losses.”
Car manufacturers, dealers and leasing companies that have e-cars on their books would therefore have to change their sales model: They should not sell the e-cars, but rather hold them and lease them to drivers as a second or third hand or rent them out on a subscription basis. Not only would this cushion their losses, they would also retain control over the valuable battery materials: an enormous advantage for car manufacturers in order to meet the legally required recycling quotas for battery production.
