The market of used cars in St. Petersburg is fundamentally slipping. 47news found out about the reasons and looked at what was left.
The St. Petersburg car market suddenly became poor in offers. 47news was convinced of this, on July 14, solving the problem of selecting a not very used car with a clean history. The financial framework was limited to 1,000,000 rubles. Firstly, the figure is beautiful, and secondly, it is more or less liftable for an average person who decides to change from public transport to driving.
“There is a feeling that the owners, who used to actively buy and sell cars, are now in no hurry and are guided by the principle “you can drive a five-year-old car for another year or two,” a friend from St. Petersburg shared with 47news, who has been scrupulously looking for her first auto.
Applying only a filter and limiting the search boundaries to St. Petersburg and the Leningrad region, we received 145 offers from Moskvich, which caught the end of the 1980s, to the Range Rover of the early 2000s. Fans of exotic – 12-year-old Jeep and Subaru variants with their boxer engines.
From the entire list of relatively fresh (2019-2022 release years) – a damn dozen for the entire five million metropolis. The same “Skoda Rapid” and “Volkswagen Polo” with mileage from 60 to 100 thousand kilometers, more recently the budget “Kia Rio”, “Hyundai Solaris”, “Renault Dusters” and “Logans”. If you need less wear, take a closer look at the domestic models Lada Vesta or Largus. For comparison, three years ago, the amount was enough for a Skoda Rapid in a configuration slightly higher than the basic one: with automatic transmission, air conditioning, a leather steering wheel, a good audio system and rear parking sensors.
47news shared his experience with car market experts. They have about the same emotions, but seasoned with arguments.
– Ads on the market of used cars really became less, back in March-April the choice was wider. The number of offers decreases because there are no buyers. Dealers have the same situation: there are no supplies, one or two Toyota Land Cruisers are sold per month for 18-20 million, – said one of the experienced players in the car market.
– And it feeds the entire sales department?
– I’ll tell you more: both the sales department, and the insurance department, and post-warranty service.
In the spring, 47news already fixed the trend: the numbers in the price tags for used cars were rapidly approaching the cost of new ones. Behind that jump, traders saw the policy of large dealers, who filled warehouses in anticipation of a shortage and raised prices to space. The interlocutors predicted that if appetites were not reduced, sales would begin to slip. This is what happened in April..
– Those who wanted to update the car, put up for a high price to buy a neighbor’s car. Accordingly, those proposals were not endless, – one of the sellers laid out the situation on the fingers. – Prices jumped sharply in mid-April, and now sales have stopped.
Another used car sales expert suggested that 47news immediately raise the bar.
– If we are talking about an abstract piece of metal on four wheels – this is one thing. If about a car that you can ride and not worry about anything, then something more or less alive costs two and a half – three million, – he outlined the order. – For now, you can forget about everything inexpensive and imported. It remains for a simple buyer to closely monitor specialized sites with ads. Naturally, filter offers by price and number of owners and wait until a suitable one appears. This may take a month, or maybe two.
Logic suggests that in the current disposition, potential buyers will pay attention to offers abroad. Colleagues from Fontanka have already asked the price of the Finnish car market. There, “Volkswagen”, “Kia” and other popular models in terms of rubles cost less than a million, but the difference is leveled by duties.
– Also, do not forget that no one will register cars of an ecological class below Euro-4. They simply won’t go through Russian customs and are only suitable for resale to Georgia or Armenia. If you pay attention, Teslas are mainly brought from Belarus. If there was a rush at the borders and massive concentrations of haulers, I would be the first to tell you, – one of the experienced interlocutors concluded.
According to Avtostat analysts, in the first half of 2022, sales of new cars fell by 56 percent compared to the same period last year. For six months, 321.1 thousand cars were sold. 91.2% accounted for passenger cars of the mass segment.
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