Market Report - New second edition May 2010

I'm pleased, with this second Market Report, to bring you news of a much more confident and secure used car supercar sector. Readers of the original report from last year will note that, in many cases, rather than falling in value, many cars are worth more than last year!

What's going on? Surely this is against conventional used car wisdom, where older cars are worth less as they age? Well, ordinarily so - but 2008 and 2009 were far from ordinary years.

The UK was in the depths of recession and premium car values really did plunge as their core buying audience felt the pain of the contracting economy. Buyers were rushing to sell their six-figure motors fast, just to get the all important readies or get out of finance agreements and this had a big bearing on values in the marketplace. Now, though, confidence is returning. And, as you'll see from reading through the report and comparing to last year's, this has brought with it an appreciable improvement in the prices of most machines.

There are far fewer steals to be had! Most desperate sellers have either taken the pill and bailed out or had their car repossessed. Those that remain have been retained much longer than usual and are either costing much more in service and repairs, or have much pending work awaiting the next unsuspecting owner. So beware of the apparent bargains and have them checked out by an authorised repairer or quality independent inspector.

However at all key price points, some very attractive cars will now be in buyers' radars. Who fancies a Lamborghini Murcielago for less than £100,000 for example? Or a hyper-performance Porsche 911 Turbo for the £40,000 mark? Trading exclusive cars is now more of a rational proposition than it was last year, although there have been more buyers than sellers for certain cars. Buyers will spend a little more, but there's much more chance they'll get the car they want.

Finance remains a challenge for both buyers and sellers, with a lack of mainstream finance companies in the field. To assist in this area, I have taken the step of bringing in-house a respected finance broker to provide finance. If you wish to find out more please visit www.clivesutton.co.uk/finance. I have also added a section to this report to provide some background to the car finance market as it is currently.


I'm also keen to ensure that people don't spend over the odds! Yes, things have improved - but not to the extent some reckon. We have recently seen March's new car registrations up 26.5% to 397,383 vehicles with pent up demand enabled by the scrappage scheme and a raft of new models. However with the end of the scrappage stimulus, the introduction of the new showroom tax and the possible increases in taxation by the new coalition government I can understand consumers taking their foot off the gas a little while until the fiscal situation is clear. Perhaps we will see real incentives to turn to hybrids which will be in keeping with the new hybrid constitution. In that case Porsche better put into production the gorgeous new concept Porsche 918 hybrid that was revealed at Geneva in March. In the meantime, do read through my Market Report to see exactly what you should be spending on the cars of your dreams.

I hope you enjoy the read, and hope it helps!

Yours sincerely

Clive Sutton

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