If you decided to go shopping for a car at any point since March last year, you’ll have endured a ‘unique’ experience to say the least. Even shopping for groceries during COVID-19 can prove problematic – attempting to pick up a new or used car brings all sorts of challenges into the mix.

But what some prospective buyers have found impossible to figure out is the way in which car prices fluctuated all over the place over the course of the past 12 months. Some new car prices plummeted, many used car prices skyrocketed and the whole thing became unpredictable to say the least.

So why is it that during a time of economic crisis it wasn’t uncommon to see elevated car prices? More importantly, when can we expect things to go back to normal – whatever ‘normal’ means from a post-lockdown perspective?

Public Transport Fears

Widespread reluctance to use public transport is thought to have contributed in a big way to used car price increases. For much of the pandemic, millions of people up and down the UK have either reduced their public transport use or altered it entirely. Among whom, many decided the time had come to pick up a cheap used car to keep them going for the time being. 

Demand for older and cheaper cars nobody would usually be bothered in suddenly spiked – as did prices as a result.

Fluctuating Exchange Rates

It’s also been a bit of a mixed bag with the dealership prices, which likewise have been up, down and all over the place.

In some instances, dealerships have been going to extreme lengths to clear inventory to compensate for poor sales. This has resulted in marked reductions on various end-of-line vehicles that have proved difficult to shift.

Elsewhere, however, fluctuating exchange rates (and the less than fantastic performance of the GBP) have resulted in some vehicle price increases. This is something that’s only set to continue during the early stages of Brexit at least, due to the heightened costs and complications of importing and exporting goods.

An Uncertain Outlook?

By the summer of 2020, we’d reached a point where it seemed like the immediate future at least was at least relatively predictable. We were through the worst of the COVID crisis and could look forward to safer and more stable times ahead.

Then came the second and third national lockdowns, which once again plunged the economy and the people of the UK into a state of abject chaos.

This in turn means that for the foreseeable future at least, nobody really knows what’s going to happen. Whether planning on picking up a car within the next few days or holding out until the summer, it’s in the hands of fate which way prices go between now and then.

Still, scrap values are performing pretty well, and it’s business as usual here at Take My Scrap Car. So if you’ve decided that the time has come to get rid of an old car that’s cramping your style, we’re standing by to take your call!

Contact TMSC anytime to discuss our COVID-safe approach to car scrapping and recycling in more detail.