Used Car Prices Climbing

Used Car Prices Climbing
November 13, 2009 06:28 AM

So much for used cars being a bargain. Previously-owned vehicles have shot up in price, and the popular "cash for clunkers" program may be partially to blame.

While the program gave local car dealerships a big boost this summer, it also took thousands of well-running, used vehicles off the market permanently. The government required dealers to destroy all vehicles traded in for the $3,500-$4,500 credit.

"I suspected it was going to have this effect. I didn't realize how big of an effect it was going to have," Said Vince Consentino, owner of T&K Auto Sales in Tonawanda.

Like used car dealers across the county, Consentino has had to raise prices dramatically compared to a year ago. According to Edmunds.com used vehicles cost 16% more than they did a year ago. For previously-owned trucks and SUVs, the prices has climbed more than 25 percent.

And in a year when used cars already were in short supply because of the bad economy, some believe "cash for clunkers" made the problem even worse and the prices even higher.

REPORTER: Which customers, in particular, do you feel have been harmed the most by the cash for clunkers program?

CONSENTINO: Everybody knows somebody in their neighborhood who holds down two jobs -- maybe a single mother or a single father, or a family, a young family... Those are the people hurt most. The ones that could ill afford the extra money they're going to have to put out for a car, or who are going to buy a car that is a substandard product and then pour maintenance money into the car.

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