Codeweavers

Car Dealer Magazine has reported Finance and Leasing Association (FLA) statistics showing a drop in the level of Dealer finance penetration.

Apparently consumers bought 21 per cent fewer new and used cars using dealer finance in February 2009.  The FLA maintain that this shows the impact the recession is having on motor finance providers.
However Martin Hill, Sales & Marketing Director for Codeweavers, has evidence that this is not necessarily the full story....

'The drop in finance penetration will obviously be influenced by the current market - for instance, there will be some people that will withdraw savings to purchase a vehicle - largely due to the level of interest on their savings being reduced substantially in recent months. Also there are still one or two issues with availability of credit in general - although this can't really be used to explain falling Dealer finance penetration, as these customers are obviously finding credit lines somewhere.

All of the independent research shows that customers are using the web to research not just their vehicle purchase, but also the best way of funding that purchase. This means that there is a significant and growing population of customers that are contacting Dealers with their funding already in place. If this happens, then the Dealer invariably will try to convert the customer to Dealer finance but will be on the back foot from the start. Usually these sort of conversions result in negligible finance profit, as the main reason for using Dealer finance - Convenience - no longer applies as the customer already has their facility in place.'

Hill then goes on to explain:
'To attempt to capture more customers at the reserach stage, Codeweavers offer a facility called 'YourCarLoan', integrated within a Dealers website. It allows for REAL finance calculations from real Lenders to be presented to customers at this important research stage. Integrated with the vehicle stock pages, YourCarLoan allows the Dealer to control the sell out price of the finance and in that way make their stock more affordable using various funding options.
These funding options include HP, Lease Purchase and PCP - the residual value options are obviously making cars more affordable and are appealing to customers, as the FLA statistics show a 3% increase in penetration of the PCP product.'

There are many existing Codeweavers' Clients that have felt the tangible benefits of this exciting interactive content.

'There are success stories ranging from increases in finance penetration, more cars being sold at or near the screen price, and also major increases in the average time a customer will spend on a Dealer's website.' explains Martin Hill.

To find out more about how Codeweavers can make yvehicle stock more affordable, contact Martin Hill on 07872 033572 or e-mail martin.hill@codeweavers.net