Used Car Prices

[Lesbest]

We all know what the "Cash for Clunkers" did for the used car market, and what a failure it was. BUT, I was at a customers' yard this past week to work on a piece of their equipment, and I saw cars going thru the recycling (dis-assembly) process that had stickers in the window.

Right now the yard recycles between 200 to 220 cars a WEEK. The buying public is competing for the same cars, we want to drive them, they need them for parts. This yard has over 500 employees. They bring in the car and evaluate it , determine what will be used off of it, and start a folder. Everyone that touches the car signs off on their participation. The car then goes out to a marshaling yard and awaits it's turn, or if they need parts now it goes into line.

They drain ALL fluids, the gas is used in the company delivery trucks, the oil is recycled, the coolant is sent to a recycler, the refrigerant is put into new 50 lb. tanks and sent to be recycled. The batteries are tested, failures go to a recycler, pass go to a vendor, all tires are removed from the wheels, ALL tires go to 2 vendors and they grade and sell the good ones, recycle the bad ones. The wheels are graded and go to stock, refirb, scrap.

Drive-line is removed and sold a unit, or engine alone, or trans alone, or scraped. All pieces are on new pallets, pressure washed and put in pallet shelves....50 feet high, 9 rows high, and I couldn't count how many wide or deep, LOTS. The exhaust may be removed complete or the convertors cut off and recycled.

Doors have interior panels removed, and recycled, doors go into inventory. Bodies are sectioned as needed, all bumper covers are either sold or recycled.

Calipers are sent to rebuilders as cores, master cyl. the same.

The tech. that de-fluids the car does between 30-35 cars a day.

It is an amazing business, lots of tow-motors moving around, cars going in, parts coming out. They sell to body shops the traditional way, they have an Ebay sales dept.
They are paying high prices for cars now (against you and me), but when winter comes and we start bending them the cost goes down. Like Wall Street, but here you can see what you are trading in.

The car with the sticker......Late model Mitsubishi Eclipse V6 Turbo?, bought off used car lot, or auction. Engine $4,000-5,000. No body damage, so all the panels will go for body shops, etc., etc., etc. The car is worth more in pieces than all together. What doesn't make the parts cut becomes a washer, or refrigerator, or whatever.

They have over 800 locations nationwide, not all this big of course, but part of the reason used car prices are so high.

Les

[working on it]

Very informative...a chop-shop operation gone corporate. That's part of the reason it's really hard to score a good parts find in the wild anymore; the "big guys" computerized macro scaled junk yards have got the edge on the occasional parts hunter. But then again, if you need a documented "good" part fast...there you go. Not all bad.

[mikeschn]

Pretty soon there won't be any used cars on the market to buy parts for. Everyone will be forced to drive relatively new cars. Then this huge inventory of old car parts will just sit and collect dust.

Mike...

[wagondude]

If they sit too long, they will just scrap them and take the recycling money for them. Got to clear out the racks for the new stuff coming in. Some money is better than inventory just sitting on the racks. Then the recycled stuff goes to china to make inferior new replacement parts.

[Corwin C]

Locally there are several guys that drive around, and look for vehicles that have weeds grown up around them or obviously haven't been moved in a while. They knock on the door and offer $$$ to take it off your hands. If you sell, they either flip it if it's in good condition or needs minor repairs. Or they recycle them for parts if they're in rough condition. Can't blame a guy for taking it upon themselves to make a buck in this economy.

I sold them an '85 Mazda 626 with 350k miles for $500 ... found out later that they got $200 for the custom alloy rims and $350 for the engine/trans-axle ... don't know about the rest of it, but apparently they made a buck on it after all ...