Dealer Specialties and LotVantage recently partnered to examine how dealers’ Used Vehicle inventory performed when utilizing SmartListing, an automated Craigslist posting solution, provided by Dealer Specialties.

The study reviewed over 241,000 used vehicles listed for sale between January and December 2016. Results showed that the 128,833 used vehicles listed on Craigslist sold in 39 days on average. Conversely, the 122,495 used vehicles that did not take advantage of SmartListing remained on the dealers’ lots for an additional 10 days. Given that dealers, on average, spend an additional $36 each day that a vehicle remains on their lot, that’s $360 per vehicle- wasted!*

With used inventory growing, it remains critical for dealers to focus even more on their turn time and profit per day.

With used inventory growing, it remains critical for dealers to focus even more on their turn time and profit per day. Dealers understand that moving inventory faster, with limited floor planning and space on the lot, makes every day important.

Learn how you can enjoy automated posting & faster inventory turn!

Turning a vehicle 10 days faster results in more profit – let’s do the math.

We’ll assume the average used car results in $1,500 in front end revenue. Based on our findings that cars listed on Craigslist turn 10 days faster a month, a Craigslist posted vehicle makes $4 more profit a day. Might not sound like a lot, but when the average dealer has 70 units of used inventory on their lot, that’s ($4 x 30 days/mo, x 12 months = $1,440). That means EACH used vehicle posted on Craigslist generates the same amount of profit as if your dealership were to make one extra sale/year! Posting all of your used inventory on Craigslist means that, on average, dealers could generate $105,000 in profit, or the equivalent of selling 6 more cars a month. This doesn’t even account for backend profit or trade ins.

For more information about how SmartListing can help simplify vehicle sales on Craigslist, click here.

*NADA and NCM