Second hand car prices have been on a roller coaster ride with the impact of COVID, semi conductor shortages and geo political instabilities.

Tanim Ahmed is Head of Business Intelligence & Product at Datium Insights which provide industry information particularly on the price of second hand cars.

He summariesed the fluctuations since 2019

So prices increased for about to about one and a half, two years, and it peaked around March, April last year where prices were about 50% higher than where they were pre-COVID. So an average $10,000 car, you're going to look at spending 15,000. This is a massive, massive increase. And that's something that's been, you know, consistent with overseas markets as well. So if you look at the US, if you look at Europe, the UK, they experienced very similar trends, very strong price growth even over very New Zealand. Price growth wasn't as strong, but it was just very similar trend. However, since March, April last year, that trend has reversed.

Currently second hand prices are around 40% higher than the beginning of 2020 and are not predicted to get all the way back to the pre COVID levels