David Thomas is director of content marketing and automotive industry analyst at CDK Global. He champions thought leadership across all platforms, connecting CDK’s vast expertise to the broader market and trends driving our industry forward. David has spent nearly 20 years in the automotive world as a product evaluator, journalist and marketer for brands like Autoblog, Cars.com, Nissan and Harley-Davidson.
Disruptions in inventory, whether it was due to stop sales, model year turnovers or even natural disasters, seem to have put a dent in the most recent Ease of Purchase score compiled by CDK.
The record witnessed with the CDK Ease of Purchase score in August wasn’t repeated in September despite higher inventory levels and even more people finding the cars they wanted in stock. That one factor, 76%, up from 72% in August, generally correlates to a higher overall Ease of Purchase score. But other factors seemed to be at odds, with buyers last month knocking the sky-high 93% of August down to just a very, very good 89%.
CDK has tracked how easy car buyers say it is to purchase a car for over two years. Last month saw the highest score for the metric to date. More than nine out of 10 respondents (93%) said it was easy to buy a new car in August compared to 88% in July and 82% in August of 2023.
In the 2024 CDK Dealership Workplace Study, respondents told us how satisfied they were with their jobs and benefits. And while nearly three out of four were satisfied with their jobs, nearly a third still plan to leave their jobs in the next six months.
May was the second month in a row where 87% of car buyers CDK’s Research Team surveyed said buying their new car was easy. This plateau of pleasantness comes despite the need to visit more dealerships to find the car they wanted notwithstanding inventory levels that are relatively high. Yet, even though the number of shoppers having to visit two or more stores rose to 70% in May from 64% in April, four out of five (79%) said finding the car they wanted was easy.
CDK recently released the Dealers Face the EV Transition white paper, which details the pessimism many dealers feel about the electric future. A clear majority (65%) indeed admit to being pessimistic about EVs, and the paper delves into many of the reasons behind that number including the impact to the dealership’s revenue, consumer interest and more.
Car buyers still found it overwhelmingly easy to buy a new car in April but there was a slight drop in the ability to find what they were looking for on dealer lots. The overall Ease of Purchase score — determined from a monthly CDK survey — actually ticked up to 87% in April from 86% in March, just off February’s record high of 88%.
In February, the tracking CDK does of new car buyers returned its most positive results to date with nearly nine out of 10 (88%) respondents saying the purchase process was easy. Having moved the bar so high it’s no surprise that in March there was a dip to a still very high score of 86% for the Ease of Purchase scorecard.
Despite hurdles when it comes to affordability, more car buyers said it was easy to complete their purchase in February than at any time since CDK started tracking that question in July 2022. All told, 88% of buyers said it was easy to buy their car in February, up from 84% in January and 85% in February 2023.
Although 2024 is shaping up to be a buyer’s market, new and used vehicles continue to be painfully expensive for many. That’s why the trend of Americans keeping their cars longer than ever seems poised to continue. It’s typically more cost-effective to fix an older vehicle than spring for a purchase, which should be a driver to service providers. So, where and why are these drivers turning for service and maintenance?
