Ally Financial Inc. and the monthly used leasing startup Fair have formed a strategic relationship that will allow the bank to provide its dealer partners a new form of financing and gives Fair access to remarketing tools and national scale.
Fair offers consumers flexible used-lease vehicle subscriptions that bundles in maintenance and allows consumers to turn in their car and swap it for another model. Through this newly formed relationship, when subscribers turn their vehicle back into the dealership, the dealer will be given the opportunity to buy back the vehicle from Fair or sell it on Ally’s SmartAuction platform.
In this way, Fair never holds stagnant inventory — vehicles are always generating a revenue stream or being sent to the auction to be sold, Scott Painter founder of Fair told Auto Finance News.
“Ally is a really powerful enabler for what we do,” Painter told AFN. “We’re very unique in the sense that this is not [a financial product] that Ally is doing, and so it offers their dealers yet another way to get a customer on the road.”
Dealers using Fair in California will be able to start using the SmartAuction platform this month, and the program will expand to 14 markets nationwide this year, Painter added.
The strategic relationship also includes adding Fair’s used leasing offers to Ally’s Clearlane marketplace. Ally is still in the “formative” stages of figuring out the right algorithm that will present the ideal financing offers to credit worthy consumers shopping on the platform, Ally’s President of Auto Finance Tim Russi, told AFN.
“They have an innovative product and we think the Clearlane marketplace of solutions is going to be interested in having that product,” Russi said. “We’ll go through tests and learn what works best, but as we offer up the options consumers will say, ‘Yes I’m interested in learning more about this,’ and we’ll serve up those solutions.”
Fair partnered with Uber earlier this year to provide flexible financing solutions for drivers on the ride-hailing platform. This alliance with Ally will help Fair reach national scale to serve those Uber drivers, Painter said.
“SmartAuction will be an important remarketing channel for Fair, while Clearlane will serve as the ultimate win-win for dealers and customers alike,” Painter said in a press release. “Combined, these two programs are just the beginning of what we can accomplish with Ally as we broaden our relationship going forward.”