Here’s an interesting article from CUNA, the credit union trade group.
The story in a nutshell: The South Carolina Department of Motor Vehicles shut down an informal car sale site that happened to be located at a local credit union. The reason: Used-car dealers in the area complained that they were losing business.
Apparently, the sale had been happening for years. Every weekend, people would slap contact info onto their cars, boats, motorcycles, and RVs, then park them on the lot of the SRP Federal Credit Union. Granted, the location has become something of a mini-dealership, with 50 to 75 vehicles per weekend. But why should dealers assume that they would be getting the sales otherwise? And on the contrary, maybe the weekly credit union event spurs dealership sales. Potential car buyers look around on the credit union lot and don’t find what they’re looking for, so they head over to the local dealership.
In an industry so much in need of even minimal activity, it seems that this move by the DMV is a step in the wrong direction.
