“If I'm a dealer today, and I'm holding on to a bunch of used inventory, I would probably be looking at making sure I have the right balance or less.. I would be hedging my bets to the negative a bit,” notes National Powersport Auctions CEO Jim Woodruff. Dealernews had an in-depth conversation with Woodruff to find out what is going on with the values of motorcycles… and where do we go from here? “The reason I would hedge my bet and liquidate some bikes is because I believe pre-owned inventory will be easy to get in the spring. It might be a little bit more expensive, but you're going to be able to get it whether it's the auction process or through other methods.
So if you do end up hedging a little bit too much, and you're a little shy of what you need, you can get more, it's not going to be a problem,” he explains. “But if you go into it heavy, and you end up with extra inventory going into next summer, I don’t think you’re going to be happy about that situation… You're probably going to be hanging onto stuff that you paid too much for that you're not going to be able to get rid of at that point. Bikes bought in September will not be worth more than they were next spring… and could be worth substantially less… so I would go into the spring leaner for sure.”