As of right now I dont think I will ever buy a new car. I would prob wait until it is 1-2 years old, has a few thousand miles on it and drops in price, then pick it up used.

Now my question, do car companies give a rats *** what I think about their cars since they wont make any money off me. Or are they still going to ask for my opinion and thoughts on cars.

Here is an example I just pulled out of my butt..
Lets say Chevy is having a "car clinic" with the new Camaro. And lets say there are 10 people there the give their opinions. 5 of them always buy new cars, and 5 of them buy used cars (me being one of them). Now the 5 "new car" guys like the car, and the 5 "used car" guys hate that car.

What does Chevy do? Do they send it through as is, cuz they know they will sell them all new, or do they change something cuz they wont sell them used?

Do car companies care about used car sales?

 

They care very much. Most dealerships make very little money from new cars. Used cars is how they make their money. Car makers need car dealers to stay in business.

Car makers care about resale value, because that's what sells new cars. Honda and Toyota sell new cars because buyers know they can trade in or sell in 3 yrs w/o taking a huge hit. Whereas personally I'd never buy a new GM car unless I planned to keep it until the wheels fell off, because they depreciate a lot more.

Caterpillar, the equipment manufacturer, actually has an active buy back program where they go around the country buying up used equipment in order to keep the used supplies low so demand will spill over into new equipment. Keeps their new sales active and keep the used equipment resale higher, which further incentivizes buyers to go ahead and buy new.

Now, GM can't do that because there's so many used cars out there it would cost trillions, but the same concepts can be implemented through other means.

 

Not to mention Certified used cars bring in revenue to the companies and give a better image as a whole to the used car market of each manufacture.

BTW, GM sold more Certified used cars than any other manufacture last year, eclipsing Toyota.

 

Does that revenue go to the manufacture or the car dealer?

 

Also, the better the resale value of a certain model, they better lease rates that the manufacturer can generally offer on a brand new one...

With a higher residual value, the lease payments go down.

 

It's costs money for a dealer to Certify a used car. So the manufacture does benefit from the certification. But, obviously, the dealer has a better and now more unique vehicle to sell also with a longer warranty, so they benefit from it as well.