Used EV Prices in Freefall

Dealers may want to think twice before they acquire used electric vehicles.

A study by iSeeCars shows that prices are again in freefall. While electric vehicle values appeared to stabilize at the end of 2023, average prices of 1- to 5-year-old EVs dropped from $33,275 to $30,904 between January and February 2024. That same month, used gasoline-car prices only fell by about $520 (from $31,689 to $31,169).

“It’s that disparity in price drops over the past year that has pulled used-EV values below used-gasoline values,” Karl Brauer, executive analyst at iSeeCars, tells WardsAuto. “Dealers need to keep the ongoing drop in used EV prices in mind when acquiring them because they don’t seem to have hit bottom yet. Dealers should assume they may have to continue discounting used EVs aggressively to find buyers.”

These prices show a major turnaround from a year ago, when the average used EV cost $40,783 and the average used gas car cost $33,469, reports iSeeCars.

Demand for used gas cars grew during the new-car production shortages brought on by the pandemic. This demand pressure is slowly easing, but with used prices hovering around $31,000, they remain well above pre-pandemic levels.
“There’s no denying the crash in used electric vehicle values over the past year,” says Brauer. “We’ve watched EV prices fall between 30 and 40 percent since June of last year, while the average gas car’s price has dropped by just 3 to 7 percent in that same timeframe.”

The iSeeCars study analyzed over 2.2 million 1- to 5-year-old used cars sold in May 2023 and 2024 and found the average used EV price was down 29.5% year-over-year versus 6.1% for the average used gas car price. In May 2024, the average used electric vehicle was priced at $28,767, or 8.3% below the average gas car at $31,424.

“Over the past year the average used price for traditional internal-combustion-engine vehicles has shifted by no more than 7 percent, with prices most months changing between 3 and 6 percent,” says Brauer. “This is in stark contrast to the 30 to 40 percent drops in used EV pricing.”

See the iSeeCars charts below for more details.