Thursday 30th November 1933

The N.A.D.A. Official Used Car Guide, carrying the U.S. government’s endorsement as the nation’s authority on used-car prices was published. About 40,000 copies were printed and mailed to subscribers in December 1933. The first issue was 388 pages, published for 21 regions. Interest in used-car values was high for two reasons. One, after debating for years how to handle trade-ins, dealers finally began applying trade-in values toward new-car down payments. Two, used cars outsold new cars. At the end of World War I, sales of used cars were about half as numerous as new-car sales. But from the 1920s through the 1950s, used-car sales consistently exceeded franchised new-car sales.