FORT WORTH, Texas -

The National Automotive Finance Association released the results of its revamped invitation-only member survey this week during its 18th annual Non-Prime Auto Financing Conference. While the survey asked the 22 participating finance companies to complete questions about originations, marketing and servicing, the results showed nearly all survey contributors agreed on one thing — how much competition intensified during the past two years.

A total of 59 percent of surveyed companies indicated their competition appeared more aggressive in the subprime market in 2013 than it did a year earlier. Meanwhile, another 32 percent of participants believed competitors were much more aggressive year-over-year in 2013

When considering activity during 2012, the survey revealed a similar pattern. A total of 31 percent of participants thought the competition was more aggressive, while another 65 percent believe it was much more aggressive.

The NAF Association included metrics from the past two years in its latest study because officials took a one-year hiatus to revamp the survey process with their partner, BenchMark Consulting International. The association meshed together some of its long-standing analysis with new material provided by Experian Automotive.

The new product resulted in the NAF Association and its members being able to identify nearly a half dozen challenges that are either new or have been presented but intensified in the past couple of years.

To reinforce the validity of its process, orchestrators pointed out that 77 percent of companies that participated are repeat contributors. The total accounts for the 22 finance companies that completed the survey surpassed 1.2 million, up 5 percent from two years ago when the last survey was compiled. The outstanding balances within the portfolios of the participants exceeded $10 billion, up 10 percent from the previous installment.

The 22 finance companies that participated included:

—AFS Acceptance
—Anderson Brothers Bank
—Automobile Acceptance Corp.
—Chase Auto Finance
—Crescent Bank & Trust
—FIFSG/First Investors Financial Services
—Foursight
—Gateway Financial Solutions
—MarkOne Holdings
—MPH2 Funding
—Nationwide Acceptance Corp.
—PFS Corp.
—Prestige Financial Services
—Regional Acceptance Corp.
—Security National Automotive Acceptance
—Southern Auto Finance
—Summit Financial Corp.
—Tidewater Finance Co.
—Top Finance Co.
—Turner Acceptance
—United Finance
—Westlake Financial Services

Editor’s Note: For more details from the NAF Association’s annual survey, look for future reports in SubPrime News Update.