Yeah during the pandemic used dealers would just throw dirty ass auction vehicles on the lot for big bucks.
This wasn't just through the pandemic; used vehicles have always been a hit/miss condition-wise depending on the store. And this doesn't just apply to franchise stores vs. independents either; I've seen plenty of "certified pre-owned" models at franchise locations that look like a pigsty.
Ours are detailed in-house before going onto the lot and for the most part safety-able, but if a particular unit needs tires or brakes, we'll often wait until a firm deal is had before spending the money on it. If the vehicle goes stale after a few weeks/months and we end up wholesaling it, the car's leaving as-is to another dealer so we wouldn't put any certification costs into it at all.
That said, the one thing I have to add to ArcticSteve's rants about dealers retailing your trade are that the online auction platform was short-lived. We haven't had very good results on it at any of my locations in the past few months. We always call committed wholesalers and shop a number. Once we have a number, we pack in a little bit of profit and offer the selling customer a fair number based on that. If the unit doesn't sell retail (and many, many of our units never see retail), the wholesaler will take the vehicle and we wipe our hands clean of it. We provide a couple of photos, any obvious disclosures, a VIN and mileage. We pull our own Carfax reports too to ensure that we don't just take a customer's word on "oh yeah it's clean, never been hit!".
