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Auto sales up in July, but still well below pre-pandemic level

Published on 11 Comments on Auto sales up in July, but still well below pre-pandemic level

Here's a bonus chart from today's retail sales report. Sales of cars were up slightly, but still aren't close to their pre-pandemic level:

Vehicle purchases have been increasing since late 2021 but are still about 6% below their pre-pandemic level.

11 thoughts on “Auto sales up in July, but still well below pre-pandemic level”

  1. illilillili

    For this kind of chart, it would be nice to see 20+ years of data. Since a car lifetime is on the order of 20 years, maybe 15ish years ago around 2008 there was some sort of event that made people less likely to trade in their 15-year old cars for new cars this year. https: //en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Car_Allowance_Rebate_System

    1. ArmaniOlivia

      I have my first check for $13,000. I have a lot of energy so I always have something first. a11 Now I’m going to work a lot harder and barely finish next week’s episode. q I strongly encourage everyone to sign up. .
      periods,……………………. http://bizpay68.blogspot.com

  2. erick

    I wonder how many people are like me.

    I have a 2015 car that is perfectly fine, has decent resale value and normally I’d be thinking about getting a new car. But I’m waiting because I figure the transition to electric is really going to take off in the late 2020s, the classic things happen slowly then all at once. So I don’t think it makes sense to buy another ICE car and since mine will be fine for another 5 years easily I’ll wait for there to be a lot more electric options, I’ll probably get a new car in 2027 or 2028 most likely

  3. tomtheelder

    Is supply still low - and therefore prices still high? Last October I paid MSRP+$5k because the Toyota I wanted was very hard to find. Another dealer asked MSRP+$17k for the same model. My dealership still has few new vehicles on its lot.

    1. Steve_OH

      Supplies are still low. I'm in the process of buying a 2023 Toyota Prius Prime, and I had to use a spreadsheet that updates its data daily from a Toyota API to locate (and quickly snap up) a vehicle that had the options I was looking for and was allocated to a dealer not too terribly far away (for whatever reason, the cars are currently being allocated almost exclusively to dealers in coastal states; production started early this year, but there are still fewer than 10 Prius Primes that have been allocated to dealers in Ohio).

      Anyway, "my" car has been built and is on a ship scheduled to arrive in port the second week of September, and be at the dealer in MD before the end of the month. My wife and I will fly out to BWI, rent a car for the two-hour drive to the dealer, pick up the car, drive both cars back to BWI, then drive the new Prius back home to Ohio.

  4. Wichitawstraw

    Talk to anyone trying to buy an EV. Most have long wait lists and now they are requiring you trade in your current vehicle. I'm hoping my 150k gas car lasts long enough for me to buy a hybrid plug in - where I won't have to take whatever cars come in to the dealer that week.

  5. climatemusings

    If you showed $ spent on vehicles (inflation adjusted, of course!) we could diagnose whether this is a supply or demand driven drop…

  6. cmayo

    OK, so what?

    Annual vehicle miles driven is still below 2019-20 levels (3.26 trillion miles compared to 3.28), and from 2010 to 2019 it was increasing at about 0.04 to 0.05 trillion miles per year. So we're about 3%-4% below trendline on number of miles driven as well.

    So... people are driving less than they would have been, so of course car purchases are less than they would have been under pre-pandemic trends.

  7. golack

    Manufacturers saw that the supply chain problem let the raise prices and get that plus some--no large rebates to move product.....so why make much more product? Save money on production and rake in profits.

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