The average new car takes about 47 days to sell, but these days a $175,000 Mercedes SUV is flying off the shelves faster than toilet paper in a pandemic.
With a global semiconductor chip shortage and fallout from 2020 shutdowns, new car inventory decreased by 15.7% in May compared with April, and used car prices have increased by 6.3%, according to car search engine iSeeCars, which analyzed which vehicles are in the biggest demand.
The chip shortage has forced car makers to either idle production of vehicles or adapt in other ways: Nissan, (NSANY) for example, is leaving navigation systems out of thousands of vehicles and Peugot is going back to old-fashioned analog speedometers for one model, Bloomberg reported. And Tesla (TSLA) – Get Report is trying to secure its own stash of semiconductor chips in an effort to keep production going.
The total supply of available unsold new vehicles in the U.S. was 1.78 million units near the end of May, down from 2.24 million a month earlier, according to Cox Automotive. The decline in the days’ supply was even greater, falling to a record-low 35 days supply from 44 a month earlier. Days’ supply near the end of May was 67% below the same period a year ago, Cox reports.
The fastest-selling new car during the month of May was the Mercedes Benz G-Class, which sells for around $175,000 in less than 10 days on average, according to an analysis by iSeeCars, which looked at 1.3 million new and used cars sold in May 2021. The starting price for the G-Class is $131,750.
To find the fastest selling cars, the number of days that each car was listed for sale on iSeeCars.com was aggregated at the model level, and the average days on market for each was mathematically modeled. Among used cars, (model years 2016-2020) the Mazda MX-5 Miata sold in 19.5 days, topping a list dominated by sports cars and alternative fuel vehicles.
Based on the iSeeCars analysis, these are the hottest new and used cars on the market, (excluding heavy-duty vehicles, models no longer in production before the 2021 model year, and low-volume models.)
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