Average New Car Price Could Crack $50,000 This Year According to Toyota

The average new car price is going to crack $50,000 and continue to climb at some point this year if the predictions of some top executives at Toyota North America are correct. According to Automotive News, they believe that demand will continue to outpace supply once again in 2023, and there could now be as many as 6 million potential new-car buyers stifled by inventory and pricing issues. Right now, the current new car price in the U.S. is $48,763, according to NPR. It’s actually a slight downtick, but it won’t last long.

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Jack Hollis, head of sales for Toyota North America, said he believes the automaker will finish the year the same way it started – with about 30,000 vehicles in inventory sitting on lots. That’s all because of strong consumer demand. “We will sell every vehicle that we can make,” he told Auto News.

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Hollis went on to say that if the headwinds the industry is currently facing weren’t there, the automotive industry as a whole would sell nearly 17 million vehicles in the U.S. in 2023. But, alas, they are there. He believes that number will end up around 2 million vehicles lower – at 15 million. That means, according to Hollis, that there are another 2 million vehicles added to pent-up demand, which now sits at about 6 million vehicles.

New cars aren’t the only place where prices will stay high, either. Hollis believes that used-vehicle demand will grow based on the fact people cannot afford new cars, an old trend. It’ll continue to keep values high.

“The only thing holding us back [as an industry] is the totality of the supply chain and the fragility of it, because we’re not back to normal anywhere globally,” Hollis told Automotive News.

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