May Car Sales Return To Pre-Recession Levels
Source: WWJ / CBS
DETROIT (WWJ) - Good weather and a strong Memorial Day weekend helped car buyers ignore reports of recalls, pushing car and truck sales up more than ten percent in May.
Im totally flabbergasted, said George Magliano, senior auto economist at IHS Automotive. Theyve beat my expectations, but I was conservative. Theyve beat everybodys. Thats the way its shaping up.
The SAAR (Seasonally Adjusted Annual Sales Rate) is expected to come in between 16.5 and 17 million, returning the industry to rates that were seen before the recession.
Auto sales for the month of May seemed almost to defy logic, said Kelley Blue Book analyst Jack Nerad. In a month that included dismal consumer confidence scores and the announcement that the American economy as a whole had actually contracted in the first quarter, auto sales were very robust. General Motors sales results epitomized that trend of defying logic. GM announced a near-record number of recalls during May, yet it turned in its best monthly sales since August 2008, the last month before the financial meltdown that triggered the Great Recession.
Read more: http://detroit.cbslocal.com/2014/06/03/may-car-sales-head-back-to-pre-recession-levels/
Omaha Steve
(99,070 posts)At least buy a car built in the USA. Jobs, jobs, jobs.
Even with my recalled Chevy Cobalt, we are sticking to the BIG 3.
OS
Purveyor
(29,876 posts)donco
(1,548 posts)considering the bad press GM is/has been getting.
Morganfleeman
(117 posts)Given that subprime auto loans are driving auto sales. A third of auto loans sold to investors now are subprime. That percentage is nearly double what it was 5 years ago. GM just issued 1.4 billion in subprime auto debt. This kind if growth is not sustainably given that loans to poor credit are such a sizeable portion of today's originations. We've seen this movie before with housing. Same problem, but different asset class.
NEOhiodemocrat
(912 posts)Newest car our family owned was a 2009 Cobalt, which was recalled, but it is actually our daughter's and she is graduating in December with her masters so thought it was time to get our-self a new car for me before she drives off in hers! Luckily for us she lives inner city so hasn't had to use it (hence me taking it over). So now we are the owners of a 2014 GM Equinox, which I love! I wouldn't buy anything but an American car, my husband and three brothers are all retired from GM...have to contribute to those retirement checks.
whatthehey
(3,660 posts)Almost one month in and we have used gas on only one trip so far.
BumRushDaShow
(127,305 posts)Have bought only American cars and the latest is just over a month old now.
voteearlyvoteoften
(1,716 posts)Figure to save 10 thousand in fuel over 100.000 miles @ 3.50 gas.