The BEA released their estimate of light vehicle sales for November this morning. The BEA estimates sales of 15.55 million SAAR in November 2020 (Seasonally Adjusted Annual Rate), down 4.5% from the October sales rate, and down 8.4% from November 2019.
Click on graph for larger image.
This graph shows light vehicle sales since 2006 from the BEA (blue) and the BEA’s estimate for November (red).
The impact of COVID-19 was significant, and April was the worst month.
Since April, sales have increased, but are still down 8.4% from last year.
The second graph shows light vehicle sales since the BEA started keeping data in 1967.
Note: dashed line is current estimated sales rate of 15.55 million SAAR.
In 2019, there were 15.92 million light vehicle sales through November. In 2020, there have been 13.20 million sales. That puts sales-to-date down 17.1% in 2020 compared to the same period in 2019.