March Sales Uptick Closes Out Strong First Quarter, Edmunds Forecasts

Staff Report

Friday, March 30th, 2018

Edmunds, the leading car shopping and information platform, forecasts that 1,597,256 new cars and trucks will be sold in the U.S. in March for an estimated seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) of 16.9 million. This reflects a 23.2 percent increase in sales from February 2018 and a 3.0 percent increase from March 2017.  

"Healthy first-quarter numbers indicate the industry is on solid ground, but that doesn't mean we can expect another banner year for new car sales," said Jessica Caldwell, Edmunds executive director of industry analysis. "Though March tends to be a prognosticator for the year as a whole, if automakers remain disciplined with incentives and further rein in spending, we could potentially see sales start to tumble in the high-volume summer months when shoppers aren't seeing the deals they are looking for."

 

SALES VOLUME FORECAST, BY MANUFACTURER

Sales
Volume

March 2018
Forecast

March
2017

February
2018

Change from
March 2017

Change from
February 2018

GM

265,570

256,224

220,905

3.6%

20.2%

Ford

241,438

234,895

193,362

2.8%

24.9%

Toyota

225,727

215,224

182,195

4.9%

23.9%

Fiat Chrysler

196,477

190,254

165,903

3.3%

18.4%

Nissan

167,596

168,832

129,930

-0.7%

29.0%

Honda

142,552

137,227

115,557

3.9%

23.4%

Hyundai/Kia

109,891

118,694

86,767

-7.4%

26.7%

VW/Audi

52,044

46,340

42,111

12.3%

23.6%

Industry

1,597,256

1,549,991

1,296,840

3.0%

23.2%

*NOTE: March 2018 had 28 selling days, March 2017 had 27, and February 2018 had 24.

Edmunds estimates that retail SAAR will come in at 13.3 million vehicles in March 2018, with fleet transactions accounting for 21.4 percent of total sales. An estimated 3.7 million used vehicles will be sold in March 2018, for a SAAR of 39.3 million (compared to 3.5 million or a SAAR of 39.1 million in February).

 

MARKET SHARE FORECAST, BY MANUFACTURER

Market
Share

March 2018
Forecast

March
2017

February
2018

Change from
March 2017

Change from
February 2018

GM

16.6%

16.5%

17.0%

0.1%

-0.4%

Ford

15.1%

15.2%

14.9%

0.0%

0.2%

Toyota

14.1%

13.9%

14.0%

0.2%

0.1%

Fiat Chrysler

12.3%

12.3%

12.8%

0.0%

-0.5%

Nissan

10.5%

10.9%

10.0%

-0.4%

0.5%

Honda

8.9%

8.9%

8.9%

0.1%

0.0%

Hyundai/Kia

6.9%

7.7%

6.7%

-0.8%

0.2%

VW/Audi

3.3%

3.0%

3.2%

0.3%

0.0%