TrueCar.com Forecasts New and Used Auto Sales and Incentives Spending for November

SANTA MONICA, Calif., Nov. 23, 2010 /PRNewswire/ -- TrueCar.com, the authority on new car pricing, today released its November 2010 sales and incentives forecast.  The forecast shows the following:

• New light vehicle sales (including fleet) in the U.S. for November 2010 is expected to be 868,283 units, up 16 percent from November 2009 and a decrease of almost 9 percent from October 2010 (on an unadjusted basis)
• The November 2010 forecast translates into a Seasonally Adjusted Annualized Rate (SAAR) of 12.23 million new car sales, nearly flat from 12.25 in October 2010, yet up from 10.92 in November 2009
• Retail sales are down nine percent compared to October 2010 and up nearly 17 percent from November 2009
• Fleet and rental sales are expected to make up 21 percent of total industry sales in November 2010
• The industry average incentive spending per unit will be approximately $2,712 in November 2010, which represents a jump of six percent from October 2010 and a slight increase of one percent from November 2009
• Used car sales* are estimated to be 2,598,805, up less than one percent from October 2010 and nearly flat from November 2009.  The ratio of new to used is estimated to be 3:1 for November 2010

"Several consecutive months of year-over-year retail sales improvements indicate that the recovery in consumer demand has not been a coincidence," said Jesse Toprak, VP of Industry Trends and Insight for TrueCar.com. "We have high expectations from December sales as year-end clearance events should drive the industry to its best unit sales total of the year.  Based on this rising demand – as well as a slew of new products that will be hitting the marketplace – we have raised our 2011 forecast to 12.7 million units."

Forecasts for the top seven manufacturers for November 2010:

TrueCar.com also projects sales down to the brand level, which can be viewed in its entirety at the Truth Blog on TrueCar.com.  Brand level incentive spending forecasts are available upon request.

TrueCar.com bases its forecast on actual transaction data.  The transaction data based forecast is refined by other current and historical factors that impact vehicle sales, including:  sales, inventory, incentives, fuel prices, and macro economic data (major stock market indexes, consumer confidence, new home starts, and CPI).  TrueCar.com does not adjust for selling days in year-over-year percentage change calculations.

About TrueCar

TrueCar is the authority in new car prices.  We show car buyers and car dealers how much people actually paid for a particular car in a specific local area.  With TrueCar pricing, both new car buyers and new car dealers can know at any time what is considered a good or great price on a new car. Consumers no longer need to walk into a dealership partially informed and fully suspicious – using TrueCar they walk in knowing the price of a fair deal. Dealers benefit by TrueCar's real-time, unbiased information about marketplace pricing, helping them price cars for increased sales, and ultimately gaining market share over other dealers.  Our innovative new car pricing service is offered free of charge on our website at www.truecar.com, on our mobile site at mobile.truecar.com, and via syndication of our tools and pricing data to leading automotive research sites throughout the web.

About TrueCar Data

TrueCar obtains data directly from numerous sources including automotive dealers, technology companies, data aggregators, and analytics companies within the automotive space.  We also acquire vehicle configuration data, customer and dealer incentives data, financing and loan data, vehicle registration and insurance data, and much, much more.  TrueCar is insatiable about data with our goal to find 100% of all purchase transactions, even if that means finding the same transaction multiple times from multiple sources within the car-buying ecosystem.  Our data is among the most timely and comprehensive in the industry, as we are able to process most car sales within a week of the actual sales date, and have a substantial fraction on the site within 48 hours of the actual sale. TrueCar believes the greater our informational accuracy, the greater benefit we provide to both dealers and consumers.

Disclaimer

This press release and the information contained herein is for noncommercial use on "as-is, as available" basis and may be used for informational purposes only.  TrueCar makes no representations or warranties, express or implied, with respect to the information contained in this press release and the results of the use of such information, including but not limited to implied warranty of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose and non-infringement.  The information contained in this press release may include technical inaccuracies or typographical errors.  Neither TrueCar nor any of its parents, subsidiaries, affiliates or respective partners, officers, or directors, employees or agents shall be held liable for any damages, whether direct, incidental, indirect, special or consequential, including without limitation lost revenues or lost profits, arising from or in connection with your use or reliance on the information presented in this press release.

*Used car sales figures include sales from franchise dealerships, independent dealerships and private party sales

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Jesse Toprak

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SOURCE TrueCar.com