New Ford Inventory At 40 Days’ Supply, Unchanged From Late 2021

The ongoing semiconductor chip shortage has forced Ford to idle a number of its plants over the past year-plus, as well as prompt it to ship vehicles lacking certain features to customers in an effort to speed up deliveries. Regardless, new Ford inventory remains quite low despite showing recent signs of improvement, with most Ford models selling for MSRP while Lincoln vehicles are moving at less than sticker price, on average. However, new Ford inventory through February remains relatively flat compared to the end of 2021, according to new data from Cox Automotive.

Overall new vehicle inventory climbed a bit – from 1.06 million units in January to 1.07 million in February – which is down 59 percent from one year ago, while days’ supply of unsold new vehicles reached 34 at the beginning of March, down from 37 in early February but up from a low of 25 in September. However, Ford’s days’ supply came in at 40, which is unchanged from the end of 2021 and significantly better than the industry average, as well as a number of its rivals.

Demand for new vehicles remains robust, though low inventory levels led to a 12 percent decrease in light new-vehicle sales, year-over-year. However, February’s sales did increase by 6 percent over January. Average list pricing decreased as well, from $44,814 in January to $44,704 in February, which is still 12 percent higher than one year ago. At the same time, average transaction prices dropped from December’s record levels to $46,085, which is around $5,000 more than February 2021 as conditions appear to be slowly improving.

“Supply has improved in recent weeks, but only marginally,” said Charlie Chesbrough, Cox Automotive senior economist. “Sales in March will be higher than February, but that will be due to three more selling days and not a significant change in availability.”

We’ll have more on Ford’s inventory levels soon, so be sure and subscribe to Ford Authority for 24/7 Ford news coverage.