Trucks! Geez....

[jyoutz]

Yep - scary prices out there. Used to be a time where I thought I was paid well. Could even comfortably afford a new truck!

I make a lot more money now, but cannot afford a new rig, even if I was being fiscally irresponsible. Same goes for houses.

I think the chip shortage will end like a dam breach. Eventually, the stockpiled vehicles will hit the market and the manufactures will need to "fire - sale" the lot to keep their production lines going. The used market will crash entirely.

I sure hope so. My neighbor is general manager of a Toyota dealership. He says they are ordering vehicles months in advance and used cars are primarily the only business they have now.

 

[Thomas]

Seems the small 4WD with little addons cost as full size pickup.

 

[fruitcakesa]

Sold my 95 Dodge CRD 10 years ago when it would no longer pass state inspection.
Recently decided I needed a 4wd truck to get up my hill in winter and mud season.
2008 Nissan Frontier w/145K miles and some rust [what else is new} $6300. Does the job for me

 

[5030]

My 2007 Dodge 2500 with Cummins has 156k miles. Barely broken in for a Cummins motor.

Too bad the rest of it is marginal.

 

[5030]

it just seemed like all the local dealers were trying to sell pickups masquerading as Cadillacs or Mercedes.

I call them 'Soccer Mom Specials'

 

[jyoutz]

Too bad the rest of it is marginal.

I love the Dodge 2500. Reliable and a real workhorse that has never given me any trouble: just regular maintenance and U joints once.

 

[Oaktree]

I think the chip shortage will end like a dam breach. Eventually, the stockpiled vehicles will hit the market and the manufactures will need to "fire - sale" the lot to keep their production lines going. The used market will crash entirely.

I'm not going to hold my breath. Can't help but think that it would be in the automakers' interests to keep supply short and prices high. I think it will be a long while before used prices come down, if for no reason other than there are so few new ones out there.

I'm a bit skeptical of the so-called chip shortage to begin with. Where did all this manufacturing capacity go? Everything from cellphones to Starlink modems to autos seems to be affected here.

I sure hope so. My neighbor is general manager of a Toyota dealership. He says they are ordering vehicles months in advance and used cars are primarily the only business they have now.

And yet we're still being barraged with tv ads to "come in and make your best deal". Only Ford seems to be pushing ordering.
There ain't no "deals" out there!

It will be a built truck. I pick out what all I want. Some things come stock. I did upgrade the tires wheels and towing packing with gooseneck hookup and spray in liner. Hay dude is right. It will be a 6.7. I need something better than a half ton to pull hay and the tractor. I own the little 45 horse kioti. But I pull other ppls equipment too. Would be nice to haul more than 6 rolls of hay at a time. Talk about time consuming just getting hay back to the barn. They do have one on lot I like but it’s white. A 2019 with 20k miles. 69.5k. For a few more why not get exactly what I want and be the first to fart in the seat?

But how custom can you get even if you special order it? I asked once here and the consensus was that you're still going to have to select from pre-determined packages...if you want the good stereo for example you also have to order the package with fancy wheels, power tailgate and air conditioned seats whether you want that stuff or not.

The only upside is that you don't need to either take one in some pukey color that's in stock or wait even longer.

 

[Clintock]

I'm not going to hold my breath. Can't help but think that it would be in the automakers' interests to keep supply short and prices high. I think it will be a long while before used prices come down, if for no reason other than there are so few new ones out there.

I'm a bit skeptical of the so-called chip shortage to begin with. Where did all this manufacturing capacity go? Everything from cellphones to Starlink modems to autos seems to be affected here.

And yet we're still being barraged with tv ads to "come in and make your best deal". Only Ford seems to be pushing ordering.
There ain't no "deals" out there!

But how custom can you get even if you special order it? I asked once here and the consensus was that you're still going to have to select from pre-determined packages...if you want the good stereo for example you also have to order the package with power tailgate and air conditioned seats whether you want that stuff or not.

The only upside is that you don't need to either take one in some pukey color that's in stock or wait even longer.

Oh yea. You’re right. Can’t build it exactly the way you want it. And the wait is up to 4 months. I’ve been skeptical of the chip deal since they started saying it.

 

[ericm979]

The chip shortage is real, but due to a number of causes. Water is short in Taiwan (home of the largest contract chip fab). Fabs use a lot of water.

A couple fabs burnt down or were damaged by typhoons in the last few years.

There's been labor shortages due to covid. It takes a lot of people with special training and the willingness to work around hazardous chemicals to run a fab.

When covid hit, manufacturers canceled their chip orders, thinking that sales would plummet. But then the reverse happened.

Fab capacity before covid was already close to 100%. Fabs are super expensive to build so you have to run them flat out. They are specialized for certain types of chip. And we were already putting chips in darn near everything.

Those manufacturing slots the car manufacturers gave up are never coming back. Those are cars they can't make unless someone builds a new fab of the right kind or they redesign the car to not use those chips. It takes multiple years to build a fab.

The car manufacturers and dealers are also maximizing their profits. It's not just the chip shortage that's causing high prices. But it's a factor, and one that's not going away soon.

 

[ponytug]

@ericm979 is so on the money!

Thousands of chips go into making a single vehicle, and being short on a single chip is enough to prevent it being made. Tesla has redesigned boards to substitute components, but that in itself is expensive, and most other manufacturers have outside companies making components for them, so it takes much longer, contracts need to be redrawn...

When the car manufacturers walked away from their orders, the valuable production slots went to other customers willing to pay more. Car makers are about the most price sensitive of any customer, and therefore provide the least profit, and the least incentive for a fab to tool up and run chips for. As Eric pointed out, those slots aren't readily coming back.

I think that the big auto makers are a little like old dogs; it is hard to teach them new tricks, and right now, in a rapidly changing environment, I think that the need for new ways of doing things are everywhere, but may be that is just me.

All the best,

Peter