The best- and worst-selling vehicles of 2007

…”The weakness in truck sales isn’t going away anytime soon,” for reasons that are rooted in the housing slump, says Dana Johnson, vice president and chief economist for Dallas-based Comerica Bank. During a downturn, penny-pinching construction companies stop building their fleets with pickups. What’s more, homeowners have a reduced ability to extract equity and make major vehicle purchases.

Then there is the fuel factor. John Teahen, senior editor at Automotive News, agrees that sales of large, gas-guzzling pickups will keep sliding downward, because with sustained high fuel prices, fewer people will be buying them for personal use. This has likely affected sales of other cars on our best-selling list, including the Chevrolet Silverado, which has experienced a 2.4 percent sales decline this year; and the Dodge Ram, a whopping 29.3 percent.


But a rise in gas prices alone doesn’t necessarily mean shoppers will postpone a purchase or buy a smaller vehicle, such as the Nissan Altima or the Honda Civic. Instead, says Johnson, they’ll be watching their wallets more in the process.

Forbes