Used Van Shortage!

If you are in the market for a used cargo van to convert, you have probably been left wondering where all of the affordable vans? Maybe you have been building your van life plan, constructing a budget and arranging your personal belongings for life on the road, only to discover that van prices have skyrocketed. You're not alone. The mid sized cargo van market is on fire right now. This is the result of several major factors that are driving up the demand for new and used cargo vans as well as.

We have narrowed it down to three factors that have led to the increase in used van prices. Understanding these factors may help you time the market better so that you can get a more affordable van and keep your build costs lower.

The Amazon Effect

As covid swept across the globe, individuals and governments went into lockdown in order to prevent the proliferation of the virus. As a result, people have turned to other methods to receive their essential items. Amazon and all of the other logistics and delivery companies have taken this opportunity to help grow their businesses by facilitating the delivery of more items. Amazon, who is already one of the largest companies in the world, has made receiving deliveries even easier and as a result they have seen a huge uptick in demand for delivery vans. This same idea goes for all of the delivery and logistics companies as well as any smaller sub-contractors. Companies are holding tightly their van inventory and going to any length in order to secure more vans. These companies are going out and buying vans sightunseen and over listed value just to make sure that they have the capacity to continue to meet increasing demand.

Christmas Effect

Every year around late November or early December delivery companies hire a large number of seasonal employees in order to meet the increase in demand during the holiday season. As part of their seasonal upswing, companies contract out more of their deliveries to almost any company with a fleet of vans. This year the seasonal demand has only been exacerbated by covid which is influencing more people to order presents online.

O.G. delivery driver

Manufacturing Effect

During the peak covid outbreak in March of this year vehicle manufacturers completely shutdown production. This closure created a backlog of new vans coming to market. As a result, all of the delivery companies held onto their vans longer than they normally would have because of the lack of new supply coming into the market. Of course this happened on top of the already explained increases in demand from all of the same delivery companies.

Affordable Vans Are Coming Soon!

All of these factors have driven up used van prices over the last few months, but we see these as great indicators for prices to drop in the near future. This is of course a bit of bad news if you are in the market for a van right this minute, but if you can hold out until after the holidays there could be a burst in the bubble. Amazon and all of the other delivery companies are meeting the increased demand and at the same time the demand will drop off after Christmas sales. Vehicle manufacturing restarted their production and has continued to try to keep up with demand. Now, with vaccines on the verge of distribution, there is promise that the bulk of covid will be behind us. This means that vehicle production will continue and with any hope people will be able to go out and shop locally and in person. Companies that increased their van inventory will inevitably liquidate their stock in order to either purchase new vehicles or to downsize back to their pre-covid levels. This is all great news for anyone in the market for a nicely used delivery van turned camper van.