Long wait times lead to eye-watering price tags for near-new examples of Australia’s top-selling SUV
Australia’s favourite SUV, the Toyota RAV 4, is the most recent model to fall victim to exorbitant resale price hikes, spurred on by high demand, restricted supply and therefore long waiting lists for new vehicles.
As Toyota Australia struggles to keep up with demand for its popular mid-size SUV, wait times for new examples of the Toyota RAV4 currently stretch out to as much as 12 months for hybrid variants.
Combined with recent price hikes – and more to come alongside a tech upgrade later this year – that has had a domino effect on the used car market, in which early adopters of the latest MY22 RAV4 are now attempting to profit from buyers not willing to wait up to a year for a new vehicle.
Some sellers are now asking in excess of $70,000 for low-mileage examples of the top-spec RAV4 Hybrid Edge, which has a retail list price of $52,700 before on-road costs off the showroom floor.
Trouble is, there aren’t any new vehicles lying around on dealer forecourts at the moment, and almost 100 near-new examples of the Toyota RAV4 are currently advertised on carsales with an asking price above $60,000.
Most of those are petrol-electric hybrid models and both private sellers and dealerships across the country are promising ‘immediate delivery’ and adding ‘Don’t wait 12 months, drive away today’.
Indeed the priciest Toyota RAV4 currently advertised on carsales for $72,790 isn’t brand-new and has more than 3000km on the clock.
It’s not the first – and it certainly won’t be the last – time we’ve seen outrageous prices for used vehicles in high demand and low supply, especially for iconic models that are the last of their kind.
Asking prices for second-hand Toyota LandCruiser 200 Series vehicles topped $200,000 last year as the new 300 Series loomed with its downsized turbo-diesel V6, while prices for near-new examples of the final R35 Nissan GT-R T-Spec have approached a whopping $1 million and continue to exceed $500K.
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Keyword: Used Toyota RAV4 prices top $70K