--- title: Shopping for a Car Now Eats Up Nearly 15 Hours of Your Time, on Average description: Shopping for a car took an average of nearly 15 hours in 2022, as customer satisfaction declined due to inventory and pricing issues. authors: - name: Pete Grieve role: Lead News Reporter url: https://money.com/author/pete-grieve/ bio: Pete Grieve is a personal finance reporter. In his time at Money, Pete has covered everything from car buying to credit cards to the housing market. education: University of Chicago, BA Political Science at_money_since: 2022 articles: 602 covers: - Economy and Politics - Banking - Business - Career Advice - Credit - Credit Cards - Debt - Education - Health and Wellness - Housing - Identity Theft - Insurance - Investing - Lifestyle - Loans - Mortgages - Personal Finance - Professional Services - Retirement - Shopping - Taxes social: - https://twitter.com/pete_grieve - https://linkedin.com/in/pete-grieve-b5aa02138 - https://www.facebook.com/petegrieve4 editors: - name: Brad Tuttle role: Senior Editor url: https://money.com/author/brad-tuttle/ bio: Brad Tuttle is a former senior editor at Money with over 10 years’ experience covering a vast number of personal finance topics, including careers, cars, travel, budgeting, investing, insurance, credit cards, consumer psychology, real estate, banking, and shopping and deals. education: Columbia University School of Journalism, MS at_money_since: 2014 articles: 366 covers: - Economy and Politics - Banking - Business - Career Advice - Credit - Credit Cards - Education - Health and Wellness - Housing - Identity Theft - Insurance - Investing - Lifestyle - Loans - Mortgages - Personal Finance - Pets - Professional Services - Retirement - Shopping - Taxes - Technology social: - https://twitter.com/bradrtuttle - https://linkedin.com/in/brad-tuttle-834b225 former_staff: true published: '2023-01-24T15:29:03.000Z' modified: '2024-01-10T13:02:51.000Z' section: Economy and Politics tags: - cars - News word_count: 377 canonical: https://money.com/how-much-time-buy-car-report/ type: NewsArticle source: structured-blocks --- > **Disclosure:** We research all brands listed and may earn a fee from our partners. Research and financial considerations may influence how brands are displayed. Not all brands are included. [Learn more](https://money.com/page/disclaimer/). ![Customers having conversation with sales assistant, buying car, view above](https://img.money.com/2023/01/News-Time-Spent-Car-Shopping.jpg) Shopping for a car is becoming a time-consuming marathon, and buyers are leaving the dealership much less satisfied with the experience, a new report says. In 2022, the average car buyer spent 14 hours and 39 minutes researching, shopping and purchasing their vehicle, according to [Cox Automotive](https://www.coxautoinc.com/news/2022-car-buyer-journey-study/), a research and consulting firm. That's an 18% increase from 2021 when buyers spent an average of 12 hours and 27 minutes going through the process. ## What the research says Based on a survey of 10,000 car shoppers and buyers, Cox found that customer satisfaction is decreasing: The share of buyers who were highly satisfied declined from 66% in 2021 to 61% in 2022. - Most of the decline in satisfaction came from the [used vehicle market](https://money.com/used-car-prices-decrease-2023-forecast/). While the share of new car buyers who were highly satisfied only dropped from 71% to 70%, the share of used buyers who were highly satisfied went from 65% to 58%. - The increase in the amount of time buyers spent going through the process was just one factor contributing to the decline in satisfaction. [Limited inventory](https://money.com/average-new-car-price-record-high/) and [high prices](https://money.com/new-car-prices-discounts-again/) also made the experience more difficult, Cox reports. ## Why it matters Shopping for a car could always be a hassle, but it became a more laborious process for the average buyer last year, and the experience was less pleasant. - The average buyer spent an extra hour researching and shopping online, while also spending about 20 more minutes at the dealership. - Buyers cited limited inventory as one of the reasons they had to spend more time looking for cars. “In 2022, the shopping experience became less about finding the PERFECT vehicle and more about finding ANY vehicle,” the report from Cox reads. - Fewer buyers are coming out of the purchasing process feeling good about the price they end up paying. As [car prices hit new records](https://money.com/new-car-prices-average-50000/) in 2022, the share of buyers who were satisfied with their purchase price decreased from 63% to 48%. ## Bottom line Buying a car hasn’t become just more expensive, it’s also become a more frustrating and time-consuming process. ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "BreadcrumbList", "@id": "https://money.com/how-much-time-buy-car-report/#breadcrumb", "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "name": "Home", "item": "https://money.com" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "name": "Economy and Politics", "item": "https://money.com/economy-and-politics/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "name": "Auto Industry", "item": "https://money.com/auto-industry/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 4, "name": "Shopping for a Car Now Eats Up Nearly 15 Hours of Your Time, on Average" } ] }, { "@type": "WebSite", "@id": "https://money.com/#website", "url": "https://money.com", "name": "Money", "publisher": { "@id": "https://money.com/#organization" } }, { "@type": "WebPage", "@id": "https://money.com/how-much-time-buy-car-report/#webpage", "url": "https://money.com/how-much-time-buy-car-report/", "name": "Shopping for a Car Now Eats Up Nearly 15 Hours of Your Time, on Average", "isPartOf": { "@id": "https://money.com/#website" }, "datePublished": "2023-01-24T15:29:03.000Z", "mainEntity": { "@id": "https://money.com/how-much-time-buy-car-report/" }, "inLanguage": "en-US", "breadcrumb": { "@id": "https://money.com/how-much-time-buy-car-report/#breadcrumb" }, "dateModified": "2024-01-10T13:02:51.000Z" }, { "@type": "NewsArticle", "headline": "Shopping for a Car Now Eats Up Nearly 15 Hours of Your Time, on Average", "articleSection": "Economy and Politics", "image": [ { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://img.money.com/2023/01/News-Time-Spent-Car-Shopping.jpg", "width": 2700, "height": 1800, "caption": "News-Time-Spent-Car-Shopping" } ], "author": [ { "@type": "Person", "name": "Pete Grieve", "url": "https://money.com/author/pete-grieve/", "@id": "https://money.com/author/pete-grieve/#author", "description": "Pete Grieve is a personal finance reporter. 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