Around 198,300 new cars were registered in November in Germany, according to the federal transport authority (KBA), 31.7 percent fewer than in the same month last year.
Low sales were linked to "reduced production, as global semiconductor shortages limited the German auto industry", the VDA German carmakers federation said in a statement.
Supply of semiconductors, a key component in both conventional and electric vehicles, has been severely disrupted as a result of the coronavirus pandemic as production centres have intermittently been forced to close.
Production of cars in Germany fell by 32 percent in November compared with the previous year, according to the VDA.
Over the course of the year, 2.8 million cars have rolled off factory lines in the traditional auto powerhouse, 12 percent less than in the same period last year.
The same trend was to be seen in sales in 2021, which trail 2020 by 8 percent over the first eleven months of the year, with the deficit not expected to be made up in December.
The domestic car market has not been in such a poor position "since German reunification" in 1990, Ferdinand Dudenhoeffer, head of the Centre for Automotive Research, said in a note on Monday.
After a 34.9 percent fall in sales in October, the car market seemed to be "stabilising at a very low level", according to Peter Fuss, a partner at EY.
A recovery in the market would only come "over the course of next year", barring "unwelcome surprises leading to a new spike in the pandemic", Fuss said.
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