Idk what the pattern is where you are, but the majority of stolen cars where I am are not sold or stripped or anything like that. They're used for N days and then ditched somewhere. Used either for joyriding, living in, crash&grab, or whatever.

One of my old neighbors had their same car stolen like 2-3 times, always ditched and found after some number of days missing.

That was the big shift here for the Kia mess. Normally the thieves tend to be professionals so the stolen ones are at a port or being stripped soon afterwards, but when that hit TikTok there were a lot more joyrides and brief use for theft/robbery because it was a bunch of teenagers who didn’t have much of a plan.