Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Weather and VAT hit used sales

The latest motor finance figures from the Finance & Leasing Association showed that the return of the 17.5% VAT rate and heavy snowfall impacted on sales in January.

Geraldine Kilkelly, Head of Research and Chief Economist, said, “While we have not seen the record new car finance growth levels witnessed in December, January was still a good month, up 23% on last year. The growth comes against abnormally low consumer new car finance sales in January of last year.
“The cold weather may have prevented consumers venturing out to car showrooms in January, and anyone thinking of purchasing a new car may have decided to wait for the ‘10’ number plate, released on 1 March.”
Consumers bought 23% more new cars using motor finance through dealers in January than in January 2009.  But January 2009 was a particularly weak month for consumer new car finance volumes.
Consumer used car finance sales remain slow, with 19% fewer cars sold on dealer finance in January than the same period last year.