Used vehicle market booming
New Zealand’s used car sales industry is experiencing boom times, setting new records in a variety of transactions.
Last month a total of more than 102,000 used vehicles were either imported, brought or sold - the first time the used vehicle market has hit more than 100,000 transactions.
The last time the market even came close to this mark was in July 2015 when there were 99,943 transactions, according to vehicle auction company Turners Group.
The greatest number of transactions in March were public-to-public, which saw 46,054 vehicles purchased, more that 4 per cent up on March last year. During the opening three months of the year a total of 131,536 vehicles swapped owners in these private sales.
Next highest number were the dealer-to-public transactions - the traditional way of buying a used car off a dealership - which last month jumped to 18,131 vehicles. So far this year 50,657 vehicles have been sold this way.
Public-to-dealer transactions, which in almost every case is the traditional trade-in for another vehicle, rose 11.5 per cent over March last year to 15,152 vehicles. And dealer-to-dealer transactions rose 8.05 per cent to 8293 vehicles.
A significant statistic for March is the number of ex-overseas registrations recorded for the month - 14,474, which was a rise of 19.10 per cent over March last year.
A statement from Turners says the high number of ex-overseas registrations will certainly be at least partly caused by the number of used vehicles coming into the country. In March alone 19,579 were imported, an increase of more than 50 per cent on March last year.
"Most commentators are picking the economy to slow heading into the middle of an election year. Used car transactions would usually follow this, but it is difficult to imagine that on the back of such a recordbreaking month." says the statement.