Significant drop in new car sales in Kildare this year as motor industry takes hit
Car sales in Kildare are down by almost 9% in Kildare this year, with statistics provided by the Society of the Irish Motor Industry(SIMI) examining the January car sales in the county.
SIMI this week issued the official 171 car sales figures for January along with presenting their final SIMI/DoneDeal Quarterly Motor Industry Review of 2016. Alan Greene President of SIMI officially launched the report at the Clayton Hotel Dublin 4.
The report showed that car sales in Kildare were down 8.9% in January 2017 compared with figures from January 2016. There were 1,692 new car registrations in the county in the first month of this year compared to 1,859 last January.
The report also outlined that according to DoneDeal 20,894 car ads were placed on their site from Kildare in 2016 and the value of the cars advertised was €150,771,359.
Car sales figures nationally for the month of January show that 171 registrations are -1.7% (39,019) compared to January 2016 (39,722). Light Commercials are currently -2.4% (6,394) compared to January last year (6,555), while HGV (Heavy Goods Vehicle) registrations are -6.3% (456) for January in comparison to the same time last year (487).
The SIMI/DoneDeal Report highlights the strong economic performance of the Motor Industry last year, with growth in registration figures seen across all counties along with the upbeat nature of business confidence and investment reflected in commercial vehicles despite a softening of the market towards the latter half of 2016.
Jim Power, Economist and author of the Review, said; “Looking ahead to 2017, while the outlook for car sales is a bit more difficult to predict than last year, the projected growth in personal disposable incomes and the availability of credit provide solid support for car sales. However, the impact of Brexit and the increased volume in imported used cars are other issues that may impact on new car sales this year. Overall, though, numbers should be fairly close to last year with perhaps a slight decline of around 3% in new car sales in 2017, which would imply new car sales of around 142,000.”