Reasonable start for new year car sales

A NUMBER of Ennis car dealers have reported a mixed start to 2012 in terms of new car sales.
Provisional national figures for new car registrations in 2011 showed sales of 89,807, an increase of 1.5% on 2010.
The main problem for anyone seeking to buy a new car is acquiring credit. According to Cathal Byrne of Renault on the Gort Road in Ennis, that concern has been eased for them.
“As a Renault dealer, we’re in a very advantageous situation for the first quarter of 2012 because Renault Ireland opened their bank in September. We are now doing a lot of car sales because we have access to the bank. So funding isn’t a problem for us,” he said.
“We would have sold a lot of cars in 2010 and 2011 on scrappage deals but funding was always an issue. But now that Renault Finance has opened in Ireland, we don’t have a funding problem and approval ratings are very, very high. Before that, our biggest problem was getting money for people and we don’t have that problem now,” he added.
Van sales are “way up” on last year, Cathal notes, while Renault has also launched a range of electric vehicles.
Noel Gavin of O’Sullivan and Hansbury on the Kilrush Road said business has slowed down since Christmas.
“It’s quiet enough. We’d a fairly good Christmas but since Christmas, it has definitely slowed down,” he revealed. He attributes the slowdown to people’s uncertainty over recently mooted taxes and charges.
“The pensioners were the people with the money all along. Now the Government is taxing them and that will slow down things. Road tax, the house charge and diesel are gone up. People are afraid of what’s around the corner,” Noel suggested.
Declan Haugh of Cahercalla Motors on the Kilrush Road is reasonably content with recent sales figures. 
“Things are good. We’re happy enough with the figures so far this year. It looks to be similar enough figures to last year, even without the scrappage. We’d be hopeful for the year ahead,” he said.
“At the end of the month, we’ll have a more accurate reflection,” Declan added.
Nationally, while the early months of 2011 recorded good figures, sales fell off in the second half of the year when the Government’s scrappage scheme ended in June.
Diesel remains the preferred fuel for new car buyers, making up 71.3% of sales, followed by 26.5%, which are petrol.