Domestic Sales of Used Cars Fell in September

Compared to September last year, domestic sales of used cars declined in the previous month, but have been increasing since the beginning of the year compared to the same period last year, joautok.hu [‘Good Cars’] told the state news agency MTI on Wednesday.

According to Datahouse, 68,586 used cars were sold in Hungary in September, compared to 72,183 a year ago. Before that, only in July did the market fail to reach last year's level, so sales in the first nine months of the year rose from 612,100 to 636,400 year-on-year. During this period, 76% of the vehicles were at least 10 years old, and 51% were lower-middle-range or small cars, they said.

According to joautok.hu, the deteriorating economic situation is reducing demand, but the first half of the year was still good, so the domestic market for used cars could surpass last year's record of 817,300 units by a few% year-on-year. The decline is also confirmed by quarterly totals, with 217,000 changes of ownership recorded in the first three months, followed by 211,000 and 208,000 between the beginning of July and the end of September, they added.

However, they pointed out that the weakening of the Hungarian currency, the forint against the euro and the tightening of supply in Western Europe are making imports even tighter. In August and September, imports fell short of 10,000 units, although the annual total of vehicles imported from abroad rose from 98,000 to 99,300 by the end of September.