New car sales down 37% in April; used car sales more than halved from mid-2007

The number of new passenger vehicle sales fell 37% to 3,525 in April from a year ago, and new commercial vehical sales fell 39% to 1,204 from April 2008, figures released by the NZ Transport Agency show. Total new vehical sales over the year to April were down 18% from the previous year. Weakness also intensified in the used car market, with 4,985 sales over April. This was only just above the February low of 4,626 and down 3% from March. The trend in the used car market shows sales falling steadily from over 11,000 sales in August 2007.