The New Zealand new car sales figures are in for the first half of 2022 and, while we’re still on track for a record year, sales are softening— though it’s as much a reflection on the continuing supply issues as it is simply pure market demand.
With 2021 setting a record-sales year of 165,459, at the half-way point of 2022, 82,104 sales had been recorded: or 164,208 annualised, a fraction under last year— though just the month of June’s 3000 sales disparity (15k vs 12k) shows how close and fickle the numbers really are. March 2022 was NZ’s biggest month ever, with 21,004!
With such a shifting market thanks to added fees for our popular utes and commercials, and the rebate incentives for cleaner and electrified cars, the used car market is similarly up and down: March also offering the most sales ever (24k), against an average of 12,000.
Leader of the new car sales race isn’t a ute, again, but Mitsubishi’s new Outlander, the brand holding an impressive three models in the top 10 (and ASX is 11th), with Triton and Eclipse Cross helping contribute to its 16 per cent passenger vehicle market share, four per cent ahead of Toyota.
Once the dominator of the top 10, utes are shifting, though their popularity remains, with Ranger just a handful of sales — and a big shipment of— behind, with Hilux in third and Triton ahead of a small gap to RAV4 in fifth.
Suzuki’s resilient Swift is the best small passenger car, while the MG ZS slots into 9th place, boosted by its EV model. In fact six of the top 10 have models with some form of electrification. Tesla’s Model 3 was 14th with 1304 sales, behind ASX, Kia Stonic and Honda Jazz, and ahead of Mazda CX-5.