Motoring Discussion > March 2013 Car Registrations.	Miscellaneous
Thread Author: crocks	Replies: 25

New Fri 5 Apr 13 15:50   March 2013 Car Registrations. - crocks

In March registrations were up 5.9% on the previous year. www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-22024659 Doesn't look as if the 13 reg has put many people off. Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 16:20   March 2013 Car Registrations. - sooty123

That's a good performance in the middle of a recession, no end of people's appetite for new cars. Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 16:27   March 2013 Car Registrations. - PeteW

But how bad was March 2012? Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 16:30   March 2013 Car Registrations. - sooty123

I'm not sure, probably not very good. However 6% is a good rise when the economy has done any better over the same period. Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 17:12   March 2013 Car Registrations. - Bill Payer

>> But how bad was March 2012? >> Was up 1.8% on 2011. You can access all the data on the SMMT website: www.smmt.co.uk/category/news-registration-cars/ Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 16:35   March 2013 Car Registrations. - jc2

Especially as people were offered the option of last September's registration if the did not want a "13" on their plate. Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 16:43   March 2013 Car Registrations. - PeteW

No they weren't. DVLA never did offer this, and made it clear that only the purchase of a private plate would avoid a '13. Agreed that a 6% rise is good - maybe this is the 'scrappage' buyers replacing their purchases? Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 18:19   March 2013 Car Registrations. - Londoner

I can't believe that the Nissan Juke sneaks in to the list of top-10 selling cars (Year to date). All taste is personal, I freely admit, but IMHO that thing fell out of the ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down! Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 18:26   March 2013 Car Registrations. - henry k

>> I can't believe that the Nissan Juke sneaks in to the list of top-10 selling cars (Year to date). >> >> All taste is personal, I freely admit, but IMHO that thing fell out of the >> ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down! >> Tree was not in leafy Surrey cos I have not seen any :-) Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 18:31   March 2013 Car Registrations. - lancara

Are the Brits obsessed with new cars? UK - registrations in first quarter 605,198 - population 62.6 million Spain - registrations in first quarter 180,724 - population 47.2 million Probably the average age of cars in Spain is higher, but surprisingly it is very rare to see broken down cars on their motorways - which is the opposite of my experience the last time I was in UK Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 18:37   March 2013 Car Registrations. - Bill Payer

>> UK - registrations in first quarter 605,198 - population 62.6 million >> Spain - registrations in first quarter 180,724 - population 47.2 million >> That's interesting - I hadn't looked at Spain before but I have compared UK to France and Germany and the numbers sold there were remarkably similar to the UK. I was wondering if the registration plate changes here boosted sales compared to those countries, but it didn't seem to. Sales in Europe as a whole are apparently well down though, so UK is bucking the trend. Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 18:52   March 2013 Car Registrations. - movilogo

Let it be. That's why used cars are cheaper in UK. Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 19:05   March 2013 Car Registrations. - Alastairw

Subjectively I suspect this is an upward blip. Three senior types at my office have 13 plate cars this month, but purely because their 3 year contract hire's have come up for renewal. Was there a similar blip in 2010? Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 19:18   March 2013 Car Registrations. - Runfer D'Hills

An Italian friend was made redundant recently and his company car ( a diesel Passat estate ) disappeared with the job. Fortunately he has managed to find a new job but it doesn't come with a car. He wants / needs a large estate of a similar size to his old company car. He can't afford to buy a new one and has been searching for weeks for a suitable used car. We were chatting on the phone the other day and while we were, I sent him a few examples of the sorts of things he was looking at from British advertisements. He couldn't believe how cheap our second hand cars were by comparison to what they have to pay in Italy. He is now, at least considering the notion of buying a British car and putting up with the inconvenience of the car being rhd. I think he's checking to see if there would be any local tax or insurance implications which would make it less attractive. There would of course be other things to consider such as headlight re-alignment and re-registration of course but he assures me that the raw prices were something like 30% cheaper here so it might still be worth it. He is used to rhd having previously lived in the UK where he had an old Land Rover at the time which he eventually took back to Italy and ran it there for a few years before becoming "respectable" as he puts it ! He reckons the only downside to rhd was motorway toll booths until they invented the electronic tag system. Apparently, we've never had it so good on car prices. I wonder why it doesn't feel that good? Last edited by: Humph D'Bout on Fri 5 Apr 13 at 19:19 Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 19:52   March 2013 Car Registrations. - Zero

>> Apparently, we've never had it so good on car prices. I wonder why it doesn't >> feel that good? It does, I look at AT and am constantly saying "Thats a lot of car for the money" Look at what Alonovich paid for his goona. Silly money. If I was your mate, I would be buying a UK Fiat second hand, silly money here, easily looked after at home. Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 20:07   March 2013 Car Registrations. - Runfer D'Hills

Aye not a bad idea. Some seriously cheap 1.6 Stilo estates available for example. Diesel quite important to him though. Petrol is very expensive in Italy by comparison. He was saying that rhd "British" cars like his old Landy are seen as quite cool in Italy. I wondered about suggesting a Jag diesel estate. He does need a big-ish car and wants an estate. He's got about €10,000 to spend all in so he might get a decent older one. Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 20:13   March 2013 Car Registrations. - Zero

>> Aye not a bad idea. Some seriously cheap 1.6 Stilo estates available for example. Diesel >> quite important to him though. Petrol is very expensive in Italy by comparison. >> >> He was saying that rhd "British" cars like his old Landy are seen as quite >> cool in Italy. I wondered about suggesting a Jag diesel estate. He does need a >> big-ish car and wants an estate. He's got about €10,000 to spend all in so >> he might get a decent older one. Show him this, he'll be over on the next easy jet. www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201304016037373 Damn I am tempted myself. Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 20:19   March 2013 Car Registrations. - sooty123

Not a looker though, looks like an overweight punto. Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 20:20   March 2013 Car Registrations. - Zero

It is, tho it does not photo well. Great cars, hired one in Turin once. Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 20:25   March 2013 Car Registrations. - sooty123

Never driven one to be honest. I used to work with someone who had one, he had it quite a while so he must have liked it. It's fat bloaty looks put me off though. Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 21:18   March 2013 Car Registrations. - Bill Payer

A colleague in Holland bought a 'new' Volvo S80 recently with 'only' 160,000Kms for €11,000. He was pleased as punch. Same car in AutoTrader £4K. Mileage doesn't seem to bother them - he ran his last car to nearly 400,000Kms. Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 21:42   March 2013 Car Registrations. - Runfer D'Hills

As you say Bill, the wife of the same guy I was speaking about in Italy runs an 11 or 12 year old diesel golf which she's had from new. Not huge Kms on it at something like 100k but they have no intention of selling it. They'll just keep it until it disintegrates. Might be a while yet. It looked pretty good when I last saw it. Climate helps I suppose. Edit - I did just ping that Croma over earlier. He's astonished at the price but lets just say, his wife agrees with Sooty... Last edited by: Humph D'Bout on Fri 5 Apr 13 at 21:45 Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 21:57   March 2013 Car Registrations. - Robin O'Reliant

>> >> UK - registrations in first quarter 605,198 - population 62.6 million >> >> Spain - registrations in first quarter 180,724 - population 47.2 million >> >> >> The Spanish are even more skint than we are though, no wonder they don't buy new cars. Reply to this message | Report message

New Fri 5 Apr 13 21:59   March 2013 Car Registrations. - Zero

They never did, even when they were rich. Reply to this message | Report message

New Sat 6 Apr 13 07:38   March 2013 Car Registrations. - lancara

The Spanish also have 15.2m of road (and 229mm of motorway) per person, compared with 6.8m road (60mm motorway - yes, that is millimetres) in UK Reply to this message | Report message

New Sat 6 Apr 13 08:46   March 2013 Car Registrations. - Londoner

The Spanish have a lot of new roads - much beloved of car manufacturers when launching new models, since it makes their cars appear to ride smoothly. Many of these roads are subsidised by EU funds of course. People will think this either a good or a bad thing, depending on their politics. Reply to this message | Report message