, the impact of the devastating floods in KwaZulu-Natal, elevated inflation, an upward trend in interest rates, record fuel prices, and record highs in the frequency and intensity of load shedding, which weighed heavily on both business and consumer confidence.
Jammine believes that part of this shift has been driven by preemptive buying, with people expecting vehicle prices to increase faster than they have in the wake of the depreciation of the rand against the dollar without recognising that the rand has only very recently depreciated against currencies other than the dollar.Strong value offering
Nada director Gary McCraw said it is amazing that the continuing growth in new vehicle sales was achieved in a year whenlost about 70 000 units of local production because of the disastrous floods in KwaZulu-Natal that put its plant out of action for four months. Despite the disruption to production at the Toyota South Africa Motors plant caused by the floods, vehicle exports grew by 17.9% to 352 450 units in 2022 from the 298 020 units exported in 2021.
Jammine is anticipating very low new vehicle sales growth in 2023 – between zero and 5% and possibly even negative growth – because of the sharp rise in interest rates and the fact that global economic conditions have already started to slow, which will impact negatively on overall economic activity.
Half of the new cars will be repossessed by June sadly.