Car companies today reported their sales figures for April.  Sales of Ford, Honda and GM were inline with forecasts, but Toyota and Nissan did a lot worse than expected.

Toyota sales were down nearly 42% compared to the year ago period while Nissan sales were down 37.8%.   These are simply awful figures, especially for Toyota since they had recentely surpassed GM to be the number one automaker in the world.  This, of course, is good news for Toyota and Nissan buyers.  We can expect these automakers to continue or expand their rebates and incentives in the coming months to make up for the sales declines.

Chrysler, which filed for bankruptcy this week, saw sales fall nearly 50%.  This dismill  figure was probably due to consumers not wanting to buy from a manufacturer on the brink of bankruptcy.

Analysts are predicting an uptick in sales in the 2nd half of the year.  We’re not so sure about that.  The economy is still losing upwards of 600,000 jobs per month.  We predict sales will be ho-hum through the rest of the year, with some spikes due to ridicolous rebates and incentives.   If you’re looking to buy a car, now IS a good time, but there probably isn’t too much of a rush at this point.

Filed under Sales.