Fears that car buyers would stay away from dealerships in August never materialized.
Instead, Americans were lured by new models, cheaper financing and the need to replace aging cars. As a result, August sales rose 7.5 percent compared with the same month last year, according to Autodata Corp.
Most major automakers reported healthy sales increases in August, led by Chrysler with a 31 percent jump. Toyota and Honda saw double-digit declines as they continued to struggle with earthquake-related car shortages.
Results were better than expected. Some analysts thought that the volatile stock market and Hurricane Irene would hurt sales. Although it was easy for carmakers to do better than last year, which was the worst August for the industry since a double-dip recession in 1983, the results were also a sign that sales could pick up speed after a disappointing summer of little or no growth.
“Consumers are inching back into buying items and some big-ticket purchases,” said Paul Ballew, a former GM chief economist who now works for Nationwide Insurance.
He attributed the sales increase to people replacing aging vehicles, record-low loan rates of less than 4 percent for customers with good credit, and high trade-in values for used cars. Car loans carried more than 6 percent interest just three years ago.
People are also driving their cars longer than before the recession. The average age of a car in the U.S. was almost 11 years in July, according to the Polk research firm.
