Vehicle digital platform CarsIreland.ie and Cartell.ie have announced the results of their first joint analysis on the used car market.

For the study CarsIreland.ie looked at the most-popular-searched-cars across its site in February 2021. Those results were then compared with data from Cartell.ie which showed the most popular private models so far in 2021 by total numbers of used-car transactions, for both indigenous and imported vehicles.

The most popular searched models on CarsIreland in February 2021 were:

1    VOLKSWAGEN Golf    4.89%
2    FORD Focus    3.34%
3    BMW 5 Series    3.07%
4    MERCEDES-BENZ E Class    2.99%
5    NISSAN Qashqai    2.52%
6    BMW 3 Series    2.23%
7    AUDI A4    2.22%
8    AUDI A6    2.19%
9    VOLKSWAGEN Passat    2.04%
10  HYUNDAI Tucson    1.94%

Cartell reports the most popular models in the Irish fleet (Private Used and Imported YTD 2021) are:

1.    FORD FOCUS    4369
2.    VW GOLF    4335
3.    VW PASSAT    3059
4.    TOYOTA COROLLA    2440
5.    AUDI A4    2149
6.    FORD FIESTA    2065
7.    NISSAN QASHQAI    1947
8.    TOYOTA AVENSIS    1841
9.    TOYOTA YARIS    1783
10.  OPEL ASTRA    1768

The results show that the top two models, on both lists, were the VW Golf and the Ford Focus. This highlights the popularity of those models end-to-end in the sales cycle from initial search by the potential buyer through to a completed transaction for the vehicle.

Interestingly, the results also showed that the third-most-popular-model searched on CarsIreland.ie in February was the BMW 5 Series, while, on the other list, the corresponding ranking for that vehicle placed it outside the op 10 at rank 11. This highlights that significant volumes of searches early-on in the buying cycle may be aspirational. Evidence of this trend can be seen further down the list where both the Mercedes Benz E Class, the BMW 3 Series and the Audi A6 appear in the top-10 on the list of most-searched vehicles, while those same vehicles do not appear at all in the list of most popular vehicles by numbers of transactions so far in 2021.