Import cars in South Korea are rising in popularity rapidly with 269 import cars currently on sale in the country. With the US-S.Korea Free-Trade Agreement Pact taking effect next year, the numbers will only continue to rise. This agreement will clear any tariffs placed on imports from the US to South Korea and vice versa.The first-half bi-annual sales numbers of the best and worst-selling import cars in South Korea were released today. The new Honda CR-V (Korean-version pictured) was the positive note with 1870 vehicles sold in the timeframe. On the negative note, the Saab 9-3 Arc SportCombi TiD did not make it past the showrooms with nil sales. In order of the highest sales to lowest, the top 10 selling import cars in South Korea were: Honda CR-V (1870), Lexus ES350 (1596), BMW 320d (880), Infiniti G35 Sedan (876), BMW 523d (772), Lexus LS460 (752), Lexus IS250 (706), Audi A6 2.4 (690), Peugeot 307SW HDI (524) and the Volkswagen Passat 2.0 TDI with 475 vehicles sold.
Something interesting we were able to catch is that the Hyundai Tuscani (Tiburon) performed worse than the import Honda CR-V. Apparently, many anticipated buyers are holding off their purchases for the 2009 Tiburon (BK), which will be RWD and offer a more powerful array of engines, going on sale in South Korea in 2008.
