Rent or Pay in Installments: Tires are Unprecedently Expensive in Iran

An astronomical jump in the prices of tires has started a new phenomenon in the Iranian market, where vendors are offering “Tires for Rent” and “Buy Tires and Pay in Installments."

Some people even try to repair tires by knurling them again, which is an extremely dangerous non-standard practice.

According to the website Eghtesad 24, four Chinese-made tires for a made-in-Iran Kia Pride car currently cost around six million tomans ($98) at the open market exchange rate. 

So, a worker with a salary of 7.1 million tomans ($116) must spend almost all her monthly income to buy tires.

The steep rise in tire prices following a shortage in the Iranian market means that many now cannot afford new tires. 

In late April, the government officially permitted the price of tires to rise even though only six months earlier, the Ministry of Industry had agreed to raise the prices by 20 percent.

The secretary of the Iranian Tire Industry Guild had earlier claimed that foreign currency problems were responsible for the shortage of tires in the Iranian market.

However, earlier this year, a scandal revealed that $22 million to import 200,000 tires had been embezzled at Astan Quds Razavi, a very wealthy religious foundation in the holy city of Mashhad. 

The foundation received the $22 million at the official foreign currency price, which is a fraction of the price in the open market. However, it imported no tires.