High new car prices mean used cars are being kept for longer
Mike Rutherford thinks the average £44k cost of a new car is putting people off replacing their motors
Get the feeling that everyone around you seems to be enjoying their new cars while you’re still stuck with the one you’ve had for plenty of years? Rest assured: you’re not alone in having such thoughts.
Of the 36 million cars registered in the UK, 20 per cent are seven to nine years old and 18 per cent are between 10 to 12. Astonishingly, almost a third (32 per cent) have already had their 12th birthdays. And at the other end
of the scale, just 15 per cent are less than three years old and the same amount again are between three and six.
Put another way, the majority (70 per cent) of cars on the road today are over or way beyond seven years old. Even more shockingly, those in the 12-plus age bracket represent by far the largest proportion on the road.
Looking to take the plunge and buy a new car? Tell us which new car you’re interested in and get the very best offers from our network of over 5,500 UK dealers to compare. Let’s go…
In the main, members of the motoring majority are hanging onto well and truly used, battered and bruised cars due to the economics of life in the inflationary 2020s. The average new car this spring/summer reportedly costs around £44,000. So if a driver owns, say, a tired, high-mileage but still reliable and loved premium saloon that’s worth only £4,000 on the second-hand market, the prospect of he or she being able or willing to switch to an equivalent new car costing an extra 40 grand is highly unlikely, if not impossible, for their family finances. Thus, more tried and tested old cars are being kept on the road longer. And why not?
Inevitably, new-car sales have fallen. Between 2015 and 2019, they exceeded two million a year. Yet from 2020 to ’24 they plummeted below the psychologically important 2m mark.
Something to do with savvy motorists already recognising the growing value for money, reliability and longevity that used motors offer, and being turned off by the circa £44k price tags for average (and sometimes very average) new models? Without doubt.
Today’s most clued-up drivers know and sensibly exploit the fact that they can buy modest, decidedly used but perfectly adequate ‘ageing’ cars via their personal disposable incomes and/or savings. In doing so, they avoid the huge expense of borrowing money at high interest rates. These are the type of loans that can easily lead to that initial purchase price of £44,000 rising way beyond £50,000 all-in. This is not the sort of money an average motorist on an average salary should have to spend on an average new car.
There are also some ‘matter of principle’ issues here. Friends and relatives assure me that even though they’ve been serial new-car buyers in the past and remain as wealthy as ever, they object to recent inflation-shattering new-car price hikes and refuse to pay them.
Instead they drive their “old, much-loved, nicely run-in” cars that cost them relatively little. Can the motor manufacturers blame them? More importantly, what is the industry doing to make new cars the attractive buying propositions they were not long ago? You know, when showroom prices were fairer, logical and more customer-friendly?
Great leasing deals available now
Vauxhall Astra
Ford Puma
Nissan Qashqai
Hyundai Tucson
Peugeot 5008
Skoda Enyaq
Find a car with the experts
