Your car is the second most expensive purchase you’re likely to make after your home. Now a new survey from BankRate shows which vehicles are likely to be unloaded by their owners after just one year. That means if any of these cars strike your fancy, you can get a real deal on them if you buy used!
All vehicles are model year 2014 unless otherwise noted.
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7 new cars that get sold most ofter after one-year of ownership
The Buick Regal has a 10.7% resale rate after one year. With a new price of $33,541 and a used price of $22,736, that means you could save 32.2% buying used!
You can save 19.6% on a used Chevrolet Sonic. The new price is $17,952 and the used price is $14,439. It gets sold by 8.9% of people who buy it new.
The BMW X1 is sold by 7.8% of owners after one year. With a new price of $39,126 and a used price of $32,112, you can save 17.9% buying used.
You can save 31% on a used Dodge Charger. The new price is $31,813 and the used price is $21,960. It gets sold by 7.7% of people who buy it new.
The Mercedes-Benz C-Class is sold by 7.4% of owners after one year. With a new price of $44,343 and a used price of $31,729, you can save 28.4% buying used.
Expect to save 18.8% on a used Chevrolet Cruze. The new price is $20,586 and the used price is $16,706. It it unloaded after one year by 7.2% of people who buy it new.
The Nissan Frontier is sold by 6.9% of owners after one year. With a new price of $26,272 and a used price of $25,060, you’ll only save 4.6% buying used.
Luxury cars, low-to-mid market cars hit the hardest
As you look at this list, you see a lot of low-to-middle market cars (Sonic, Cruze) and a couple of luxury cars (Mercedes, BMW).
Why would the luxury cars in particular lose their value? Because with luxury cars, when you buy new, it’s very easy to run up the price sky high. Take the BMW 3 as an example. You can buy an entry level model in the 3 series in the low 30s. (The average new car price in America today is right around $32,000). Or you can buy a 3 series that’s $60,000 or more.
With a lot of luxury cars, people pile on the options. But the danger of that is if you dump that car during the first few years of ownership, the value has dropped like a rock because of depreciation and you have to eat that loss.
Then think about how Tesla does business. You build the Tesla S online. There’s no salesperson telling you about this or that must-have feature. Yet someone can still easily double the price of the car by the time they’re done with the options. (Read why Clark decided to buy a Tesla S.)
So, if you like luxury cars and your money matters to you, be sure to buy them used. This is true for luxury cars more than any other kind of vehicle.
Be sure to check out our used car buying tips before you start your next vehicle search!
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