The French, like the Europeans, travel fewer and fewer kilometers with their own cars and buy fewer new vehicles, favoring the second-hand market. This is the consequence of a lack of purchasing power but also a more utilitarian report to the automobile.
In the early 1990s, sales to individuals accounted for three quarters of the French car market, today it is less than half, notes Flavien Neuvy, director of Cetelem Observatory of the automobile. “What is striking is that the decline is constant over the past 25 years” and it is general in Europe, he says.
If new sales are generally maintained in these mature markets, it is thanks to corporate purchases, including for company cars.
Dear cars …
“There is of course a problem of purchasing power, cars are becoming more expensive,” says Neuvy. “Young people do not buy new cars, but they do not reject them or they do not need them, just because they are financially out of reach.”
“The bulk of the population turns to used vehicles,” says Jean-Francois Doulet, mobility specialist and author of the Atlas of the automobile. He points out that the rate of equipment is constantly increasing and that the market as a whole must be considered. The second-hand market is growing and represents more than twice the volumes of new.
In the early 1990s, about 7% of households each year bought a new car. Today it is half the time, and the vehicles purchased are also less used. The mileage traveled drops an average of 100 km per year. Result: the car wears less and we keep it longer …
A boon that benefits the low cost and Dacia brand
Now, “buyers of new vehicles have a very particular profile, more masculine, more senior.The average age of buyers is around 55 years,” says Mr. Doulet.Cars, ever more sophisticated, better equipped, never stop to see their prices swell faster than inflation. In France, the average price of new models reached this year nearly 27,000 euros. In Germany, it is even more than 30,000 euros. “Mechanically, this has removed some of the population from the new home market.There is some of the customers who can not or do not want to put so much money into a “This trend is a boon for the Dacia brand (Renault group), a low-cost car specialist with virtually no competition in this niche. City car Sandero was Europe’s best-selling retail model in the first half, according to data from Jato Dynamics. Its Duster is also the best selling 4×4 (SUV) on the continent, always excluding business customers.
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