CNW: Lease Penetration to Reach 25 Percent This Year
By Jennifer Reed, Auto Group Editor
February 23, 2010
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BANDON, Ore. — Reviewing both open and closed-end leases from dealers and third-party lessors, such as banks, CNW Research discovered that the automaker with the largest market share is Ford.
Ford trucks apparently account for more than 8.6 percent of lessees in January. Meanwhile, Toyota cars came in second with 6.4 percent of all leased vehicles.
"In both cases, their sales share is larger than their lease share," Art Spinella, of CNW, highlighted. "Conversely, Toyota trucks and Ford cars have a higher lease share than sales."
Luxury brands, such as BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Lexus all show dramatically higher lease shares than sales. This tends to be a common trend as a large percentage of lessees are in the higher income brackets, or basically aspire to more luxurious vehicles, Spinella pointed out.
In fact, the choice to lease can be a tax consideration or business decision, he noted. And in the latter case, lease contracts tend not to show up on credit reports as liabilities.
"Leasing's comeback is fueled by a desire among automakers to keep monthly payments as low as possible as both a draw for fence-sitting consumers (those who can't decide to acquire a vehicle now or later) and a way to better manage inventories, production and future marketing costs," Spinella explained. "For certain: This year's lease share will top a quarter of all sales."
Breakdown of CNW's findings:
Ford trucks: 8.64 percent lease market share, 9.4 percent sales market share
Toyota cars: 6.40 percent, 7.1 percent
Toyota trucks: 5.43 percent, 4.4 percent
Chevrolet trucks: 4.96 percent, 7.3 percent
Chevrolet cars: 4.68 percent, 7.7 percent
Ford cars: 4.55 percent, 4.9 percent
Nissan cars: 3.76 percent, 5.6 percent
GMC trucks: 3.73 percent, 3 percent
BMW cars: 3.43 percent, 1.4 percent
Mercedes-Benz cars: 3.21 percent, 1.4 percent
Hyundai cars: 2.85 percent, 3 percent
Lexus cars: 2.74 percent, 1.1 percent
Lexus trucks: 2.5 percent, 1.1 percent
Mercedes-Benz trucks: 1.99 percent, 0.8 percent
Jeep trucks: 1.98 percent, 2.2 percent
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