Are Trucks & SUVs Becoming the Luxury Sports Cars of Auto Leasing?
The preferences of auto lease customers continue to shift from smaller vehicles to SUVs and trucks, according to Swapalease.com.
Back in the second quarter of 2016, roughly 27.5 percent of Swapalease.com drivers listed their vehicle as a luxury sports sedan, while another 24 percent listed their vehicle as either a truck or an SUV. By the second quarter of this year the tide definitely shifted, with 22.8 percent driving a luxury sports sedan and 27.2 percent listing a truck or an SUV as their current vehicle lease.
As far as the type of vehicle current Swapalease.com consumers want to drive, 32.9 percent listed an SUV, compared to the 30.3 percent wanting an SUV in 2016. For small cars, this number has dropped to 6.7 percent this year, down from 7.1 percent in 2016.
Swapalease.com reported other trends in its data.
Vehicle leases have historically been written for either 36- or 39-month terms. However, 54.1 percent of drivers said their ideal lease term was for two years, up 4 percent compared to survey respondents in 2016. Only 39.4 percent of Swapalease.com customers currently list the three-year auto lease term as ideal.
Historically, the majority of leases written are for foreign brands, and this trend seems to be growing, according to Swapalease.com. This year, 68.2 percent of drivers said they were currently leasing a foreign brand vehicle, up 2.2 percent compared to 2016.
Meanwhile, 49.9 percent of customers surveyed by Swapalease.com said they wanted their next vehicle lease to be with a different brand. That’s a 5.2 percent increase compared to 2016.
“America continues to say they want to drive trucks and SUVs rather than smaller cars, and this is especially true in a lease environment,” said Scot Hall, executive vice president of Swapalease.com. “We still see very attractive and aggressive deals on smaller car leases, and we certainly don’t think these will go away any time soon, but it would be wise for dealers, OEMs and even lenders to take note of this trend to build lease offers around their trucks and SUVs to satisfy this growing demand further.”
