Press Release
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact:
Jeannine Fallon
www.Edmunds.com
Office: 310-309-4900
jfallon@edmunds.com
Average Monthly Car Payments Falling As Loan Terms Extend to
Record Lengths, According to Edmunds.com
Santa Monica, CA - Nov 25, 2003 - The average monthly new car payment dropped
from $466 per month for cars sold in October 2002 to $447 per month for cars sold
in October 2003, according to Edmunds.com, the premier
online resource for automotive information.
"Ironically, this trend does not reflect lower transaction prices or lower loan
amounts, both of which rose during the last year," stated Dr. Jane Liu, Executive
Director of Data Analysis for Edmunds.com. "Instead, the lower payments came about
because the average financing has stretched from 59.6 months last year to over
62 months this year. Over 38% of last month's new car buyers took out loans for
terms exceeding 60 months, as compared to only 24% of car buyers in October 2002."
In October 2003, the average car loan amount was $23,801, an increase of 0.9%
from last October's $23,656. And the average finance rate rose from 5.46% in October
2002 to 5.63% in October 2003. So, taking into the increased term lengths this
year's new car buyers will pay an average of $285 more in interest.
New car prices are rising from month to month as well. From September to October
2003 the Edmunds.com New Vehicle Price Index rose a remarkable 1.68% to 99.8%
(base = 100 set in January 2002), which corresponds to an annual rate of over
22%.
This data was released today with the Edmunds Price Index for new vehicles (EPI-N),
which reflects price shifts for the industry as a whole, and can be analyzed by
different market segmentation. Similar to the Consumer Price Index, the EPI-N
measures the average changes in retail prices for a fixed basket of new vehicles
with fixed options over time for the purpose of trend analysis. This index takes
into account all of the manufacturers' various United States incentives programs,
including subvented interest rates and lease programs as well as cash rebates
to consumers and dealers. Edmunds.com also analyzes transaction prices and net
prices by country of origin, manufacturer, make and model, reflecting manufacturer-to-consumer
rebates, including low APR and special lease programs.
About Edmunds.com, Inc.
Edmunds.com is the premier online resource
for automotive information. Its comprehensive set of data, tools and services,
including Edmunds.com True Market Value® pricing, is generated
by Edmunds Data Services and is licensed to third parties. For example, the company
supplies over 800,000 pages of content for AOL's auto channel and NYTimes.com's
auto section and delivers monthly data reports to Wall Street analysts. Edmunds.com
was named "best car research" site by Forbes ASAP, has been selected by consumers
as the "most useful Web site" according to every J.D. Power and Associates New
Autoshopper.com StudySM, and was ranked first in the Survey of Car-Shopping
Web Sites as reported by The Wall Street Journal. The company is headquartered
in Santa Monica, California and maintains a satellite office in Troy, Michigan.
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