We all choose the color of our beloved cars according to our personal taste. That’s nothing unusual but did you know that color can affect the resale value? Take a look at these statistics, you might be surprised.
There was a study recently that was conducted by car search engine iSeeCars, and it analyzed over 2.1 million used vehicle sales and found out that color really does impact the value when passing on ownership.
Cars generally depreciate 33.1% on average in the first three years but did you know that yellow ones keep their values best? Well, they do. They have a depreciation rate of 27%. On the other hand, gold cars depreciate the most, and they stand at 37.1%.
“Yellow cars are relatively less common, which could drive up demand and help maintain their value,” claimed Phong Ly, iSeeCars CEO. “Our analysis shows that yellow vehicles have the lowest depreciation of any color for lower-volume cars like convertibles. Interestingly, yellow is also the color with the least depreciation for popular body styles like SUVs and pickup trucks.”
Based on this research we found out that green and orange cars also retain their value fairly good. They are also less common just like their yellow counterparts. But, let’s talk numbers. Only 1.2% of all three-year-old vehicles have a green or orange paint job.
Now, do not put all the blame on rarity because there are even worse colors than green and orange. Purple, beige and gold also make up a very small percentage. They stand at 0.7%.
We have to denote that only because some colors retain their value better that doesn’t necessarily mean that they also sell better. For example, yellow cars average 41.5 days on the used car market. Their ‘title-contending’ orange friends stand at 38.1 and green ones wait for 36.2 days before being bought. The ‘average’ car that isn’t colored in any of these ‘exotic’ colors sells after 36.5 days.
Now, your car could be of any color, but preserving that pristine glow of a new vehicle is difficult over the years, especially if you don’t have a garage, leaving your vehicle exposed to the sun and rain. That is why car wax should be your friend. You will be able to display your car in its full glory and the good news is that it is not expensive. Green, yellow, black and white – it doesn’t really matter.
