Vehicles under $15k are 1.6% of the market, and their share of the market has dropped over 90% since 2019. The old advice that you can get a beater and drive it in to the ground for $5k hasn't been true for years but it still seems pervasive in personal finance spaces.
Increased safety features on recent car models are a factor here as well. In the decade before I drove, airbags became standard, and weren’t even required until I’d been driving for a bit.
And over the last 10 years, NHTSA has pushed for stability control, 5 star crash test ratings, etc…
Then the whirlwind of safety over the last 5 years where back up cameras became required, and blind spot monitoring, brake assist, lane keep assist, adaptive cruise control all became available features.
You can still buy a car without those, for sure, and unfortunately that still costs $12k unless you want 200k miles or rebuilt titles.
But as I’m shopping for my kids first car, I find it hard to draw the line on what safety features she can have vs not have, and suddenly a few safety features later, used cars cost $20k. A far cry from my first car that I bought for $1k and drove in to the ground.
It's Almost Impossible To Find A Decent Used Car Under $20,000 ( jalopnik.com )
Vehicles under $15k are 1.6% of the market, and their share of the market has dropped over 90% since 2019. The old advice that you can get a beater and drive it in to the ground for $5k hasn't been true for years but it still seems pervasive in personal finance spaces.