Jan 2023

Fleet Leasing to Rally in 2023

Experts are predicting that leasing will grow as a proportion of auto sales in 2023 after falling last year to what Cox Automotive said was its lowest share of the market in at least a decade. Affordability concerns and increased automaker incentive spending are expected to help drive that growth, experts said.

Cox Automotive projects that leasing will represent 21% of new-vehicle retail sales in 2023, up from an estimated 19% in 2022, according to Charlie Chesbrough, the company’s senior economist. Even with that expected jump, the share of customers leasing this year will still be below 2019’s pre-pandemic levels when lease deals made up 30% of retail sales.

Alex Yurchenko, chief data science officer for Black Book, also expects 2022 will mark the bottom of the industry leasing collapse brought on by the pandemic and inventory shortages. Yurchenko said Black Book projects that lease share will grow to “above 20%” of sales in 2023, and while it’s going to start increasing, lease share won’t return to pre-pandemic heights anytime soon.