Many will be able to buy a new car in 2023

The main factor in the rise in car prices in 2022 was the state of uncertainty in the supply, difficulties with logistics and importation of both the cars themselves and their components, as well as the volatility of the foreign exchange market – exchange rates were constantly changing, and it was hard to predict them.

Now the market is gradually leveling off, promising more order, allowing sellers to make fairly transparent predictions that will come true.

What happened in the car market in 2022 is very well reflected in the price charts of popular models. It is noteworthy that the most unruly prices were those for budget cars of popular brands. This can be seen on the price growth chart. Kia Rio:

Price card for Volkswagen Tiguan turned out to be more broken, but by the end of 2022, costs reached a plateau:

Prices for cars in the premium segment turned out to be more stable and after the March “panic” they went down and depended on the exchange rate (e.g. Mercedes—Benz E-class):

Expert opinion

– Basically, cars of those brands that have lost stocks or production capabilities have increased in price. Chinese manufacturers have also leveled their prices in the market after Korean and Japanese brands, but not as much in percentage terms. At the end of 2022, domestic cars have increased the least in price, with the exception of the Lada Largus, which experienced a production shortfall.

The trend is changing: the market has learned to adapt quickly, and if we see an increase in car production and supply in 2023, it is likely to contribute to a drop in weighted average prices in the market.

The emergence of a large number of new brands and models on the market, especially in the price range of 1,300,000 – 1,800,000, may also affect the price reduction in 2023.

With this in the context of the year, I think we’ll still see about a 10-15% price increase depending on the segment, but like last year, this forecast could be impacted by a variety of factors.

With parallel imports, suppliers of premium cars have a fairly large stock to “negotiate”, which allows buyers to receive more interesting offers with an increase in the number of deliveries. But in the segment with a price range up to 2 million rubles, such a reserve is less, and the cost is usually the same.

I think as the market fills up with Chinese-made cars, we will see prices for Korean and Japanese cars come down. In this case, there is warranty support, a wide range of options, interesting design solutions, a wide variety of models. And we, in turn, see an increase in the share of Chinese car manufacturers in the passenger car segment almost every month.

Photo: Sergey Bobylev / TASS