What’s so important about car colors — more importantly, the color of your car?
Depending on how you purchased your vehicle – from a previous owner or if it just happened to be the one on the lot – you may not have given the color of your vehicle much thought. It’s just a color, after all.
What you may not realize, however, is that car colors are not as trivial as they appear on the surface. In fact, the color of your vehicle may directly influence your ownership experience. Here are the facts…
Most Popular Car Colors in the United States
As unique as people can be, consumers’ desires pertaining to vehicle paint colors are rather tame, to say the least: twenty-three percent of Americans choose silver, fifteen percent select white and twelve percent drive a black vehicle. The remaining fifty percent of consumers purchase more vibrantly colored vehicles, such as red, blue, green, etc.
Best Car Colors for the Highest Resale Value
Taking into account that the average car will have 3-4 owners before it drives away to the big junk yard in the sky, it’s not an unrealistic expectation to consider putting your vehicle up for sale before it exits its prime. Wanting to sell your car isn’t enough to get top dollar, however; the color of your vehicle plays a large role in your car’s resale value.
Due possibly to the market saturation described in the paragraph above, silver, white and black car colors do not retain the same value as their more uniquely toned counterparts. The top five colors with the least depreciation rate are orange, yellow, green, brown and red.
Which Car Colors Can Get You In Trouble With the Law?
Although profiling vehicles based on paint color is considered dubious by many law-abiding citizens around the country, drivers have questioned whether or not certain shades of vehicles are ticketed more often than others.
The answer is “yes,” but not exactly for the reasons you may think.
The perception is that brighter vehicles – particularly red, yellow and orange – are ticketed more often because of their vivid, eye-catching tones. This, however, is not the case. Falling in line with the most popular car colors chosen by United States drivers, the most commonly ticketed shades of vehicles include white, gray and silver. Looking at pure data alone, these shades of colors are only ticketed more often because they happen to occupy the largest space on roadways, thus dispelling any myths that red cars are more likely to be pulled over just for being red.
Make An Educated Decision
So there you have it! The next time you’re in the market for a new or used vehicle, pay attention to your paint color. Consider how your choices now will effect your wallet down the road. If you intend to own your vehicle until the final mile ticks across the tachometer, a white, silver or black color is suitable. If you believe you may sell your car later on, choose a more vibrant paint scheme; they look good driving down the road, and they’re worth more in the long run.