Civic at head of class for teens
6/20/2007
sacbee.com

What do teenagers drive, other than parents crazy?

Not the Mustangs or Corvettes they fantasize about, but mostly drive new or used Honda Civics.

That's the finding of a study by Quality Planning Corp., a San Francisco-based firm that works with insurance companies to reduce underwriting costs. It divined what teens drive from the cars they insure.

"We found the time-honored battle between teen desires and parental practicality is alive and well," said Ted Harris, manager of research and development at QPC.

So whoever holds the checkbook chooses what teens drive.

That's why the Toyota Camry was high on the list of used cars teens drive, a popular hand-me-down considering its status as the best-selling passenger car in the U.S. for years.

But when teens didn't have to settle for the leftovers, Camry wasn't even on the list.

In its survey of more than 17,000 16- to 18-year-olds, QPC found the Top 10 new vehicles, representing only 16.4 percent of the total teen cars, were Civic, Ford Focus, Toyota Corolla, Chevy Cavalier, Ford Ranger, Accord, Ford F-150, Ford Explorer, and Pontiac Grand Am and Sunfire.

Harris said vehicles 1 to 3 years old were considered new for the teens, the reason Grand Am (replaced by the G6 for 2005), Cavalier (replaced by Cobalt for 2005) and Sunfire (dropped after the 2005 model year) were there.

Sports cars, like Mustang, didn't make the top 10. Parents are concerned about the perceived risks of a high-performance car for a novice driver and the high cost to insure one.

No big sport-utility vehicles either, in part because teens favor small and easy-to-park machines, but in larger part because of high gas prices.

"A year ago Hummer was a teen fashion trend, now it's old-school and lost its popularity," Harris said.

Among the used cars, 7 to 10 years old for survey purposes, teens' Top 10 rides were Civic, Accord, Camry, Cavalier, Explorer, Corolla, Ranger, Grand Am, Jeep Grand Cherokee and Ford Taurus.