About 39% of Americans who have bought a car report some form of purchase regret, according to a LendingTree survey of 1,919 US car owners. That figure covers all buyers — new and used combined; the survey never separates the two, so it cannot tell us whether new-car or used-car buyers regret more. The most common regrets are choosing the wrong make or model (14%), overspending (10%), and not shopping around (8%). Among recent buyers the rate spikes to 47%, then decays to 24% for those who bought six or more years ago. A second all-buyer source, CarGurus’ 2024 Consumer Insights Survey (n=3,150), found 79% of buyers satisfied — again not broken out by new versus used, and satisfaction is not the same thing as regret. Because no source isolates new-only from used-only regret, both sides of this pair carry the same 39% all-buyer baseline, and this entry is flagged as a proxy.
The financial mechanism is plausible even without pinning down exact figures: new vehicles carry a substantially higher purchase price and monthly payment than used ones, and depreciate fastest in the first year or two of ownership. Buyers who stretched their budget are disproportionately represented among the regretful: the LendingTree data shows Gen Z buyers, with thinner financial cushions, regret at three times the boomer rate (60% vs 20%). Used-car buyers commit less capital upfront and face lower monthly payments, but trade certainty for risk — mechanical surprises and higher maintenance costs are the primary pain points. Cox Automotive’s 2023 study found 49% of all car buyers paid more than expected, a figure that cuts across both segments but likely stings more against a higher new-car baseline price than a lower used-car one.
The honest answer is that the survey data cannot rank new against used. Neither the LendingTree nor the CarGurus study isolates new-from-used, and the CarGurus figure measures satisfaction rather than regret. The financial argument that committing more capital to a faster-depreciating asset should generate more regret is plausible, but no source in the evidence base actually measures it — so this pair reports the same all-buyer regret rate on both sides and no measured gap.