I had an interesting discussion with an experienced auto technician recently about vehicle longevity.
I mentioned reading that the typical lifespan of automobiles has reached approximately 12.6 years and continues to increase gradually over time. However, this mechanic with three decades of experience completely disagreed with this statistic.
He argued that many current vehicles, especially those manufactured before 2017, will likely fail between 8-10 years due to inferior manufacturing quality. According to him, manufacturers now use cheaper components, lower grade metals, and excessive plastic parts throughout the vehicle to reduce weight and costs.
He also mentioned that at buy-here-pay-here dealerships, they repeatedly service the same vehicles as customers frequently default on payments. His prediction is that post-pandemic manufactured cars will start breaking down shortly after their 5-year warranties expire, similar to how household appliances fail.
His theory is that automakers intentionally design vehicles as recurring profit centers rather than long-lasting products. What are your thoughts on this perspective? Are modern cars actually becoming less durable despite the statistics?
I’m torn on this. The 12.6 year average might be statistically accurate, but it doesn’t tell the whole story. My 2015 Honda’s still running great at 9 years, but I’ve seen plenty of newer cars with major issues way earlier.
That mechanic probably sees the worst cases all day, so his perspective’s skewed toward failures. But he’s not wrong about cheap plastic everywhere - pop the hood on a 2020 something and compare it to a 2005. Pretty obvious difference.
The planned obsolescence thing is interesting. They definitely want you buying new every few years, but completely designing cars to fail right after warranty seems risky reputation-wise. Maybe it’s more about making repairs so expensive people just buy new instead of fixing?
The real issue is that average includes all those older, better-built cars still on the road. When a 2002 Toyota finally dies at 20 years, it pulls that average up even if newer cars are crapping out sooner. The buy-here-pay-here observation is telling too - those places know exactly how long cars last because they deal with the cycle constantly.
That 12.6 year figure is misleading - it’s scrappage age, not reliability. Cars don’t get scrapped when they break down. They get traded, sold, repaired, and passed around the used market for years. A car with transmission problems at year 8 might still be driving at year 15 with its third owner. Your mechanic’s BHPH experience proves this perfectly. Those dealers see the same cars cycling through multiple owners because they’re functional enough to drive but unreliable enough that people keep defaulting and trading them back. If modern cars really lasted 12+ years without major issues, the subprime auto market would look totally different. The real test isn’t how long cars stay registered - it’s how long they stay with their original owners. Most people trade out around 6-8 years, right before major components start failing. That’s not coincidence. Manufacturers hit their sweet spot: long enough to avoid lemon law issues, short enough to keep the replacement cycle humming.
Both sides are probably right. That 12.6 year average is likely accurate, but it doesn’t show the full picture.
Lenders are pushing 72 and 84-month loans more often now, which means they think cars will last longer. Or maybe they’re just trying to make payments affordable – hard to say which.
Your mechanic friend’s onto something with planned obsolescence. Think about it: if cars lasted 20+ years like some older ones do, new car sales would tank. The whole lending system depends on people buying replacements. That 8-12 year sweet spot works perfectly – long enough to avoid warranty headaches, short enough to keep people shopping.
The used car market tells a different story though. Subprime lenders still finance 10-15 year old cars, but repos are climbing. Sure, the economy’s rough, but durability problems definitely hurt loan performance 
The real test? Watch resale values and repo rates for those post-2020 vehicles over the next few years.