Men like looks, women practicality in cars: study

DETROIT: The beefy men prefer their cars or fast, while women go for lower price tags and higher miles per gallon, according to a poll released Thursday.

TrueCar.com, who studied the data of 8 million purchases in the U.S. last year, found Mini BMW AG had the highest percentage of women buyers to 48 percent, while 93 percent buyers Ferrari Fiat SpA were men.

"The study shows that car buyers are women more aware of costs and the purchase of fuel efficient vehicles while buyers of males were completely opposite, the purchase of vehicles that were either large and fleshy, like a big truck, or choose a high price, high-performance vehicle, "TrueCare analyst Jesse Toprak said in a statement.

After Mini with women were Kia Motors Corp. (47 percent) and Honda Motors Co. Ltd. (46 percent) brand vehicles, according to the study. Last year, Saturn General Motors Co. and Kia linked to 45.2 percent, followed by Mini at 45 percent.

There were 15 brands with over 40 percent of women buyers, TrueCare said.

Maserati (84 percent), Porsche (80 percent) and General Motors GMC (74 percent), followed by Ferrari for the largest percentage of male buyers, according to the study.

The best selling model for women, with a minimum of 1,000 retail sales was New Beetle from Volkswagen AG to 61 percent, while for men it was the Porsche 911 to 88 per cent TrueCare said.