What Cars Are Boomers Buying?Forget oversized SUVs. The bestselling 2011 cars reflect an increasingly practical streak among middle-aged consumers.

The Ford F Series trucks are the overall bestselling new vehicles for middle-aged consumers in 2011, though fuel-efficient imports showed the biggest growth in sales this year.

That assessment comes from the number-crunching automotive industry analysts atEdmunds.comwho compiled data for SecondAct.com on the hottest-selling 2011 vehicles for people ages 45 and over.

The findings contradict analysts' assumptions a few years back that as baby boomers became empty nesters, they would spend their extra income on luxury vehicles and the sort of flashy sports cars that they coveted in their youth. Instead, faced with rising gasoline prices, an economic crisis that has shrunk their nest eggs and the need to keep working (and to help out adult children who can't find jobs), many boomers seem to be rethinking their priorities.

"We are seeing a trend of 45-plus purchasers moving toward affordable, more fuel-efficient import cars like the Toyota Yaris, the Nissan Versa and the Kia Forte," says Edmunds.com senior market intelligence analyst Art Kerdmanee. "This is a huge shift from their typical purchase patterns of large domestic sedans."

Top Sellers
虽然小,full-efficient进口大growth area, not all boomers are ready to give up on their old favorites. When Edmunds analysts looked at the overall top-selling cars for buyers 45 and older, they found that some familiar names were still at the top of the list, though they aren't selling as well as in the past.

Listing	Type of Car / Truck	# Sold from January - August 2011
1.	Ford F Series line of trucks:This pick has been around since 1948, practically as long as the oldest boomers.	122005年
2.	Chevrolet Silverado	103,476
3.	Toyota Camry	99,895
4.	Honda Accord	90,444
5.	Honda CR-V	86,188
6.	Hyundai Sonata	82,250
7.	Honda Civic	81,026
8.	Chevrolet Equinox	75,352
9.	Ford Escape	73,919
10.	Ford Fusion	69,325

Growth Trends
The changing market is reflected in Edmunds.com's list of the cars showing the most sales growth from purchasers 45 and older between 2010 and January to August 2011.

Listing	Type of Car / Truck	% Increase over 2010
1.	Toyota Yaris	19.1
2.	Toyota Corolla	12.0
3.	Nissan Versa	11.0
4.	VW Tiguan	10.9
5.	Nissan Xterra	10.7
6.	Kia Forte	10.7
7.	Toyota RAV4	10.2
8.	VW CC	9.7
9.	Honda Fit	9.5
10.	BMW 3 Series	9.5

Overall Market
And though boomers' tastes are shifting, they're such a vast segment of the population that they still make up the bulk of the market for big sedans and luxury-class sport utility vehicles. Here's the list of the 2011 vehicles with the highest percentages of total purchases made by 45-and-older consumers.

Listing	Type of Car / Truck	% total purchases made by ppl 45+
1.	Buick Lucerne	88.7
2.	Toyota Avalon	88.7
3.	Lincoln MKZ	87.0
4.	Buick Lacrosse	85.3
5.	Chevrolet Impala	84.0
6.	Lexus ES	83.9
7.	类似MKX林肯	82.4
8.	Ford Ranger	81.8
9.	Cadillac CTS	80.5
10.	Cadillac SRX	79.6

走在By
Edmunds also provided data on the vehicles with the lowest percentage of their total sales coming from adults 45 and over. At the bottom is theHonda Odyssey minivan, with its Toyota counterpart, theSienna, close behind. Another vehicle middled-aged buyers avoided is theNissan Pathfinder, an example of the bulky, more-truck-than-car SUV that appealed to car buyers in the early 2000s before the rise of gas prices. Similarly, the vehicle with the biggest year-to-year decline in percentage of sales to 45-and-overs is theFord Explorer,a midsized sport utility that peaked in popularity in the 1990s.

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