Chinese luxury car owners young with distinctive images: report

Chinese luxury car owners are, on average, 33.5 years old, that choose selective car brands as status symbols to support their image, according to a report released Wednesday.

"The Luxury Car Brands in China 2014", released by the Hurun Research Institute, compared eight luxury car brands in China: Audi, BMW, Mercedes Benz, Lexus, Volvo, Land Rover, Cadillac and Infiniti.

The findings show that luxury car owners in China were young, highly educated and wealthy. Seventy-six percent of luxury car owners were men and about 10 percent had spent at least three years overseas.

Eight-hundred owners of the eight car brands from 10 major cities -- including Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou -- were surveyed between February and October this year. It was found that those surveyed had 1.4 cars each.

Mercedes-Benz owners had the highest income, Infiniti owners the lowest; BMW owners had the highest percentage of female owners, while Cadillac had the highest percentage of male owners; Volvo owners were the highest educated, whilst Land Rover owners were the least educated, the report said.

Of those surveyed Audi's were the choice of government officials, whilst Land Rover that of entrepreneurs. Lexus had the least distinct ownership group, it said.

China has 1.09 million individuals with personal wealth of 10 million yuan (about 1.63 million U.S. dollars), according to another Hurun report.

The average monthly income of the luxury car owners was 30,000 yuan with their household income reaching 88,000 yuan, according to the report.

In terms of buying motivation, 50 percent of respondents said: "my old car was broken or getting old".

Impulse was also a driving force for purchases, with 44 percent buying a vehicle after seeing it at an exhibition and 36 percent inspired by an advert or after a test drive.

The report also showed that 80 percent were aware of negative publicity surrounding luxury car owners. BMW was the subject of the most negative publicity, whilst Volvo received the least.