The automotive market in Bulgaria is characterized with steady growth of new car imports and sales, and decreasing imports of used cars. In 2006 new car sales grew 30% while trucks and buses grew 62.6%.
Despite the upward trend in new car sales, automobiles in Bulgaria tend to be very old with the continued import of used cars at a rate of about 150.000 cars per year. Almost 20% of the cars registered in Bulgaria are older than 20 years. Since 2000 Bulgarian families prefer to buy cars not older than 10 years. Now almost 70% of Bulgarian families own a car and almost 80% of the firms with business activities have motor pools consisting of cars, vans, minibuses, jeeps and light trucks.
