Residents in Newfoundland are more likely to buy a brand new car when compared to those dealing with the high cost of living in other provinces.
Vince Gibbons’ premium trim 2025 Corolla GR is, admittedly, a little bit of an indulgence.
It wasn’t exactly what he was looking for when he began shopping for a new vehicle, but after a test drive last summer, the car’s polish won him over.
“I instantly fell in love with it,” he said. “I said, ‘you know what? I’m getting to the point in my life where I’m going to have a vehicle I want for a change, not one that I need.’”
The white Corolla is one of more than 35,000 brand-new cars that rolled off dealership lots in Newfoundland and Labrador in 2025.
No other province in Canada buys brand new vehicles at such a rate: In the 11 months with compiled data from 2025, Newfoundland and Labrador leads all provinces in per-capita purchases, working out to about 63 brand-new cars bought for every 1,000 people in the province between January and November.
New Brunswick, the closest province in purchasing habits, bought 52 cars per 1,000 people, according to data compiled by Statistics Canada.
Residents of British Columbia and the three territories — where data is combined by record-keepers at Statistics Canada — were the least likely to buy new vehicles, with a rate of 34 per 1,000 residents.
The 34,426 vehicles bought in Newfoundland and Labrador in that timespan amounted to $1.6 billion in purchases. All that spending provided a significant boost to the provincial economy, which grew more than expected — also leading all provinces — in 2025.
“We probably drive too much, but it’s easy to drive here too, isn’t it?” remarked Paulette Samson, who just took a sunnyside yellow-coloured Mini Cooper home to Paradise, N.L., in January.
“I can pull out of my driveway here, I can go to a beach, I can go to a store, she said. “I can go anywhere and not really be held up in traffic.”
Even one of the province’s biggest transit advocates acknowledges that family vehicles are a necessity for the vast majority in Newfoundland and Labrador.
“If me and my partner lived on any of the ZIP routes: the 2, the 1, the 3 or the 10, then we would not have a car, period. But in our area of town, the bus comes once an hour,” said Myles Russell, a recent candidate for St. John’s City Council.
“If I want to go to my job, it takes me an hour and 40 minutes in the morning, and in the evening, I wouldn’t be able to do it … that’s the reality for a lot of people in the city.”
Gibbons said he couldn’t imagine not having a car — he works early shifts at the St. John’s International Airport.
Russell bought a brand-new car a few weeks ago, saying the used vehicle market in the province is less appealing than in other, drier climates, because all of the salt used on highways and roads increases corrosion and wear on vehicles.
“When it came to that monthly payment, it just made sense to buy (it) brand new, right out of the package,” added Samson.
Even if it helps the economy — and even if consumers seem to love the convenience — Russell believes there are some significant downsides to car-focused cities, which includes a sense of social isolation that comes with spending more and more time away from others.
“You go from your isolated house to your isolated box where you listen to your own music, you then go to an office with a couple of people that you see all the time, every day, in and out. You go back in your car, back to your home. That is extremely socially isolating,” he said.
“It becomes all about you, and less about community.”