By: Leslie Brody
Posted In: News
Photo credit: KRT Media
HACKENSACK, N.J. – Alex Tsaur loves his sporty black Audi S4. It has soft leather seats, satellite radio, all-wheel drive and a moon roof. When leased last fall, it was worth more than $50,000. Tsaur says he earned it- by pleasing his parents with As and Bs in school.
In the wealthy enclaves of North Jersey, 18-year-old Tsaur is hardly unusual driving a prestige car at a tender age. His beloved Audi has good company in the seniors’ parking lot at Tenafly High School. One recent afternoon, the 122 cars sparkling in the sun included 13 BMWs, eight Mercedes-Benzes, seven Lexuses and six fellow Audis, plus a sampling of Volvos and beefy sport-utility vehicles. “It’s Tenafly,” Tsaur says with a shrug. “It’s one of those towns where you’re pressured, kind of obligated to get a nice car. Your friends have a nice car, you have a nice car. It’s a social thing. “Girls see you more,” he adds. “They see you have a nice car, they know you’re rich.” And fast. As Tsaur squeals out of his parking spot, he swerves to avoid a car backing up. The noisy scene is commonplace after the last bell rings at affluent local high schools, where students often boast more expensive rides than their teachers. Across the country, the number of cars sold to teens has zoomed, from 4.76 million in 1985 to 7.78 million in 2003, according to CNW Marketing Research, which tracks auto sales. So has the share of parents footing the bill. Twenty years ago, parents fully paid for 19.5 percent of teens’ cars. By 2003, that had risen to 38 percent. Yet only a tiny slice of all those motoring American teens are driving prestige or luxury cars- just one in 100, according to CNW. That would seem to indicate North Jersey’s youth are especially well-wheeled. Local teenagers say a number of parents give swanky cars to reward good behavior. “Some parents are not necessarily good talkers and may need to resort to a $50,000 car to say ‘I love you’ instead of sitting down for a heart-to-heart,” says Jake Mann, a 16-year-old in Tenafly. “I disagree with it, but it does happen.” Some students are appalled and embarrassed by this phenomenon. “Our school is very materialistic,” says 17-year-old Chelsea Hunter, who feels lucky to drive her dad’s Honda CR-V. “In Tenafly, you turn 17 and get a brand new BMW,” she says. “For some of these people, it’s the nicest car they’ll ever have. Where are you going to go after a BMW?” Her mother, Rona Hunter, has a Saab but won’t let Chelsea drive it. “I don’t want people to see my 17-year-old in my Saab – that would say I have no values,” says Hunter, a graphic designer. The parents who are willing to sign the leases or sales contracts say they are seeking safe cars for their kids, but others say such reasoning is misguided. Side airbags, anti-lock brakes and other safety features are easy to find on moderately priced cars, notes Phil Reed, a senior editor at Edmunds.com, a car rating service. He says he’s frequently “stunned” by the high-end cars parents are buying for children. “There seems to be a tendency, especially for dads, to want to buy cars they think will make their sons or daughters popular,” he says. “I think it’s a huge mistake, but the whole concept of buying a car that will make you happy is deep in the American psyche.” Reed also warns against giving teens sports cars: “If you buy a teenager a performance car, he’ll drive it like a performance car. That’s the last thing you want.” Andrew Troyano, a senior at Northern Valley Regional High School at Old Tappan, N.J., has an inkling. He got a ticket for driving his black BMW Z3 convertible at 39 mph in a 25 mph zone. “Cops always follow me as soon as they see me,” he says. Others confess, with a hint of pride, that they often speed. Some students work for their wheels. John Swierkocki of Wayne, N.J., paid $6,000 toward the 1999 Land Rover his parents bought last month for his 17th birthday, paying $20,000 second-hand. He made $4,000 as a golf caddie last summer and plans to earn more to put in a sound system. “I’m half spoiled,” he says with a smile. Scott Covitz, 18, juggles two jobs, one at a gas station, the other at a telemarketing firm, to cover the insurance and $320 lease payments on his 2004 Infiniti G35, which cost roughly $40,000. His teachers at Northern Valley “assume I’m a spoiled rich kid, but my dad makes me pay for it,” he says. “I take pride in paying for it myself.” Others treasure nearly new hand-me-downs from parents or siblings. Sarah Brennan, a 17-year-old at Northern Valley, is thrilled to have her brother’s black 2001 BMW 330Ci while he’s at college. “I’m really lucky,” she says. “It’s every teenager’s dream.” The sense that passers-by might judge them harshly, or that jealous students might “key” their cars, upsets some of the young drivers; they say they study hard and help their parents by chauffeuring siblings around. Some families aren’t comfortable talking about these cars at all. Several parents never responded to a reporter’s query about the high-end cars they had given their teenagers. Four who did call back declined to discuss their choices. As one father tartly put it, “What I do for my kids is nobody’s business.” And some students admit feeling sheepish when they pass teachers in cheaper cars. “I kind of feel a little awkward,” says Nima Zahedi, a 17-year-old Tenafly junior who switches between his parents’ two Mercedes. “They probably think, why does a junior have this kind of car?” But another Tenafly student, who owns a BMW, and whose mother insisted that he not be identified, has no such qualms. “They chose to be a teacher and knew what kind of salary they were choosing,” he says. “I know teachers who drive BMWs, too.” Brook Zelcer, an English teacher at Northern Valley, drives a 1999 Toyota RAV4. Growing up in Fair Lawn, N.J., he says, he was happy to use his family’s clunker, a Buick Skylark. Now, he says, it’s disturbingly common to hear students say, “I got in an accident in my BMW, so my dad bought me another one.” Zelcer says lessons about the value of saving and charity, and the downside of buying more than you need, are often ignored. “Their parents’ voices speak through them. They say if you work hard for your money, why can’t you spend it the way you want? All kinds of rationalizations to justify selfish behavior and indulgence,” he says. Indeed, for these families, the ritual of buying a first car may be one of the rare areas where teens and parents are thinking alike. Students argue their parents are “wrong about everything,” Zelcer says, “except when it comes to politics or ways to spend money. Then it’s ‘my father or mother knows everything.'” ___ c 2005, North Jersey Media Group Inc. Visit The Record Online at http://www.northjersey.com/ Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.
