Big SUVs take over the luxury lane

Our love of SUVs has extended to the prestige market. The growing $70,000-plus large SUV segment totalled 1811 sales in May, just 30 less than the number of Holden Commodores sold.

Land Rover has yielded its long-held reign over the segment to the German big three, whose expanding range of premium SUVs often outsells their similarly equipped sedan siblings.

Models priced either side of six-figures, such as the Audi Q7, BMW X5 and Mercedes-Benz GLE-Class, are also more popular than relatively affordable small premium crossovers such as the Audi Q2, BMW X1 and Mercedes GLA-Class.

The BMW X5 led the segment in May, ahead of the Q7, with the GLE-Class and Range Rover Sport not too far behind.

The X5’s 320 sales were almost as much as the BMW 3 and 5 Series combined, while the Q7s 291 sales made it the second most popular Audi in Australia after the A3.