TransUnion has just released its Consumer Pulse study for the second quarter of 2026 (survey conducted April 29 to May 13, 2026, among 988 Canadian adults). As it does every quarter, the study measures household financial health, credit intentions and fraud exposure. And as happens every quarter, most dealers won’t read it.
That’s a mistake. This report describes, with precision, the customer walking into your showroom and, more importantly, the one who never does. Here is our reading, with concrete implications for the sales floor and the F&I office.
A consumer who is doing better, but doesn’t feel it
The overall picture is one of modest, fragile improvement. Twenty-four percent of Canadians say their finances are better than planned this year, up five points year over year. Twenty-five percent saw their income rise in the last three months, against 15% who took a cut. Optimism about the next 12 months climbed from 40% to 45%.
But here is the number that matters to you: only 28% of consumers believe their income is keeping up with inflation. Half believe the opposite. Inflation on everyday goods remains the number one financial concern for 86% of households, far ahead of housing (51%), recession (49%) and interest rates (41%).
Dealer translation: your customer may have more money than a year ago, but doesn’t feel any richer. They shop with a defensive reflex. Fifty-one percent of households cut back on discretionary spending last quarter. One customer in four expects to be unable to pay at least one bill or loan in full.
That customer doesn’t respond to a monthly payment pitch thrown out blindly. They respond to a financing structure that respects their budget reality. It’s a context where precision in deal structuring is worth more than ever.
Credit demand holds, but automotive intent drops
One Canadian in four plans to apply for new credit or refinance in the next year. That figure has been remarkably stable for four straight quarters: consumers haven’t pulled out of the credit market, they’ve become selective.
The product breakdown, however, should raise an eyebrow. Among those planning to apply, only 9% are targeting a new car loan or lease, a drop of 10 percentage points from the previous quarter. That is the steepest decline of any category measured. Meanwhile, credit cards dominate (49%) and buy now, pay later keeps growing (18%, +2 pp).
Two possible readings. The first: automotive intent is cyclical and this quarterly dip will correct itself. The second, less comfortable: in a budget under pressure, replacing the vehicle is the expense that gets postponed. The spending intention data points the same way, with only 14% of households planning to increase large purchases (appliances, vehicles) next quarter.
For the dealer, this means every customer who shows purchase intent is worth more. The cost of a poorly structured deal, a customer routed to the wrong lender, or an unnecessary credit pull rises proportionally.
Self-exclusion: your biggest competitor isn’t the dealer next door
This is the richest section of the report for F&I. Roughly one consumer in five considered applying for credit, then walked away. The reasons, in order: they decided they didn’t need it (29%), the cost was too high (26%), their credit history (22%), they found an alternative funding source (21%, +7 pp from last quarter), their income or employment status (20%).
Do the math: roughly one discouraged borrower in five excluded themselves because they believed they wouldn’t qualify, either due to their credit file or their income. They weren’t declined. They never got to the application.
This phenomenon has a name: self-exclusion. And it has a direct consequence for your store. The subprime or near-prime customer who assumes they’ll be turned down doesn’t fill out your contact form and doesn’t give up a Saturday afternoon to be told no. They buy private-to-private, they postpone, or they turn to the alternative financing whose growth is documented in this very report.
The structural answer to self-exclusion is upstream pre-qualification. A credit pre-qualification form, based on a soft pull with no impact on the score, turns the question “will I qualify” into a concrete answer before the customer gives up. That is exactly the role SAM plays in the DecisioningIT ecosystem: from the pre-qualification request, no matter who submits it, SAM produces a financing direction and a profitability benchmark. The final decision stays with the F&I manager and the lenders. But the self-excluded customer now has a reason to make it all the way to them.
Note as well that interest rates are no longer the wall we imagine: 46% of consumers say rising rates have little or no impact on their intention to apply for credit. The obstacle is more psychological and informational than purely price-driven.
Consumers are monitoring their credit, and they know why
Forty percent of Canadians now check their credit report at least monthly (+3 pp year over year). More interesting still: the reason has changed. Checking to improve the score is down eight points, while checking for fraud prevention (+7 pp) and report accuracy (+3 pp) is climbing.
The 2026 consumer is no longer a passive spectator of their credit file. They know it, they watch it, and they arrive at the dealership with an idea of what they’re worth. Two implications:
First, the F&I manager working the old way, with multiple credit pulls and hard inquiries fired off before the deal structure is even clear, will run into a customer who sees those inquiries pop up in their mobile app the next morning. Soft pull discipline in pre-qualification is no longer a refinement, it’s an expectation.
Second, transparency becomes a selling point. A process where the customer understands why a given financing direction is being proposed builds the trust that converts into backend average (PVR). F&I profitability is not a promise here, it’s the normal consequence of a customer who doesn’t feel cornered.
Fraud: the context TransUnion confirms and dealers already live with
The report documents a hardening threat environment: 44% of consumers were targeted by a fraud attempt via email, phone or text in the last three months without becoming victims (+4 pp year over year), and 20% know they were affected by a data breach (+4 pp). Phishing dominates at 45% of schemes.
What TransUnion measures on the consumer side, Equifax Canada measures on the lender side, and the two curves meet in your F&I office. <cite index=”4-1,6-1″>According to Equifax Canada, fraud in automotive financing jumped 54% year over year, driven by falsified credit applications and identity theft, and the incidence of synthetic identity fraud in applications rose from 2.8% to 8% in a single year</cite>. <cite index=”8-1″>These synthetic identities are nurtured for months, sometimes years, until the fraudster secures automotive financing and disappears with the asset</cite>.
The paradox in the TransUnion report is the gap between exposure and response. A third of consumers took no cybersecurity action in the last 60 days, and more than half of the inactive group explains it by uncertainty about what to do. If consumers themselves are overwhelmed, imagine the salesperson handed a driver’s licence and a pay stub at 4 p.m. on a Saturday.
Identity verification and application data consistency can no longer rest on the F&I manager’s eye alone. That’s the job of an intelligence layer, upstream, where every application gets the same rigour at any hour. The human keeps authority over the decision. The machine keeps consistency on vigilance.
Law 25: this report’s data is also a compliance warning
One point the report doesn’t address but every Quebec dealer should connect: the consumer who monitors their credit to catch fraud and who suffers data breaches is the same one protected by Law 25. Every credit application your store collects is a set of sensitive personal information you are accountable for.
The questions to ask your technology vendors are simple: where does the data reside, is it hosted in Canada, and can you document processing in the event of an incident? One customer in five was hit by a data breach this quarter. The question isn’t whether your dealership will be tested on this ground, but when.
What to take back to your floor
Three operational takeaways stand out from this Q2 2026:
The customer is there, but fragile and selective. Overall credit demand is stable; automotive intent fell this quarter. Every opportunity is worth more, and every deal deserves to be structured with precision rather than instinct.
Self-exclusion is a measurable pool of lost sales. The customer who believes they won’t qualify will never call you. Upstream pre-qualification, with no impact on the credit score, is the mechanism that brings them back into your funnel. IT starts with SAM, and what SAM delivers is the financing direction and the profitability benchmark that let F&I work the right deal with the right lender.
Fraud is now a daily reality, not a theoretical risk. The combination of TransUnion data (consumer exposure) and Equifax data (auto financing fraud up 54%) leaves no room for doubt. Vigilance must be systematic, documented and compliant with Law 25.
The 2026 Canadian consumer is better informed, more cautious and more closely monitored than ever. The dealer who wins will be the one whose financing process measures up to that customer.
Sources: TransUnion Canada, Consumer Pulse Study Q2 2026 (survey conducted April 29 to May 13, 2026, n = 988, margin of error ±3.1 pp, 95% confidence); Equifax Canada, fraud trend reports on the automotive sector.
