ATLANTA -

Manheim’s Tom Webb mentioned a noteworthy fact on his blog regarding Ford Motor Credit off-lease activity after the Blue Oval reported its fourth-quarter and full-year activity on Tuesday.

For the first time since 2008, Ford reported that 24-month lease vehicles made up Ford reported that 24-month lease vehicles made up more lease return volume last year than units associated with 36-month leases or 39-month-and-longer deals combined.

Of the 62,000 units that made up the OEM’s lease return volume, 24-month units represented more than half of the figure at 33,000 units. Ford said 36-month lease units represented 17,000 vehicles while 39-month-and-longer contracts made up 12,000 units.

Five years ago was the last time the automaker had off-lease volume patterns like 2012. In 2008, Ford’s 24-month off-lease volume comprised 88,000 units while 36-month off-lease volume included 61,000 units and the remainder was 19,000 units.

To put the 2012 figure into further perspective, Ford noted that its 24-month off-lease volume in 2011 represented just 4,000 units of its full-year total of 86,000 vehicles.

The quicker turn of these Ford models — ones that likely are ripe to become certified pre-owned units — continues a trend of upbeat trends regarding off-lease activity.

The number of lease returns in 2013 is likely to climb by nearly half-a-million units year-over-year, according to Edmunds.com, which expects more than 2.5 million leases to reach end-of-term this year.

The 2.5 million or so lease terminations projected for this year compare to less than 2 million estimated for 2012, according to data Edmunds compiled into charts on its website.  In 2011, the number was about halfway between 2 million and 2.5 million lease terminations.

Just a shade less than 3 million leases came to an end in 2010, after more than 3 million leases drew to a close in 2009.

To see more from Webb’s blog, visit manheimconsulting.typepad.com.

Nick Zulovich can be reached at nzulovich@autoremarketing.com. Continue the conversation with Auto Remarketing on both LinkedIn and Twitter.