CARY, N.C. -

After falling 7% in 2020 but still remaining relatively strong, certified pre-owned sales are likely to bounce back in 2021 to what would be one of the strongest years on record, according to Cox Automotive.

There were 2.6 million certified sales in 2020, down from 2.8 million in 2019, says a Cox Automotive analysis of Motor Intelligence data released Friday.

The year closed with 231,042 CPO sales in December, down 2% year-over-year.  However, that beat November sales by 24%, Cox said.

“The CPO market in December normalized from its November drop that was attributed to a combination of factors including, seasonality, the ongoing pandemic, broader economic conditions and supply/demand,” analysts said in the Data Point report.

Looking forward, Cox Automotive is projecting 2.7 million CPO sales this year.

While that would not be a record, it would still rank among the three best years ever for certified sales, based on Auto Remarketing’s previous reporting.

And while 2020 sales failed to extend the streak of record years, they were still close to recent highs and have shown considerable gains since the spring.

“Where we saw the biggest improvement from April was in the CPO market. In December, CPO sales declined 2% year-over-year and were up 24% month-over-month,” Cox Automotive manager of economic and industry insights Zo Rahim said in a presentation earlier this month. “CPO sales ended the year with 2.6 million units (sold), down 7% in 2020.

“Gently used and younger used vehicles should continue to see consumer interest this year.”

Going back to 2020 CPO sales, Cox said the programs at Toyota, Honda and Chevrolet —the industry’s largest — combined to move close to 800,000 CPO vehicles last year. That’s close to a third (30.5%) of the market and similar to their combined market share in 2019 (32%).

Several automakers included certified results in their most recent sales reports.

CPO numbers at Mazda improved 8.4% in 2020, as its dealers sold 66,193 certified units. Mazda had an especially strong December, moving 5,945 CPO vehicles for a 23.9% gain.

Porsche finished the year with 27,261 certified sales, an 8.6% increase. It had 7,081 CPO sales in the fourth quarter.

The BMW brand had 108,593 certified sales in 2020 (down 9.3%) and the MINI brand had 9,488 CPO sales (down 25%).

In Q4, BMW had 25,811 certified sales (down 20.5%) and MINI had 2,175 (down 21.2%).