Luxury Cars Still Have Largest Price Declines, But Which Models Lead Increases?

In August, it was used luxury models that were showing the biggest movements on either end of the pricing pendulum. This month? A slightly different story.

While luxury models yet again dominated the Top 10 Biggest Price Drops on Cars.com, September’s list of Top 10 Biggest Price Increases was more about moderation in prices — and the big presence of trucks and full-size vans.

That’s according to a recent post authored by Mike Hanley on the Kicking Tires blog from Cars.com that examined the price movements of 2010 through 2012 model-year vehicles listed on Cars.com.

Hanley also authored the blog post for August, which showed luxury units as leaders of the increases and decreases.

As for September, topping the list of decliners was the Infiniti M37, whose average price on Sept. 1 was down 4 percent from the Aug. 1 price. It was followed by the BMW Z4 (down 3 percent) and Audi A6 (down 3 percent). Seven other models on the top 10 list had prices fall 2 percent, a group that included such models as the Mercedes-Benz S-Class, Volvo S60 and BMW 328i.

On the opposite side of the equation, the list of price risers was much more consistent.

“There was considerably less price fluctuation among the cars that saw price gains in September, with all models in the top 10 getting a 1-percent price bump,” Hanley wrote. “Of the 10, half were pickup trucks or full-size vans, and not a single luxury model made the list.”

Those pickups included the Ram 2500, the Ram 1500 and Chevrolet Colorado, and the full-size vans were the Ford E-350, Super Duty and the Ford E-250.

The Jeep Wrangler Unlimited, Nissan Cube, Toyota Camry Hybrid, Ford Escape and Nissan Versa also made the top 10 increases list.

The overall movement in late-model used prices was a $16 month-over-month decline, as prices settled at $22,177, the blog indicated.  Prices during the trough month of 2013 (June, with a $22,154 average) were only $23 lower.

Eligible vehicles on the lists were required to have 500 vehicles within the Cars.com national database and be from model years 2010, 2011 or 2012.

To read the entire entry, visit blogs.cars.com/kickingtires/2013/09/luxury-car-prices-tumble-again-in-september.html.

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