Lane watch: What hasn’t happened in 77 weeks
Perhaps it shouldn’t alarm consignors and dealers too much, but Black Book spotted a vehicle segment make a notable value decline for the first time in 77 weeks.
After a stretch of price increases or week-over-week stability that began February 2021, analysts said prices for full-size vans dropped 0.55% during the week that closed on Saturday. That’s quite a change from the average weekly increase for those commercial workhorses of 0.52% compiled during that stretch.
In fact, according to Black Book’s newest Market Insights released on Tuesday, the softening by full-size vans topped the overall market decrease of 0.47%, as only one of the 22 different vehicle segments edged higher.
Based on a volume-weighted basis, prices in the car segment nearly mimicked the overall drop, as values for those units decreased another 0.45%. That’s after a 0.47% drop a week earlier, according to Black Book data.
Black Book indicated depreciation for luxury cars led the way with a decrease of 0.82%, followed by sporty cars (down 0.63%), near luxury cars (down 0.62%), premium sporty cars (down 0.53%) and prestige luxury cars (down 0.51%).
Analysts then said their volume-weighted information showed values in the overall truck segment softened by 0.48%.
While that full-size van value streak ended, Black Book noted another one remains intact. Analysts reported prices for full-size luxury crossovers decreased another 1.31%, representing 28 consecutive weeks of depreciation with an average weekly decline of 0.48%.
Rounding out the latest observations, Black Book said the estimated average weekly sales rate remains “somewhat stagnant,” settling around 66%.
“The wholesale channels remained fairly consistent last week, with very few model year 2022 vehicles,” Black Book said in the report. “Older model years (model year 2017 to model year 2019) were offered in the lanes but they many are lower quality with higher mileage than normally expected.
“Buyers were still very active in the lanes and sellers tended to be more open to negotiation,” analysts added. “Floors are continuing to soften, which may be an indicator that sellers are hopeful about new inventory coming.”