July 03, 2012

Medium- and Heavy-Duty Wholesale Prices Continue to Slide

Wholesale values for medium- and heavy-duty duty models are decreasing this month, reports Ricky Beggs, editor at Black Book, in his report on specialty markets.


Last month Beggs reported a pattern of decreasing wholesale prices for medium-duty trucks, and this month brings more of the same, especially with late-model trucks. They are not dropping by large amounts, but they are still dropping, Beggs says.

This month, there has been a reverse of last month's soft market, with an uptick for older models. There was an increase of around 16% in May's new medium-duty truck retail sales. Beggs says hopefully with those new truck sales, some of those replaced trucks will appear at auction.

The supplies of used medium- and heavy-duty trucks are adequately meeting meet the increased activity in new construction, single family home remodels and repairs, commercial construction, and also in delivery as tonnage being moved is increasing. Thus, used market values are not being pushed up.

Regarding heavy-duty, Beggs says we continue to see a slide in the wholesale prices for this group at auctions around the country. The drop in prices that we are continuing to experience is nothing to be alarmed about, Beggs says. He says we do expect to see a continued softening of the market in the coming month.