September CPO Sales Lowest Since February

Certified pre-owned (CPO) sales in September fell nearly 5%, just under 10,000 units, from August to finish at 201,707, Cox Automotive reported Oct. 11.

This total is down over 26,000 units from last year and is the lowest monthly total since February of this year. 2022 CPO sales are down 15% year to date.

Leveraging a same-store set of dealerships selected to represent the country from Dealertrack, Cox estimates that used retail sales declined 8% in September from August and that used retail sales were down 10% year over year. Compared to September 2019, sales were down 18%, a slight improvement from August, when sales were down 19%, based on the same-store results.

“The one upgrade in our quarterly forecasting updates for Q3 was to take CPO sales up slightly," said Chris Frey, senior manager of economic and industry insights at Cox Automotive, in a news release. "CPO has been up and down this year as it’s impacted by supply and demand, but we should see CPO end the year at 2.4 million. The value of an extended warranty cannot be understated, especially in a rising cost environment.”

2022 CPO sales are expected to finish better than originally expected but still below the 2.7 million CPO sales in 2021.