GAINESVILLE, GA - According to Black Book, The four car segments that increased this past week have been consistently strong over the last two months. The Upper Mid-size Cars (UMC), up by $27, have increased for the past eight weeks. The remaining three increasing segments have all increased nine of the previous ten weeks. The Compact Cars (SCC) and the Entry Level Cars (ELC) both increased $19 for the week. The final increasing segment was the Entry Mid-size Cars (EMC) which finished $8 stronger for the week. On the other end of the change spectrum, the three segments with the longest declining streak consist of the Premium Sporty Cars (PSC) down by $80, the Luxury Level Cars (LLC) which declined by $24, and the Prestige Luxury Cars down by $37.

"The price of gas and diesel at the pump has declined ever so slightly over the past two weeks, down almost $0.02 for gas and $0.015 on diesel," according to Ricky Beggs, VP and managing editor of Black Book, in his recent "Beggs on the Market" report. "It’s probably not enough for any of us to feel better when we fill our tanks, nor was it enough of a change to drive the market adjustments in a directly connected manner."

There was an uptick in the number of truck segments increasing to eight of the fourteen segments this week from only five the previous week. The overall average change was consistent at -$11 for the second consecutive week. Six of the eight increasing truck segments have been in a positive trending mode for five of the past six weeks for the Full-size Pickups (FPT), to as long as nine of the past ten weeks in the Compact SUVs (CSU).

Even though the Luxury SUV (LSU) segment has a small number of models in the segment, there was enough softness in values of a couple of those individual models to have the segment decline by 1.14 percent during the past week. There was still plenty of activity as the past week’s worth of data required over 2,080 daily adjustments, the second highest number over the past five weeks.

"What do we expect to see in the market this coming week? Even with looks of amazement at the strong values, retail activity is requiring the dealers to return to the auction lanes and airwaves to restock their depleted inventory," Beggs noted.

The percentage of adjustments that were increases over the past week supports a solid market, but not hardly as aggressive as the previous eight weeks. The 51 percent that were increases during the most recent reporting period still represents solid demand within the used market and an economy that is gradually moving from “need” only purchases to some that fit in the level of “want.”

View the video here: