In an overall used-car market that was 3.65 percent stronger than the one in April 2013, sales of vehicles ages 1 to 5 were especially “hot” last month, according to CNW Research.

And likely not coincidentally, certified pre-owned sales jumped nearly 10 percent year-over-year in April, data from Autodata Corp. indicates.

CNW said there was a 9-percent gain in sales of 1- to 5-year-old used cars overall, which is close to the increased in CPO-specific sales noticed by Autodata.

There were 193,091 certified pre-owned sales in April, which is a 9.5-percent improvement over year-ago figures. Through the first four months of the year, dealers have sold 744,861 certified units, which beats the year-ago sum by 10.5 percent.

Asian automakers sold 91,027 CPO cars in April, which marked a 5.8-percent gain. Europeans moved 33,811 CPO units for a 12.1-percent upswing. The Big 3 posted 68,253 CPO sales for a 13.5-percent lift.

Overall Used Numbers

The number of used cars sold by franchised and independent dealers in April, plus those included in private-party sales, came out to 3.96 million last month, CNW said.

This compares to 3.82 million in April 2012. Through four months, there have been 11.44 million used vehicles sold, up from 11.26 million in the same period of 2013.

Franchised dealers sold 1.41 million used cars in April (up 4.7 percent), independents moved 1.28 million (up 3.95 percent) and casual sales increased 2.21 percent at 1.26 million.

CNW president Art Spinella gave some overarching analysis on April’s used-car market in his report released Friday.

“The Internet continues to drive traffic to used car sellers at the expense of newspapers,” he said. “In April, the number of shoppers went to a dealership because of something seen on the Internet jumped 116 percent versus a year ago and nearly 28 percent versus March of this year.

“Newspapers, on the other hand, saw a decline in the number of consumers who say they were driven to a dealership by print newspapers — down 16 percent versus a year ago.”

Spinella went on to note: “More consumers are shopping franchised dealerships for a used car or truck versus March of this year (up 46.5 percent), but off somewhat vs. year ago (down 4.5 percent). For independent dealers, the comparable percentage changes are up 22 percent (versus last month) and down 22 percent (versus last year).”