Consistency was the word in the lanes last week — especially for the car segments.

Black Book’s Ricky Beggs reported the car segments’ prices fell by an average of $71 last week, which is slightly lower than the previous week’s drop of $84.

In his latest “Beggs on the Used Car Market” report, the Black Book editorial director said the four-week average change during the month of September for the car segments was a drop of $70, showing a consistency in price as the industry entered fall.

Beggs also pointed out another trend seen just last week that points to the stable nature of car prices.

When excluding the premium sporty cars, which saw a drop of $168 last week, the range from the lowest level drop ($42 for the near luxury cars) to the second highest drop ($80 for the entry sporty cars) was only $38.

“This is another sign of the level of consistency within the cars,” Beggs said.

Truck prices remain stable, as well. However, this may not come as a surprise since these segments have seen unusually strong price retention all year.

The truck segments average segment decline for each of the past three weeks has gradually declined to only $14 this past week, the lowest level of change since the drop of $9 for the week ending June 6.

During this week’s video, Beggs also touched on two segments that have consistently seen stronger price retention than their segment counterparts: compact cars and compact pickups.

The compact cars, for example, have seen a weekly average drop of $57 for the past 12 weeks.

And the compact pickups fell by an average of only $20 over the same period.

“If you have vehicles in any of these segments this might indicate some models to stick with a little longer in your inventory, even if they are reaching the limit on your days-to-turn policy. It might also indicate some models to add to your inventory,” Beggs said.

For the next few weeks, each “Beggs on the Used Car Market” report will feature an interview with industry experts. Each interview was conducted at the recent NAAA Convention and Expo in Boston.

“During the convention several key industry personnel took the time to sit down with us and share their thoughts on a few topics regarding the market. We are including one of those in this week’s video market update blog with others to be shared with you in the coming weeks,” Beggs said.

See this week’s video report above, which features interviews with Patty Stanley, owner of Carolina and Indiana Auto Auctions and the current president of the ServNet Auction Group, as well as Brad Bollman, vice president of remarketing solutions for GM Financial.