Wholesale auction sales started the year on a high note, with particularly good signs showing up in segments that lean heavily toward off-rental and off-lease.

According to AuctionNet data from the National Auto Auction Association, there was a 2.2% year-over-year spike in January for auction sales, adjusting for selling days. Compared to December numbers, they were up by more than 16%.

But here’s what’s even more noteworthy:

Commercial sales for 3-year-old vehicles, a segment loaded with off-lease vehicles, climbed 1.5% from January 2025 — the first year-over-year increase for this segment in more than a year, NAAA said.

Helping to drive this uptick was the improvement in lease originations that began in 2023, so now those off-lease units are starting to trickle into auctions.

Another standout segment was the 1- and 2-year-old commercial vehicle — an off-rental-heavy crowd — where auction sales jumped 60% year-over-year in January, NAAA said, after another sharp rise (53%) in December.

“As was the case with 2025, commercial activity continued to power the upward trend in auction sales,” NAAA vice president Larry Dixon wrote in the analysis.

There was a 14% year-over-year increase in overall commercial sales at auction last month and a 6.5% drop in dealer sales.

Breaking it down by vehicle type, auction sales in car segments fell 3% year-over-year on average, while truck segments climbed more than 8%, on average.

Compact car volume was off 2.2%, luxury car volume slid 2.8% and midsize car sales fell 6.9%, according to NAAA.

On the truck side of the market, compact crossover/SUV sales rose 16.7%, compact luxury crossover/SUV sales were up 10.8% and full-size pickups rose 6.1%.

Midsize crossover/SUV volumes were up 2.9%, while midsize luxury crossover/SUV sales rose 6.2%.

Sharing some EV analysis, Dixon wrote, “Electric vehicle sales continued to post gains, although the group’s roughly 40% prior-year improvement was below the 47% growth rate averaged in 2025.”

Auction prices beat year-ago figures by 3.5% and were 0.3% higher than December, according to NAAA.

“While it’s not uncommon for auction prices to increase month-over-month in January, more often than not, the rise in prices observed over a given first quarter doesn’t occur until February (for example, prices fell 2% from December 2024 to January 2025),” Dixon said. “This could indicate that dealers expect stronger first quarter retail sales than usual given that individual tax refunds are expected to reach all-time highs this year.”

Note: This is part of a monthly series in which Auto Remarketing shares AuctionNet data and commentary provided by the National Auto Auction Association.

As noted by the organization, more than 260 NAAA member auctions power AuctionNet, making it the most comprehensive source of wholesale auto auction sales data in the U.S. Unless otherwise noted, auction sales figures are based on total reporting auctions, the number and composition of which may vary over time.  Data below courtesy of AuctionNet/NAAA.

 

AuctionNet® Wholesale Auction Results
January-26
Total Unit Sales
Select Segments Jan-25 Jan-26 % Change (selling day adjusted)
Compact Car 58,100 54,238 -2.2%
Compact Crossover/SUV 84,861 94,557 16.7%
Compact Luxury Crossover/SUV 14,880 15,741 10.8%
Full-Size Pickup 77,117 78,128 6.1%
Luxury Car 33,697 31,269 -2.8%
Mid-Size Car 66,416 59,018 -6.9%
Mid-Size Crossover/SUV 94,326 92,631 2.9%
Mid-Size Luxury Crossover/SUV 23,304 23,633 6.2%
Electric Vehicles 10,825 14,376 39.1%
Source:  AuctionNet®. Segmentation provided by Black Book.