Compact tractors offer a contrasting perspective against the more recent moves of combine and row crop tractor data. While row crop tractor supply is on an upward trajectory and combine supply has reached its peak (for now?), compact tractor supply has sustained elevated supply levels for nearly a year. While the value of these versatile machines is much lower and the target buyer and their demand drivers are different, studying a new viewpoint can often lead to valuable insights.

The data layout below is similar to our combine and row crop tractor analysis. The top graphic below normalizes a 30-day running average supply of compact tractors between 40 and 99 horsepower by units that Tractor Zoom is seeing per dealership location. The blue line is incoming units, green is outgoing, with yellow being the remaining supply on dealerships’ lots.

Under the supply graphic is the corresponding average monthly compact tractor values at dealerships (blue) and auctions (gray). One of the reasons I love tackling compact tractor data is the high volume of it all, especially from our dealer partners’ listings. Here I’m able to filter down the hours of these machines to just include those between 350 - 650 hours to control variability without losing accuracy. Dealership average values are flat year over year, which displays the challenges of balancing manufactures' price and production increases, higher trade-in value expectations, and customers’ steeper financing rates for used tractors. 

Auction values are up 8% from last August, but down 10% from their high in January. Because the buyers of these tractors vary greatly between farmers, lawn and garden contractors, municipalities, and acreage owners, the hammer values will vary too. I’d summarize the auction values as steady, if not slightly cooler than this winter.

To check this statement, I pulled up the new Market Trends auction breakdown. Most working model compacts fall under 1,000 hours. I can tell from a quick glance in the graph below that those values have indeed decreased at auction since January. 

Yet, for compacts, 0 - 500 and 500 - 1,000 hours is still a big range. Now I can drill down even further to that 0 - 500 category, which is shown below. 

Now I can see that while almost all hour segments are coming down from a January peak, it is the tractors with less than 250 hours that are taking the biggest hit in value. Not coincidentally, this is also the segment where listed supply at dealerships and sold at auction have increased the most since January.

This concludes our three-part analysis on combines, row crop tractors and compact tractors. Ideas for this content and most of the solutions we build at Tractor Zoom can be tied directly back to conversations with you. I'd love to hear your feedback on this analysis as well as questions and ideas for future exploration. Feel free to email me at acampbell@TractorZoom.com.