Spent Tuesday morning walking a yard with a dealer trying to move three 2021 Cat 320s. Competitive bids were low. He wasn't happy. I told him what I always tell people after a show week: it takes about ten days for the market to catch up to what just happened in Las Vegas. He still wasn't happy.
THE NUMBER
-11.03%
Used crawler excavator, dozer, and wheel loader inventory — year-over-year, per Sandhills Global's February 2026 market report, released March 6.
Inventory levels in that category have been trending down for eight months straight. February brought a slight month-over-month rebound of 1.37%, driven mostly by dozers (+2.46% M/M) — but year-over-year, the trend is unambiguous. Used wheel loaders are the biggest mover: down 13.75% YOY.
The headline from Sandhills this week isn't just low inventory — it's why inventory is low. The title of their March 6 report says it directly: quality used machinery is shrinking as equipment shifts into rental fleets. Rental companies are absorbing iron instead of releasing it. That's not a supply blip. It's a structural redirect.
If you're buying used right now, that 11% YOY drop means you're shopping a thinner market than you were a year ago. Asking prices and auction values are showing a mix of sideways and upward trends. Translation: sellers know they have leverage. Don't expect to steal anything. Expect to pay fair or walk.
THIS WEEK'S STORY
CONEXPO Just Ended. Here's What It Actually Means for Your Fleet.
CONEXPO-CON/AGG closed its doors in Las Vegas on Friday. Every three years, the industry descends on the convention center for what is essentially a giant product reveal — 2,000 exhibitors, nearly three million square feet of exhibit space, 150,000 attendees. This week's show was the biggest since the event returned post-pandemic, and the headlines were predictable: electric machines, AI, autonomy.
Most of that coverage is aimed at investors. Here's what fleet owners and buyers should actually be watching.
Cat is building a platform, not just machines. Caterpillar's headline announcements this week went well beyond new iron. They launched a refreshed Cat Rentals brand and digital platform, announced a new service model called Cat Compact aimed at smaller contractors, and showcased the Cat AI Assistant — software that lets operators and managers interact with machines and fleet data through a single interface. More significantly, they announced an integration with Geotab that pulls on-highway telematics into their VisionLink fleet management platform, so you can manage on-road trucks and off-road iron from one screen.
What this means in practice: Cat is moving toward a model where the machine is the entry point and the subscription software is the margin. If you're running a mixed fleet — trucks and heavy equipment both — this matters. Managing everything through one platform has real operational value, and it creates stickiness with Cat that competitors will struggle to match.
The autonomous equipment announcements were real. Cat demonstrated the CS12 — its first fully autonomous soil compactor — live on the show floor. DEVELON (Hyundai's construction equipment brand) showed an autonomous excavator in action. These aren't concept machines. They're production-direction hardware, and the companies presenting them are betting that labor shortages on jobsites will drive adoption faster than most operators expect.
The labor picture supports that bet. Construction and heavy civil work faces a structural shortage of qualified operators in North America that isn't going away. Autonomy starts to make economic sense not when it's cheaper than a skilled operator — it's when you simply can't find the operator.
The Chinese OEMs are serious about North America. LiuGong showed 13 machines at CONEXPO under the theme 'Tough Customers. Tough Equipment,' including zero-emission excavators and wheel loaders claiming 40% lower operating costs through reduced maintenance and fuel. These aren't fringe players. LiuGong, DEVELON, SDLG, and others are showing up with serious product lines, North American dealer networks, and aggressive pricing. The established OEMs know it, which is part of why Cat and Deere are doubling down on the service-and-software layer — it's much harder for new entrants to replicate than the iron itself.
MY READ:
CONEXPO 2026 was a genuine show of industry confidence. Big lineups, big attendance, real technology. But for someone managing a fleet or running a dealership, the practical takeaway is this: used prices are tight now, new iron is getting more expensive, and a wave of next-gen product just got announced that will eventually compress values on what's sitting on your lot today. If you have late-model current-gen inventory — 2022 to 2024 excavators, loaders, compactors — the time to move it is the next 12 months, not after. The show just started the clock.
DEALS & MOVEMENTS
Sunbelt Rentals (SUNB) began trading on the NYSE on March 2, completing its spin from UK-listed Ashtead Group. The company operates more than 1,600 locations across all 50 US states and eight Canadian provinces, with a fleet valued at more than $19 billion. Equipmentfinancenews An earnings call is scheduled for March 12, followed by an investor day on March 26. A freshly independent, US-listed Sunbelt will be more aggressive on North American fleet investment. That's more competition for used iron and more upward pressure on rental rates.
United Rentals guided 2026 total revenue at $16.8–$17.3 billion — cautious enough to send the stock down nearly 13% on January 30. Analysts flagged "tariff-related uncertainty" and a structural shift toward mega-projects as headwinds, with local construction demand cooling relative to large-scale semiconductor plants and data centers. FinancialContent URI isn't collapsing — it's maturing. But the message is clear: the post-pandemic boom is structurally different now.
Herc Rentals reported a 27% YOY jump in Q4 total revenue to $1.2 billion, completing a full-year total revenue increase of 23%. Equipment rental revenue was up 24% in Q4 and 18% for the full year, and revenue from sales of rental equipment hit $509 million for the year — up 64%. Equipment World The H&E acquisition has positioned Herc as the third-largest equipment rental company in North America. They're not done buying.
Hitachi Construction Machinery will officially become Landcros in April 2027, with CONEXPO serving as the public preview. During the transition period, Hitachi and its 22 dealers across the US and Canada will use a dual-branded logo as customers adjust. Equipment World For parts buyers and fleet managers running orange iron: your dealer relationship, warranty coverage, and parts availability are not changing. The name is cosmetic. The machine is the machine.
Tariff pressure on construction equipment is accelerating. The producer price index for materials and services used in nonresidential construction rose 2.9% year-over-year in January, while construction spending slipped 0.4% from December 2024 to December 2025. Agcfla The AGC is urging Congress to renew the surface transportation bill, arguing that without demand certainty, domestic suppliers can't ramp up production to offset tariff-driven cost increases. Associated General Contractors of America The surface transportation bill is the floor under demand for this industry. Watch that clock.
ONE PRACTICAL THING
How to Use CONEXPO Announcements to Time Your Used Buys
The show just ended. Here's how to use what you saw — or read — to make actual buying decisions.
New product announcements at CONEXPO are not random. They represent 12 to 18 months of pipeline. The machines announced this week start hitting dealer lots in volume roughly six to eighteen months from now. That matters for used values.
The categories to watch are the ones with the heaviest new-product activity this cycle: compact excavators (Cat 319, CASE D Series mini excavators, new Komatsu units), motor graders (Deere's new SmartGrade P-Tier lineup), and articulated dump trucks (Komatsu's new HM460-6). These categories got the most new-iron attention at the show. That's where used values will face the most pressure 12 to 24 months out.
The play: If you need iron in those categories and you're flexible on technology spec, buy good used product now, before new-product availability drives trade-in supply up and compresses auction values on the current generation. If you're selling, start moving late-model current-gen units in those same categories before the new product lands in volume.
The show is a map. It tells you where the OEMs are going. Work backwards from that to figure out where the used market is going.
SIGN-OFF
That's the week. If you're seeing something different in your market — used prices moving faster or slower than the data suggests, rental rates shifting, or a major fleet dispersal coming to auction — hit reply. That's where the real signal is.
— MachineryBrief
Published every Wednesday · Reply anytime · machinerybrief.com