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If you have bid on a used excavator at auction in the last year, you know the trend: The gavel keeps going down on Cat and Komatsu. Fusable’s EquipmentWatch data for March 2025 through February 2026 shows it’s not a coincidence. During that time, 13 of the 20 most expensive crawler excavators sold at auction were Caterpillars, and Komatsu took the rest. None of the other brands made it.
That’s not a random stat for buyers trying to decide where to put their next dollar or sellers wondering what their machine is actually worth right now. It’s a road map.
The Data Behind the Headline
The period’s top sale was a 2023 Cat 395 with 1,912 hours that sold for $740,000 at a J.M. Wood Auction Company sale in Montgomery, Alabama, on September 24, 2025. That’s a low-hour, late model machine and it’s priced like new equipment, and that should tell you something about how tight supply has gotten for premium excavators in this size class.
Runner-up was a 2022 Cat 349 with only 1,323 hours that went for $426,000 at a Steffes Group auction in Ames, Iowa, in December 2025. The top three were rounded out by a close in price 2023 Cat 352 with 2,798 hours. The trend continues down the list. Newer model years, low hours, and documented service history are what separate a $400K+ hammer price from a machine that barely clears reserve.
What’s Happening to Prices Overall
Beyond the headline auction sales and the wider used excavator market is a more nuanced story. Average resale prices peaked around $159,000 in July 2025, according to data from more than 419,000 resale listings, and softened to the $155,000 range through the winter months over the same 12-month period. The largest monthly declines were in November 2025 (down 1.9%) and February 2026 (down 2.5%)
In the meantime, the average age of used excavators on the market crept up from 7.1 years to 7.7 years over the period. Together, the two data points indicate fleets are holding onto machines longer and buyers are having to go farther down the age curve to find inventory, even as headline prices ease slightly.
Why is this significant when you are buying?
The auction data and the overall price trend tell two sides to the same story:
There isn’t quite enough supply of late model Caterpillar and Komatsu excavators in popular size classes to warrant low prices at the top end, and that doesn’t make them any less desirable.
Outside the top tier, prices have eased slightly from month to month in the broader market, allowing for some flexibility in negotiating prices for machines in the lower end of the market, especially older machines.
That combination is ideal for consumers who make no attempt to find the newest model year at any price, but only those who want to possess a definite class of machine. To find the sweet spot, it’s going to be a couple of years from the latest release of a well serviced Cat or Komatsu excavator with clean hours and service records.
Why is it important when selling an excavator?
For a low-hour Cat or Komatsu with a spotless maintenance record, this is the best-selling opportunity the used market has seen in a year. This is the kind of machine that people are bidding on and the outcome of the auctions reflects that.
The competition isn’t happening on the same scale for machines that aren’t in that profile, that have more hours on their clock, or with older years or brands that don’t have as many resale options.
When the used construction equipment is not on the ‘premium’ level, timing and presentation (service records, recent inspection, clean undercarriage) will be even more important to close a good sale.
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