Automobile sales, led by the used car segment, rose slightly last month in Mahoning and Trumbull counties from July a year ago, marking for the first time during the viral outbreak consecutive months of positive figures.

Still, dealers remain 11 percent off from figures posted last year as they continue to crawl back to numbers that were on pace to be better than 2019’s before Ohio’s discontinued stay-at-home order depressed the economy.

There were 5,628 deliveries of new and used vehicles in July, 17 more than in July 2019, according to numbers Tuesday from the Greater Cleveland Automobile Dealers’ Association.

For the seven-month period in the Mahoning Valley, dealers are down 3,948 from the 34,923 vehicles sold during the same time in 2019.

Used car sales last month pushed total sales into the black, just as they did in June, with 2,374 deliveries, an increase of 13.8 percent from July 2019. Still the segment overall remains 2.3 percent off from overall 2019 sales.

New car sales fell 10.5 percent, from 3,171 to 2,852, and are down 18.2 percent for the year. Through July 2019, there were 19,429 sales compared with 15,882 for the first seven months of 2020.

Dealerships in Mahoning County with the most sales in July were Boardman Subaru, 292, the top overall seller in the Mahonig Valley; Sweeney Chevrolet, 288; and Greenwood Chevrolet, 274.

The top new vehicle sellers were Sweeney Chevrolet, 208; Sweeney Buick GMC, 182; and Greenwood Chevrolet, 169.

The top used vehicle sellers were Boardman Subaru, 136; Fairway Ford, 116; and Greenwood Chevrolet, 105.

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