Rental growth at H&E Equipment

H&E Equipment Services reported a 12.4% fall in total revenues to US$153.8 million for the third quarter of 2010. Equipment rental revenues increased 7.0% to $48.3 million, new equipment sales fell 2.1% to $47.7 million and used equipment sales decreased 55.0% to $14.7 million.

On average, rental rates declined 5.9% compared to the third quarter of 2009 but increased 1.8% from the second quarter. Time utilization was 62.3% in the third quarter of 2010, up compared to 54.9% in the second quarter of 2010 and 54.3% a year ago.

John Engquist, H&E Equipment Services' president and chief executive officer, said; "Market conditions continued to improve during the third quarter and as a result, areas of our business delivered solid sequential gains."

"Due to improving rental demand, we increased both our overall rental capacity and the physical utilization of our fleet. We were also very pleased to achieve sequential rental rate improvement of 1.8%. As a result, rental revenue increased 15.8% from the second quarter and 7.0% from a year ago.

"In October, our rental business performed at levels we have not experienced since early in 2009, at which time we were maintaining $100 million more in rental assets. However, while we are very encouraged by the current activity, we remain cautious regarding the balance of this year due to potential seasonality issues and ongoing economic challenges in several of our markets."