PLEASANTVILLE--With consumer confidence low, Americans are forgoing buying new cars and instead snapping up used models. Driving up used car prices to their highest levels in 7 years.

Jose Justiniano is checking out used cars at New Liberty Motors in Pleasantville.

"We have one. Me and the Misses are looking for a second car. Mostly an SUV or truck," said Justiniano.

And just like other Americans in the car market, he's buying used to save green. In fact demand for used cars in the US is up, while supply remains low. According to Edmunds.com an online auto consumer guide, the average price for a three-year-old car is up 10 percent.

Michael Bellino owns New Liberty Motors and he says there are three reasons why demand for used cars are up and the supply is down.

"Obviously the economy. But when the cash for clunkers, when they ran that program, they lost a tremendous amount of used cars," said Bellino.

In fact, about 680 thousand used vehicles were destroyed by the close of the program. Bellino also says car manufacturers played a role in the decline.

"With Chrysler and GM having the issues that they had and slowing new car production down. It's caused the newer car dealers to levitate more towards a used car sales program rather than a new car, which sucked up a lot of the market," added Bellino.

Even dealerships losing their franchise cut into the used car supply.

"In Turn you had dealers that were in business for 50 80 years they're not going to close their doors and simply go out of business, so they turned into used car stores. You have such a high demand for the product and such a small amount of it that's it definitely driven prices up it made it harder to buy a good quality used car," said Bellino.

Bellino is always on the lookout for inventory even buying cars from drivers who come to his lot.

While Justiniano didn't buy a car today there is one piece of advice he gives to all people looking for a used car. "Buy American."