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35:26
Company
Waymo
A company owned by Google's parent company that makes self-driving cars. They run a service where you can call a taxi through an app, and a car with no driver inside will show up to pick you up.
Company
Zoox
A self-driving car company owned by Amazon. Unlike normal cars modified to drive themselves, they build unique carriage-style vehicles from scratch with no steering wheel or pedals.
Car
Yugo
An incredibly cheap, poorly made car imported from Eastern Europe in the 1980s. It was so unreliable and cheaply built that it became famous as a joke, with people saying it was cheaper to abandon it when it broke down than to fix it.
Person
Sam Fiorani
An expert who studies the car industry and predicts how many cars companies will build and sell in the future. News stations often interview him to explain why cars are getting more expensive or why there are shortages.
Concept
USMCA auto content rules
A trade agreement between the US, Mexico, and Canada that forces car companies to build more of their car parts in North America using higher-paid labor if they want to avoid paying high taxes (tariffs) when shipping cars across these borders.
Car
Toyota RAV4 Hybrid
A very popular, mid-sized family SUV made by Toyota that uses both a gas engine and electric motors to save fuel. It is highly sought after because it is incredibly reliable, cheap to run, and holds its value extremely well on the used market.
Term
additional dealer markup
An extra fee that a car dealership tacks onto the price of a car just because the car is popular and hard to find. It is pure profit for the dealer and has nothing to do with the car's actual value from the manufacturer.
Term
out-the-door price
The absolute final price you pay to buy a car, including all the hidden fees, taxes, and registration costs. It's the actual total amount of money you have to hand over to the dealer to take the car home.
Car
Rav4 Hybrid
The Toyota RAV4 Hybrid is a five-passenger SUV that uses both a gas engine and an electric battery to help you save money on fuel. It is a hybrid, meaning it charges its own battery while you drive and does not need to be plugged into an electrical outlet. It is built by Toyota and is designed to be a simple, reliable, and easy-to-use vehicle for daily commuting and family trips.
Car
Mazda Cx50
A stylish, slightly rugged SUV from Mazda that actually uses Toyota's hybrid engine technology under the hood. It gives buyers the fuel savings of a Toyota with the sporty feel and premium interior design of a Mazda.
Place
Consumer Reports test track
A private race track and testing facility in Connecticut where the consumer advocacy group Consumer Reports tests new cars. They buy the cars anonymously and push them to their limits to see how safe, reliable, and good they actually are.
LIVE
It's noon here in Ventner City, New Jersey on our nation's capital, Washington, DC,
and this is Courage Live for Tuesday, June 30th with your hosts, Zach and Ray, me here in my
living room in Ventner and Zach hanging out with his office. It's a somewhat somber day for the
Shevska family and our Shevska family history. It is an hour and a half away from the exact
ninth anniversary of the passing of my wife, Suzanne, Zach's mother, Dara's mother, Suzanne.
I'd like to say how are you doing today, handsome? I'm not my normal,
ebullient self, but I will do my best. Sorry, I'm doing a quick Google search,
ebullient. Don't know that word. Enthusiasm. Wow, I just learned a new word on this show today.
Sounds good because my mom was a teacher, so that's quite nice. Every year,
my dad writes an essay to my mom this year. I helped him take it from his LinkedIn page,
and I actually put it on a little website. It's twosuzanne.com. My mom's name is Suzanne,
so here I'll put that up on the screen in case anyone wants to go check out what my dad shared.
One moment, pops. I'll get this up on the screen, I promise. You do these essays every year, Dad.
Why do you do it? To honor your mother, to remember your, well, not that I ever forget
your mother, but just to remind people of who Suzanne was and the significance of her life
and her fight and everything else about her. We shouldn't be the only ones damn it to know her.
I think she's worthy of the world knowing her. That's just me. What can I say?
I encourage everyone to go ahead and read the most recent note that my dad shared with my mom.
Very sweet. Again, I had the link up there on the screen. If you want to go check it out,
it's a very, very, very incredible thing that my dad does every single year, and I encourage you
to read all of them. Yeah, they're all right here, and we also have some photos from our
family as well, which is really fun. Anyway, please check it out. Really, really,
really appreciate you dad sharing that. I'm very proud of you. Today's show is brought to you by
our company, caredge.com. We'll transition into the show. If you'd like, learn more about all the
ways we can help you back at caredge.com. Today, we're going to talk about that. We've got some
of the latest data from our friends over at Carfax. I called them our friends. We don't know
anyone over it. The big story, dad, continues to be the same thing. Used car prices jumped more
than $1,300 in the first six months of 2026. The $3,600 number I grabbed dad, hybrids and EVs.
They're up 12% or $3,600 from the start of this year. We're going to talk about the used car market
and what's going on there. $3,600 increase, man. What a bummer for people who want to buy a car.
Well, it's only a bummer for those who want to buy a hybrid or a used EV.
They stick with the old gas cars and they're only up, what, $1,300? Is that what it is?
Only $1,300. Now we can exchange people $2,300. Let's call the show.
I mean, unfortunately, yeah, the vehicles that have the most interest from customers, these vehicles
that get good fuel economy, $3,600 increase of 12% jump. You can see here the average price in the
category has spiked $850 just in June. We're seeing prices even accelerate more. Now that Mid
Atlantic State saw prices for hybrids and EVs jumped $1,400 in the month. There's some big
implications for what's going on globally. There's another story here, which is Toyota sales actually
being down. Well, the reason Toyota sales are down globally is because they can't produce as many
vehicles. The reason they can't produce as many vehicles is because of what's happening globally
with international conflicts, the war with Iran causing a lot of issues there. There's some big
stories here with car prices going up in the way that they have, the used car market especially
seeing it. You know my favorite chart that I like to look at. I mean, it's a scary chart that we
like to look at. We are getting, I'm going to try and use my ebulant equivalent word, precipitously
close to $52,000 as the average market price for new cars. We're at $51,974. What do you make of it,
is there relief in sight? In a word, no. If used car prices spiked what they spiked in the first
five months of the year, okay, and they spiked what they spiked in June,
and we know that new car prices are up and we're about to crack the $52,000 barrier as the average.
I mean, why would you think there's any relief in sight? I mean, what would be the leading
indicators that would suggest that prices are about to return to normal? The only thing that
would cause that to happen in my mind would be either another great recession or a depression.
I mean, because otherwise there's just not enough pressure to move pricing back to where
we think it needs to be. Do you see any relief in sight? The only relief I get is the new ergonomic
pillow that I bought, so I have better support when I sleep at night.
No, and when you start to look at the different segments of vehicles, they're all up some less
than others. Cars, this concept of cars as a segment, had the smallest increase of just $1,350
over the last six months. Pickups, luxury cars and SUVs are up $1,500. Vans and minivans are up $2,000
since the start of this year. I know, Dad, you did a recent media, I forget which local news station
it was. Yeah, several news stations have had you on recently as the expert to talk about why
minivans are cool again. I think you've explained many times over. It's because SUVs have become so
unaffordable for people that we're seeing minivan prices in van prices skyrocket. I mean, $2,000
since the beginning of the year, the only segment that rivals that is obviously the $3,600 increase
we've seen on EV and hybrid vehicles. If you're in the market for an EV, I guess not EV, but a
hybrid van, holy cow. I mean, you're going to be looking at prices that are just mind boggling
here. Well, the really troubling thing here, cars had the smallest increase at $1,350 over
the past six months. That's $200 a month. They shouldn't be depreciating that or more,
not appreciating that or more. On the low end, we see values spiking more than $200 a month.
On the high end, we see it around $300 a month. No, excuse me, $600 a month because the time
six is 36. That's unfathomable to me. It is hard for me to understand how the vast majority of
Americans with everything in everyday life increasing as dramatically as it had this year,
how we are supposed to be able to, I don't know, deal with that on a daily basis.
We're going to stick with the use car market here for just another moment, but then there's an
implication in a new report that's honestly, you say, we have clickbait YouTube community.
There's some other people out there with clickbait, but they're called Bain and Company. Before we
turn there, this is a chart from Blackbook. Blackbook tracks use car prices both at the
wholesale and retail level. I'm pulling this up just to show how exaggerated what's happening
this year is compared to prior years. The black line is current wholesale weekly price index.
Wholesale use car prices compared to 2025 and 2024. You can see they're significantly higher
than they had been in prior years. Then obviously, on the retail side, we've got the same situation.
Retail prices have gone up significantly more than prior years as well. A friendly reminder,
typically, typically, pre-pandemic, used cars lost value. They didn't appreciate
any value. These are just some charts that indicate things have gotten more expensive on
the use car market this year than they have typically. Obviously, the baseline that they
were coming from has also increased. We shared the new car data as well. It's the same story.
They keep getting more expensive. The car facts data obviously demonstrates. Then there's the
ongoing global conflicts, a.k.a. Toyota production being down and their sales being down. There's
a lot of moving pieces here. Yes. You look at Toyota's sales drop. It's a little bit here in
the United States. A lot in China. It's much greater in China percentage-wise,
but the Middle East is where they're experienced the biggest decline,
which was, what I think, 37%, 33% if I remember correctly, something like that. That is a staggering
decline for the number one volume automaker in the world to experience that type of disruption
in such a large region globally as the Middle East. Obviously, Toyota, new car side of things,
production issues, global conflict causing headache there. Same things impacting what's
going on with used car prices domestically here. Then there's the, well, what happens? What happens
on the other side of this? There is a headline in the news today. This comes from a report that
Bain and Company published the other day. A, quote, perfect storm points to a much smaller
U.S. auto market by 2040. I'm going to read a few parts from this article, and it's going to sound
like a lot of the things we've been saying for a while now. These are the key points that TMBC
pulled out. Some auto forecasters predict the industry will be smaller and more competitive
in the coming years. Bain and Company cites slowing population growth, changing consumer
behavior on high prices as some of the reasons they're expecting automakers to sell fewer cars.
Analysts said auto sales could fall by more than 2 million units by 2040. Before I get
into some of the key points in the article, what do you make of this? Dad sounds an awful
lot like what you and I talk about on a daily basis.
It is their attempt to state what I think is the obvious. What is obvious to me is that
manufacturers, and I have said this in any number of TV interviews that I've done on radio interviews
that I've done. Automobile manufacturers, the automakers have figured out how to make a tiny
profit selling fewer vehicles, and they are okay with that. The reason they're okay with that is
they anticipate that there will be fewer people in the future who will be able to afford to buy
their products, end of sense. However, those people who can afford and will continue to buy
those products will buy the high profit margin, higher priced vehicles that the manufacturers
will be willing to continue to produce. If, as I like to say, the market today is
for about 13% of the population, that number might become 10% by 2040, and the manufacturers,
the automakers, will be fine with that because those 10% of the population that can and will buy
cars will buy expensive enough cars that the automakers will make enough money that they
can stay in business. The rest of us can take tips from what the good folks in Cuba are doing
and figure out how to keep 30, 40, 50 year old cars running because the rest of us,
that's all we'll be able to afford. And if I may, we have a lot of great
members of our community and viewers and Mark, who is a lover of EVs to the greatest extent I know,
sent me the other day where Waymo and Robotaxi and Zook and whoever the others are,
that we are reaching the expedited acceleration point for these type of vehicles to take over.
So if the future really holds autonomous vehicles, I mean, there was one article he
sent me where they're not even going to require brake pedals in these vehicles anymore because,
well, if there's no human to be there in that driver's vision, what the hell do you need the
pedals for? Before we go too far down that path, I want to call out a few key areas that Bain and
Company referenced in this report because, yes, what you're talking about could happen,
but I think it's a little bit down the line. So there's some things happening right now,
however, Deb, you can see right here, half of 16 year olds today don't have a driver's license
compared with nearly 70% of 16 year olds between the years of 1966 and 1984. That stat might reflect
a mere delay rather than a total refusal. Bain's research suggests most people still get licenses
by 25. Still, the share of new vehicle registrations among people aged 18 to 34 fell from 12% in the
first quarter of 2021 to under 10% by mid-2025. Fires 55 and older account for nearly half
of new registrations, and it fell the largest share for eight straight quarters, the firm said.
So there's an interesting stat, takeaway autonomous, takeaway power, train takeaway,
everything. Younger people seemingly are refusing to get driver's licenses, and older people are
making up a larger share of those that actually purchase these vehicles. Well, if I'm not mistaken,
I believe like the minute you turned 16, it was like, let's go mom, take me over to motor vehicle,
I'm ready to take my driver's test. You couldn't wait to get your license. Now you're going to be
31 next month. Has the world changed that dramatically in the last 15 years that kids don't
want to get their driver's license? Or if I may, they try and tie together with Mara. Are these
kids just thinking to themselves, what the hell do I need to find out or learn how to drive for?
They're going to be all these autonomous vehicles that can take me anywhere I want to go, okay?
And I can sit comfortably in the backseat with my Nintendo switch or whatever the hell it is,
my PlayStation, whatever the hell it is, and whatever screen they want to be attached to at
the time, they can be attached to because there is no need in their mind for them to learn how to
drive if it's just going to become something that is absolutely autonomous. Why would people
need a driver's license? Why would people even have an interest, young people? I mean, they would
have to think to themselves, you got to be out of your mind to drive a car. Why do you folks want
to drive a car when you can actually have a car take you around and you don't even have to talk
to anybody up front? Yeah, I think that you're spot on. I mean, I'm thinking of our younger
cousin Rachel who's in college and doesn't have a driver's license, never got it. And then it's
becoming more and more common and just say, okay, you know what, I can get an Uber or I can get a
Lyft. Take away autonomous for the moment. If that does come great, if it doesn't come, it also
doesn't really matter because we still have all these rideshare applications and things that
people need. Here's the scary part. And at a certain point, every one of your Uber and Lyft
drivers are going to be like 90 because nobody's going to have a driver's license. So if you want
some old, elderly person to be slipping you around in a car, okay, that can't hear anything and
I don't know their eyesight might not be quite as good as it used to be. And I don't know their
reflections at 90 are nearly as good as they used to be. Or do you want to be in an autonomous
vehicle? I don't know that I want to be, I don't want my Lyft driver to be 90 years old when I get
to the next Lyft. That's just me. One other point that they made in this,
the Bain and Company report, you can see here, however, auto forecasters say that with vehicle
prices as high as they are, the industry will have to find a way to keep cars in service.
Quote, today's vehicles can't have a limitation of five to 10 years for Irini, who's a researcher,
said it's not practical, excuse me, for a person who's spending 50 or $100,000 that it's going to
be junk in less than a decade. So this is one of the biggest challenges as well, is as these
vehicle prices have gotten more expensive, we've also seen an influx in recalls and safety related
issues and things like that. And so the math doesn't math when the price of the vehicle goes sky
high, but then the reliability doesn't increase as well. That being said, the age of the fleet in
the United States has gone up significantly. It's like almost 13 years now is the average age of
vehicles on the road in the United States. But yeah, man, this is pretty like, take everything
we've talked about today, use car prices, some of them up $3,600 in the first six months of the year,
$600 a month in price increases, new car prices are up, the most popular brand in the world,
can't produce enough cars to keep up with demand. And then you have a report saying,
by 2040, we're going to go from 16 million vehicles sold to 14 million vehicles sold.
There's a contraction going on. It's like, to be very clear, not good for our business side,
we're predicated on more cars being sold. It's scary, dad, to think that this is going to
contract as much as it likely will. Yeah. And if I may, in my lifetime,
I only know of one brand of disposable cars that ever had any run at all in this country,
and that was the Hugo. Hugo. Yeah, that was the closest thing to the big click of automobiles
that wherever it broke down is just where you left it, because there was no point in fixing it.
But it was inexpensive enough that you could leave it on the side of the road and you wouldn't care.
But if you're paying $50,000 to $100,000, as Sam Fiorini from Auto Forecast Solutions was
suggesting, I think people are expecting a greater longevity from a vehicle when you're
paying that kind of money. It shouldn't be that at last five years, and just the value of the
vehicle was $10,000 a year, not including insurance, maintenance, fuel, and everything else.
What do you think then, dad? Because we're not the only ones reading these reports. It's getting
mainstream press, and obviously, there's been an affordability crisis for a long time, but the
contraction of the broader auto industry is becoming more and more well known and spoken of.
How does that play into what's going on here? USMCA talks formally begin on July 1st or tomorrow,
as the Trump administration seeks stricter auto content rules. Last time I checked,
federal government regulations, tariffs, things like that have actually had a direct impact on
vehicle prices here in the United States, and USMCA could do the exact same thing. We could end up
with a situation where vehicle prices domestically go up even more on the other side of this.
Hopefully, they go down, obviously, but that has to be going through the heads of the group that
are doing these regulations for USMCA or negotiations for USMCA. They have to be
thinking about affordability and the contraction of the broader auto industry domestically.
Let's be realistic here for a second. One of the reasons that so much manufacturing has been
pushed out of this country was to be able to find less expensive labor, cheaper labor,
lower costs, so that we could keep things affordable. Because the cost of manufacturing
in the United States is higher than, say, the cost of manufacturing the same part in China,
or Vietnam, or Bangladesh. Because the cost of living isn't as high in Bangladesh.
It was all shorty, everything, yeah.
So if the concept is to have stricter auto content rules, that the auto content has to be
more built in the USA at a higher labor cost, then ultimately, yes, you would think at connecting
the dots that the prices are going to have to go up. If it costs you more to build it here,
then that cost is going to be passed on to the ultimate manufacturer. If it costs the suppliers
more to build it here, and the suppliers are going to charge the automakers more for the part,
then ultimately the total cost of the vehicle has to go up. So I don't know what the solution is.
Perhaps the solution is that they're just going to sell fewer cars to fewer people by 2040,
and everybody will be good with it.
It will be interesting, Dad, to see if this ends up putting even more pressure on the story that
we started with, which is used car prices. Like what happens with USMCA if it has a direct impact
on new car prices down the line?
We know what's going to happen. It's not even summer reruns. We're watching it live.
We can see in the last six months that cars have gone up over 200 hours a month.
Hybrids have gone up over $300, so we know. It's like we're watching it in real time.
There is nothing to suggest that if new cars continue to go up in price,
that used cars will suddenly go down in price. No, they're going to follow suit.
Because what is it that people buy when they're buying a used car? They're buying a price differential,
and so if the price differential today is about $20,000, let's say, and that price differential
will continue to be $20,000, but if new cars go up $2,000, that means ultimately used cars are going
to go up $2,000. If the ultimate cost of new cars continues to increase,
there is nothing on the horizon that will suddenly bring down the cost of those used cars.
It just doesn't exist. There's no pressure there, and the reason there's no pressure there.
There's so many factors, but kids, not desirous of getting a driver's license,
I'm literally thinking to myself, what the hell do I need to have to drive for?
If the machine can do it all by itself, why do I have to drive? Then you have people having to
make life choices between rent or mortgage or food, and at a certain point you just say to
yourself, I don't need the car, I don't need it, I'll Uber, I'll Lyft, I'll use public transportation,
I'll use a RoboTaxi or Waymo, whatever it is, but you don't need to spend that money.
Want to actually demonstrate what we're talking about here today with a lot of these used car
prices going up, new car prices going up, obviously the report of 2 million people taking
themselves out of the market over the next 10 years or 15 years or so, and then what we just
turned to there, USMCA and what impacts that could have on car prices as well. Here's a 2024
Toyota RAV4 XLE First Sale. This is in Arizona, and you can see here 32 days on the market,
it's got 20,529 miles on it. Now this vehicle that I've been ahead and I found the original
Carfax had an original MSRP of $36,484. So think again for a second here, they're asking $35,000
for a hybrid, and this is a hybrid, used RAV4 with almost 21,000 miles on it. That's the
absurdity of what's going on right now in the market, and kind of all signs point to that's
probably more of a bargain today than it will be next month is with crazy thing to say out loud.
Absolutely it is, and then do yourself a favor. Go see what a brand new 2026 would be,
and forgetting what MSRP is, what's the adjusted market price? What is the dealer
addendum for additional dealer markup on those vehicles? And then suddenly that 2024 that you
have the opportunity to buy at roughly the same price as what it was brand new,
looks like avertable bargain. Yeah, that was an XLE all-wheel drive. So let's find that over here.
So we're going to go XLE, and then we'll go there with me. All-wheel drive. All right, drum roll.
Okay, yeah, I need more looking at these are C rated dealer here, so I have to double check what
their fees are, but let's say it's $43,000 to get your hands on a new one. Does this dealer add
add-ons? Yeah, and this dealer adds $1,296 in add-ons. And I know exactly where that dealership
is, and do you think that there could be an additional dealer markup added to that vehicle
once you get to the lot, that there's an addendum sticker that might show that? Because it is
virtually impossible to get your hands on one of these because they're all pre-sold?
So let's take a peek. So give me a second. I'll rotate this. Bear with me, all. Sorry,
I didn't anticipate it to be sideways like this. Drum roll, please. Oh, man.
I'm trying to look at it sideways. Yeah, it's pretty hard. One second. I'm rotating it,
and I will get it on the screen. There we go. Save that. All right, here it comes.
Oh, my God. Do it. Delivery $63,000. Wait, what the heck is this? Well, how does the vehicle
price get to $53,000? All right, all right. Stand by. Stand by. So we've got a 2026 Twitter
Rav4XSE hybrid. So this is a different one. Yeah. Again, to be clear, the way I got here,
was we were on this dealer's inventory back on CarEdge.com. We found one. This is a Rav4XLE,
but this is a totally different MSRP, $42,983. I came down, I clicked on View Full Report.
That took me to the RightToyota dealership page on CarEdge.com's dealer reviews. I scrolled down,
I found the first Rav4 plug-in hybrid I could. It's this one. We also have this one right below it,
so we'll open this one as well. Okay, so this is from May. So last month, this was on a 50...
Yeah, so, Dad, they're adding $2,000. So you don't even have to guess here. This dealership
adds $2,000 of accessories, $495 dock fee, and then another... Crystal Fusion,
yeah. I mean, who doesn't want one of them? Crystal Fusion. The other one was this one.
And yeah, we've got, on this one, Dad, $2,895 of accessories. Yeah. So I think...
I mean, what this shows is, because where we started here to be clear was we were looking at a
used one. Yes, at $34,000. At $34,000, and we're saying, yeah, that actually is a proverbial bargain
when your comparable options are $60,000 plus. Wait a second. 2026 Rav4 XLEs are 60 grand OTT.
There. That's insane. Yeah, I'm going to make a suggestion to anybody that's looking for a Toyota
Rav4 Hybrid. Go look at a Mazda CX50 Hybrid. It's the Toyota Hybrid engine system.
I can't get over the fact that we're just like kind of normalizing $63,000 as an
outdoor price for a Toyota Rav4. But the whole point of this exercise is to say,
why would you ever think that used car prices moving forward are going to go down? If I may.
Personally, I don't ever want to see another one of our headlines say, use cars about the crash.
Use car market crashing. It is not. It has not. It will not. As long as new car prices continue
to escalate at the rate that they're escalate, and as long as there can be that big enough gap
between that new car and that pre-owned car, those used car prices are not falling off a cliff.
They're just not. And if what Bain is suggesting is true, if that's what happens,
that they see by 2040 that the new car industry in America will be happy selling 14 million new
cars a year as opposed to 16 million new cars a year, well, then they're only going to be selling
those 14 million cars that are higher priced cars. Yeah. This is...
There's no cliff. I hate to say it. And I know that we use hyperbole and we use clickbaity,
and clickbaity was Ned Baity's son, click. We use clickbaity headlines. I get it. I do.
But to think that there's this proverbial cliff that all the lemmings are going to follow,
there is no cliff. It seems as if... Bear with me for a moment. It seems as if we are all on a trek
to climb Mount Everest, and we are reaching the stage of that climb where we just all need
oxygen container, the canisters, so that we can breathe as we continue to climb
further and further up the mountain of high prices. It ain't changing. Okay? There's no cliff.
There's no impending doom when it comes to prices of new cars and used cars. Yes,
they are unaffordable. Yes, they will remain unaffordable. Yes, that's what the industry has
decided that is best for them, and we as consumers just damn well better get used to it. I'm done.
All right, y'all. Again, where we started today's show, it's a nine-year anniversary of my mom's
passing my dad's wife. He writes every single year, my dad, a really, really, really kind
message to my mom, a little essay. We made a little website to susan.com this year,
so you can check them all out right there. Encourage everyone to spend some time reading.
Is there worth a good midday cry? So spend some time back on that. That'll help you after the show.
Get this posted on LinkedIn as well, so you can get all sorts of eyeballs on. I know how proud
you are to connect with mom in this way, and obviously, as your son. Let's do a smile on my
face because it's going to live forever, which is really awesome, and it's a testament to who
you are. If we can help you with anything, folks, caredge.com is the company my dad and I started
almost seven years ago. The careers page is almost done, so we will have that up soon. We are
hiring for a handful of roles, so you're going to see that. You cannot wait to see applications
come in. We are really excited to grow and expand our team, so please, please, please get excited
for that. And we'll be back tomorrow. Tomorrow will actually be the last show of the week for us.
On Thursday, I am out traveling. I will see if I can get space to do the show on Thursday,
going to be spending some time with our friends at Consumer Reports. I'm going to be up at their
test track in Connecticut, so I will try my best to make sure that we can do a show, but I don't
think I'll be able to, but I'll let you know. I'll confirm that tomorrow. And then Friday is July
4th, dad. On 4th of July, we've got some guests here in DC, so I have to go be a good host of those
guests. But yeah, I look forward to being back tomorrow, and then I'll just see you at work.
Are you saying, and by the way, Friday is July 3rd. It is not the 4th.
Well, Friday is July 3rd? Yes. Oh, then we've got a show Friday, my bad.
Yeah, Friday is July 3rd. Now, it is the substitute holiday for people who have to have that weekend.
Yeah, I saw we had the day off, so it's almost before the July. Oh, I'll work. I'm working.
All right, I'm working. The 4th of July is Saturday. I'm working. And if I may, I know in this
country we love to have our holidays fall on a Monday, and we do it artificially so that people
can have their three-day weekends. But damn it, the 4th of July has to fall on the 4th of July.
It's just that freaking simple, okay? You can't celebrate the birth of your country on a different
day. It doesn't work. I'll try and be good. Can't believe I thought Friday was the 4th,
because I saw on our counter is the day off, and I was like, oh, yes, it's okay. All right,
anyway, we're back. We're back tomorrow. We're back on Friday, but unfortunately,
I don't think I'll be able to do the show from Consumer Reports on Thursday, but that'll be a
fun trip nonetheless. All right, Dad, enjoy the afternoon. I'll help you out with the LinkedIn
post now, okay? Yeah, absolutely. Thank you, everybody, for being here, and we look forward
to seeing you back here tomorrow. We do indeed. Love you. Yeah, love you too.
About this episode
Zach and Ray dive into the alarming reality of skyrocketing car prices, highlighting a massive $3,600 spike in used hybrid and EV prices alongside a near-$52,000 average for new vehicles. They analyze why relief is unlikely, pointing to global supply chain disruptions affecting Toyota and a sobering Bain and Company report predicting a significantly smaller U.S. auto market by 2040. The duo debates how automakers are shifting toward lower-volume, higher-margin sales, leaving average buyers priced out and potentially turning to autonomous ride-sharing or keeping older vehicles running longer.
Original notes
Today on CarEdge Live, Ray and Zach discuss the latest data on car prices. Tune in to learn more! Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com
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CarEdge Live
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