The Honda S2000 is a small sports car that seats two people. It's famous for being fun to drive and has a powerful engine that can rev very high, making it popular with car lovers.
Mismatched tires mean that the tires on a car are different from each other, like having one type of tire on the front and another on the back. This can make the car harder to control, especially when driving fast.
The brake caliper is a part of the car's braking system. It helps squeeze the brake pads against the wheels to stop the car when you press the brake pedal.
The Lotus Exige Cup is a special version of the Lotus Exige sports car. It's built for racing and has features that make it faster and more fun to drive on a track.
A VIN is a special number that helps identify a specific car. It's like a social security number for vehicles, showing details about where and when it was made.
The Chevrolet Express is a big van that can carry a lot of people or cargo. It's often used by businesses and families because it has plenty of space inside.
The Aston Martin V8 Vantage is a fancy sports car with a strong engine. It comes in a version that you can drive with a manual stick shift, which many car lovers enjoy because it makes driving more fun.
Tail lights are the red lights at the back of the car that help other drivers see when you're stopping or turning. If they're fine, it means they're working properly.
Rear fenders are the parts on the sides of the back of the car that cover the wheels. If they're untouched, it means they weren't damaged in the accident.
Collector cars are special cars that people like to buy and keep because they are rare or have a lot of history. Some people think these cars can be worth a lot of money later on.
GT3 is a special version of the Porsche 911 that is built for speed and performance. It's known for being very fast and fun to drive, especially on racetracks.
Thinking of cars as an asset class means seeing them as things that can increase in value, like a piece of art or a house. People might buy certain cars hoping they will be worth more money later.
Diminished value means that if a car gets damaged and then fixed, it might be worth less money than it was before the damage, even if it looks good again.
High mileage means the car has been driven a lot, usually more than 100,000 miles. This can make it less valuable to collectors because it may have more wear and tear.
The Plymouth Prowler is a unique-looking sports car that was made in the late 1990s. It stands out because of its cool design that looks like an old-fashioned hot rod.
The Chevrolet Monte Carlo is a stylish two-door car that was popular in America for many years. It’s known for being comfortable and has a racing history, making it a favorite among some car fans.
Carfax is a company that gives you a report about a car's history. If a car has a 'bad Carfax', it means there are problems in its past, like accidents, which might make people hesitant to buy it.
Minor damage means the car had small problems that were easy to fix and didn't really hurt the car's safety or value. It's not a big deal compared to major damage.
The Chevrolet Corvette is a fast sports car made in America that people love for its cool looks and powerful engine. It's often talked about because it's been around for a long time and is considered a classic.
A paint meter is a device that checks how thick the paint is on a car. It can show if the car has been fixed or repainted after an accident. Here, it's mentioned that checking a plastic bumper isn't really necessary.
Aftermarket wheels are wheels that you can buy separately from the car manufacturer. People often choose them to change the look of their car or to make it perform better, but they might not always be as safe or reliable as the original wheels.
The Lamborghini Diablo is a very expensive and fast sports car from Italy that looks really cool. It's famous for its powerful engine and is often seen as a dream car for many people.
The Porsche 911 is a famous sports car from Germany that has been loved by car enthusiasts for many years. It's known for being very fast and fun to drive, and many people consider it one of the best sports cars ever made.
The Jaguar XJ220 is a super-fast sports car that was made in the 1990s and was known for being one of the fastest cars at that time. It's a rare and special car that many car lovers admire.
The Porsche Boxster is a two-seater convertible sports car that is fun to drive and has a stylish design. It's a great option for people who want a sporty car without spending as much as they would on other Porsches.
A prototype car is a test version of a new car that helps companies see how it works before they make a lot of them.
LIVE
Welcome back to Switchcast Season 6.
I am your host Doug Tabott here with my co-host Tyler Sanders, and behind the cameras and
in front of the mics, I think that's how it works, is Ethan Huffnagle, our executive
producer.
He does have a microphone, but he doesn't have a mute button, which is just the way
we like it.
I can say whatever I want.
Switchcast is the podcast, the automotive podcast that's not just for car people.
The show where we seek to edify, educate, and entertain in no particular order.
Although I think we're leaning more towards entertainment the last couple seasons because
we've run out of knowledge, so we have, you know, not much left to educate people on.
And so, yeah, it's a, you know, self, self, self.
What is, I can't even come up with a vocabulary here.
All I can think of is self aggrandizement, but it's actually the opposite.
It's a...
Flagellation, not the, what is that term?
A homeschooler in me is very disappointed in myself.
Oh my gosh, the...
Self-deprecation.
That.
Not...
There you go.
Flagellation.
Self-deprecation, not to be confused with what happens when you buy a new car and drive
off the lot.
Or used one sometimes.
Self-deprecation, not self, yes, that's...
Self-deprecation, not depreciation.
Yes, driving off the lot is self-depreciation.
Oh, yes.
Yes.
Okay, well, let's get warmed up because apparently we need it.
That was, I just went out on the track with cold tires on a 40 degree day and put it right
into the tire wall, on turn one, trying to use big words that are above my vocabulary
this early in the game.
That's all right, we'll get there.
Speaking of which, that happened with a friend of mine, it wasn't me, I've never wrecked
on the first lap that I know of.
Friend of mine took out my Honda S2000 at Nelson Ledges, I'm in the passenger seat,
it was on mismatched tires, which I knew about, it was a leased car, it was a CR, S2000CR
club racer, and I took over the lease from a friend of mine, it had like three months
left but a ton of miles, and everything that could go wrong in an awesome way went wrong
to that car.
We cooked a brake caliper at Audubon and then had to drive it back and we ended up changing
the caliper or not changing it, just unseizing it, backyard shade tree repair in a Home Depot
parking lot.
Nice.
It was to the point where we're like, if it's totally seized, I had a Lotus Exige Cup
car in the trailer behind our tow vehicle, and I was like, well, it has tail lights and
it has really bright fog lights, but the headlights are blacked out on the cup cars,
I'm like, I'll just drive this home and put the S2000 in the trailer, and I had a dealer
tag with me, so I'm like, hey.
It's technically the safer thing to, could have been the safer thing to do.
Sure, but we were able to get the caliper change in the parking lot, but anyway, we
were totally cheeping out on the tire replacement because it was a leased car, so we're like,
it just has to make it to least turn it.
I did a lot of track days with that car, and yeah, first lap, and I told the driver,
I was like, hey, not only are the fronts like snow tires or whatever versus our compounds
on the back or vice versa, but cold tires, first lap out, just cool it.
Well, we made it to turn 13, I think it is, at Nelson Ledges.
And just blash, and I'm in the passenger side watching the tire wall come at me.
Boom, man, one lap, one lap.
How did these turn in go?
No, it actually went fine.
So John Sabo saved our butt.
It was really not that bad.
It was just like dents in the door and the front fender tires are a great thing to run into.
And he just hammered out the fender, and when the leased turning guy was there,
just kept him busy in conversation and stuff like that.
And it's like, yep, fine, good, good to go.
Nice.
Do you have the VIN for that?
Oh, yes.
I would love to know where it is.
Should not buy either of the S2000s that I have owned, either of them.
They were driven very hard by a young 20-year-old who thought he knew how to drive, not, yeah.
We covered a dealership scam last week, I guess two weeks ago now,
and a guy from a listener from Maine emailed in and says he inspects cars for Lemon Squad,
and there's a scam online dealer who's claiming an address in Maine up there.
And he's been hired multiple times to go inspect cars that don't exist at a dealer that doesn't exist.
At least these folks are doing their due diligence, sort of, at some level of due diligence.
After they've placed the deposit, that's a problem.
Oh, never mind.
The guy took a deposit, and oh, yeah, full transparency, no problem.
Give us a thousand dollars deposit, order your PPI, and then they go,
well, the PPI came up with nothing.
Literally.
Really nothing.
Nothing.
Car doesn't exist.
Yeah, car doesn't exist, which, I mean, it just shows that there's so many scammer websites out
there shows that scamming pays because these guys keep finding people that don't even like
Google Street View the address, like, come on, that is caught almost every one of them.
Every one of them.
He asked me, like, what could be done since he's on the ground there locally,
and I'm like, well, nothing, because they're not.
They're being run out of, you know, maybe the Fallok Museum in Iceland.
Yeah.
Somewhere like that overseas, but I did send him a sheet on how to take down a scam site online.
It's not that easy, actually.
It's multiple levels of reporting and following up, and it's actually quite a bit of work,
arguably more work than it is to put up a scam site.
Our website constructor is nodding, but anyway, this sheet was put together by my baby daddy.
That sounds bad.
It's the biological father of my stepson.
Anyway, he's an internet hacker guru, whatever.
So we will link this in the comments.
So if you have time on your hands and you want to try to combat some of these scam sites,
even though they'll likely pop up just as quickly as you take them down,
you know, it's something you can do for the car community.
So we'll link that Google Doc in our show notes.
I'm pointing at you to remind me to get that to you so we can link it in the show notes,
but also, yes.
Oh, what is still, we don't have a new, we don't have fresh,
fresh fuel for the podcast, the same as last one.
Yeah.
Well, you know, the cork doesn't really cork so well anymore, so it's going to need finished.
We've got to finish off the Knob Creek 18 year.
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We're going to do
Doug Tabott car dealership story time this week for no other reason than I felt like venting.
Let's go to how we love a good Doug vent.
Not a rant, just a vent.
So the joys of small business slash business ownership.
We always say like it's not really business ownership.
You don't work for yourself.
You work for the government and the bank and your customers, which you should always be working
for your customers.
That's the fun part of it.
Working for the government and the bank and everybody else is not so fun.
Thankfully, I've gotten to a point in my business where I'm not working for the bank.
It is our cash.
I'm not working for an investor.
To me, that's not business ownership.
That is you just have a different boss and you can't quit because you have to pay the investor off.
A lot of my competition has big time backers and they're able to do a lot more things,
sell multi-million dollar cars, have incredible facilities.
And I am not in any way jealous of what they are doing because I know that there's somebody behind
the scenes.
Orchestrating.
And if those who control the money want something to change,
sure, we'll change.
Or they're giving freedom as long as you perform and then when you don't,
pull the plug, whatever.
For me, that would always be in the back of my mind is just like debt.
They could pull the plug at any point and so that's causing a lack of sleep at night.
As far as the stress is concerned, I sleep very well at night.
Now, there's other things like eating spaghetti too late at night or whatever.
Acid reflux, that's a whole other thing.
However, to set that up, it has its downsides because I only have as much money as I have
money to work with and that's it.
So sometimes things get tight and it's the best kind of tight.
It's not tight as in, oh no, I got to make the payments to the bank.
It's just a matter of, well, we can't buy those cars because we bought these cars instead
and that's the limitations of a small business.
And having tried investors and banks and stuff in the past, that's not a tradeoff I'm willing
to make again.
Anyway, it almost, well, it got real spicy a couple weeks ago having these limits because
yeah, it just got real tight.
Do tell.
And it was very, very frustrating because I was relying on people to do what they said
they would and at some point making commitments based on that whereas I typically only make
commitments based on what I am going to do.
Makes it real easy to not go back on your word.
But it was essentially a comedy of errors, perfect storm situation.
So we had an estate deal where we were supposed to, or we got bids on a Lamborghini 165,000 bucks
and it wasn't a car I wanted.
But we got four bids, everything was great.
Yep, the state accepted it.
I texted the high bidder.
I said, are you ready to go?
The deal's happening tomorrow.
Like this is your car, you ready?
Yep, no problem.
Build me out.
You'll get a wire in 24 hours.
Well, it was a Friday afternoon, so the guy came in and instead of just like
brokering the deal, sending it to the dealer and just saying, well, you know,
estate can send me a check.
I was trying to make things convenient.
So I said, well, I'll wire the estate money and then I'll just get reimbursed on Monday.
Gotcha.
No problem.
I mean, that eases things up.
If everybody's on the up and up, that's perfectly fine.
Sure, sure.
But I had also committed to buy another car with those funds.
Okay.
So again, not something I would usually do, but okay, well, this is a quick broker deal.
I confirmed that they're buying the car.
I wasn't planning to pre-fund it, but for 24 hours, fine.
I'll have a wire in my account on Monday.
Monday comes and goes.
Yes, confirm the wire's coming in today.
Yep, we're sending it out.
Didn't come.
Okay, well, Tuesday I'll have to work.
Tuesday comes and goes.
Multiple confirmations, yes, the wire will be sent out.
Tuesday comes and goes, wire's not there.
Wednesday, we're coming up against Thanksgiving.
So I'm like, well, if it doesn't come today, it's not coming till next week,
because nobody's doing anything on Black Friday.
So I really, I didn't intend to front the money on this deal.
I don't want to.
And the opportunity cost now, where I'm having to say no to another deal that I wanted to
participate in is more expensive than the deal itself.
And it wasn't just this one deal.
That was a problem.
So we have a reserve.
Somebody could critique me and say, oh, well, if you can't afford to do a deal like that,
don't play in those waters.
Sure, fair point.
And that's why we've moved down market to typically sub $100,000 cars as of the last
few years, at least for inventory, because they're just better ROI.
And if we do have a situation where we get a car that we can't sell, it's just not tying
up as much capital.
It doesn't become that big of a deal.
But that we also, I keep a reserve for situations like this.
So if it's like, oh, okay, well, I need to dip into a reserve or do a bigger deal,
we can still do that.
The problem was I had already had like three, four, five other deals.
Oh no.
And I already had dipped into the reserve.
So I had two of them that a guy hired me to sell his cars for him.
I lined up the deal to another dealer, but there was a payoff.
There was a loan on both of the cars.
So the courtesy in dealer world is you get paid, the seller gets paid when they have
the title in hand.
That's mostly because of places like C&C Exotics and Charles Harris
and all the dealers that would sell cars before they had paid them off, never pay them off.
So that's our trust commitment.
So no problem.
I bought those two cars, paid off the banks, sold them to this other dealer, but I'm not
going to get funded until the titles come in.
Well, those couple of weeks before Thanksgiving, everything slows down now.
So I'm sitting on my hands waiting for those titles.
So that's six figures right there.
Uh, another one.
We sold a six figure car on an auction.
Great.
Sold it like right around Thanksgiving.
Guy has to sell stocks, move money, whatever to wire funds.
No problem at all.
We expect that that's normal.
But you know, there's a week on that deal.
And you know, it was just, uh, and then I think I bought another six figure car.
Same thing.
I sent the check in for it, but they were waiting on the title as well.
So I had to keep those funds available because the title hadn't come in,
but I had mailed the check.
So I had to make sure that, you know, that was funded.
But I pre sold that one to a dealer as well, and they're not going to pay me until the title comes in.
So it's like six figures here, six figures here, six figures here, all out,
none of which I had planned to have out.
Are you sweating?
And all just sitting.
I mean, I had like 750 grand in accounts receivable, just sitting there going,
all right, when's it coming in?
And then I have this Lamborghini deal that's like, oh yeah.
The Lamborghini deal was on top of that?
Well, yeah, that was included in the 750, but it was after all these other ones.
And I was like, okay, well, this is only for a day.
But it was kind of like the straw that broke the camel's back where I'm just sitting there going,
I can't do anything until these deals come back in.
And it was very, very frustrating.
And I'm also sure it's stressful, you know, there's a lot of this stuff.
You're probably used to it because you do this for a living,
but there's still like a chance that somebody could not pay.
Yeah, a deal could fall through.
Yep. Oh, no, there's two more.
This was this was not the only one.
This I mean, it was like full moon week.
A guy gave us a deposit on a car the Wednesday before Thanksgiving,
claimed the balance was going to be wired the Tuesday after called us on Tuesday
when he was supposed to be wiring money.
Said he was stuck in Colorado because someone got sick.
So it would have to be the following Monday.
Like, well, your deposits expired because that's five days.
But like, whatever fine, we'll see if the Monday money comes in Monday comes along.
Now, by this time, we've been funded on the other deals, but it was just like
everything, all of this happened in the same two week period where everybody's delaying.
Now, this one was funny.
He came back around on that Monday, he was supposed to wire money and then said,
oh, well, you know, I got to got to move money or I'm working on funding you this week.
Oh, I was like, okay, that's delay number two.
That Friday, we got a notification of a credit application by his wife.
Five days after he said, I'm working on paying you this week,
he hadn't even applied for financing or maybe he had other places.
And I was like, bro, you said this was going to be a cash deal.
Then you said somebody was sick.
That's just, we're keeping his deposit.
Oh, so I laugh when people go, oh, non refundable deposits are shady.
Okay. No, that guy is shady.
100%. And you had time in this deal.
You had money that you were expecting to come in.
You couldn't let other people look at the car because it was like you had a deposit.
Oh, man.
The last one, the last one, we sold the car to a repeat client.
He was going to wire us money and he texted us thankfully, he's like,
I've got your account number saved in my bank so I can just click one click and wire you money.
And we're like, well, no, we had to change our incoming wire account.
So we have a separate account for incoming wires because we give the account number out
to so many people, it's ripe for fraud.
So we don't do any other transactions, we zero it at the end of every day.
Well, two days before that, we'd had somebody do a couple micro credits and a debit from our
account to link a Charles Schwab account or something.
I'm like, well, I didn't do that.
Somebody's trying to link our account, so I shut the account down and opened a new one.
So I was like, sorry, can't wire money to that account.
We have to give you our new account number.
He's like, oh, well, that takes a few days then to like,
once I set up a new account, I can't wire into it for a couple of days.
And this was right in the middle of that.
So at that point, it was just like so ridiculous.
I just laughed when he told me that.
I'm like, of course, who else wants to buy some time and not pay us for a little while?
You're just swimming in it, Doug.
You got the time.
So I say this, right?
This makes us sound like we're broke or don't know how to run our business.
Again, this goes back to the fact that I've made a decision to operate without investors
and without floor plans or whatever.
Like I've chosen the quote unquote stress of stability.
I've chosen to put limits in place so that I can't go outside them.
I can't play games because once you start playing those games, if you get behind,
now you owe people money.
If I get behind now or I can't get behind, if I start losing money,
I'm just losing money that I have.
But to end on a positive note, I want to congratulate ourselves on how we've done
the last few years.
That goes a lot to my team, not just me, honestly, mostly in my team.
Every single one of these deals we were doing were profitable.
It would be a lot worse if we were struggling to get paid on cars that we were upside down on
or had to pay off a floor plan lander once we got the cash or some of these guys that play
games and buy one car with somebody else's money and they really hope that money comes in
because they're buying time with somebody else.
Like none of that.
It was literally just, okay, I want my cash back so I can then recycle it again.
So the worst of this was it was opportunity cost of, okay, we made money on this car.
I just wanted the money to come in quicker.
And let me take this opportunity to brag about our turn numbers for a bit.
Ooh, let's go.
Despite of the delays and stuff.
I was talking with a dealer friend of mine and granted we have a small dealership,
but sometimes that actually makes it harder to have good numbers because we're dealing in
specialty cars.
A lot of bigger dealerships have like automatic, if the car gets 60 days old, we wholesale it
no matter what and they keep their turn numbers down.
We don't have that policy.
But our average turn time this year from purchase, not from list date, from purchase
to being funded on the sale of the vehicle is 53 days.
Holy, that's nice.
Down from 60 last year, which was our best ever.
As well, we currently have one, but two weeks ago, we didn't have a single car in stock
that's over 90 days aged, which is like, you know, the time where you need to sell it.
So this means we're recycling our cash almost seven times every year.
Our sales and growths profit have increased year over year since 2022 every year.
2021 was just an anomaly year.
Yes.
I mean, even Carvana made money in 2021.
But in 2025 already, we finally surpassed our impossible to beat 2021 numbers.
I think in 10 months, we had beat 2021 full year.
As the end of November, books closed, we sold 15% more cars than the entire
2024 year and we only lost money on 3%.
Holy crap.
3%.
That's healthy.
Yeah.
So when I look to gas you up even a little bit more, I always see you or somebody post
like new inventory fresh off the truck.
Here it is.
And I swear, and these are just my just my feeling.
I swear half the time that stuff doesn't even make it to the inventory page.
Somebody finds it, you get to get a deal done and you get it moving.
Yeah.
On that note, our shrew negotiator this week comes to us.
Uh, thanks in part to our technical advisor, Dan Doucet.
He's been shopping for an Aston Martin V8 Vantage Coop six speed manual in a not vanilla spec.
So if you have one for sale, let us know.
Especially green.
Yeah, especially green.
And he sent me one that he had found online and it kind of looked like a scam, but it isn't.
But the guy's almost as shady as a scammer.
This was amazing.
Poor Dan.
He thought he had like four great options for this challenge car to get to get a dream of his.
And I think all of them turned out to be duds.
Yeah.
Well, anyway, this one was nicely priced, although found out it was a total loss once
I finally got the VIN from the guy.
Oh, you got it.
The previous total loss insurance claim.
Wow.
But I texted him off of the Craigslist ad.
I said, hi, inquiring on your V8 Vantage, could you share the VIN please?
His response, you're not serious to buy.
Oh, I didn't know.
But you asked for the asking for the VIN is like the most serious you can be.
Other than just giving money.
Like what?
Weird.
I finally got the VIN out of him after a little bit of back and forth.
Because I had found his name and his address and got like, yeah.
So I responded with his name.
So he knew like, because he didn't have in Craigslist anywhere.
So I was like, okay, buddy, like his name.
And I was like, you know, how would you know without running my credit?
And he goes, well, it's cash only.
I don't do payments.
I was like, okay, well, I got to get a loan from my bookie and he needs the VIN to extend
me collateral.
So he sent me the VIN.
So the car is real.
It just was shady.
The car is real.
It's just very shady.
And well.
And I don't think it's titled in his name because he's in South Carolina and the last
title was in North Carolina.
So I think I don't think he has a dealer license or anything.
He's just skipping title and playing car dealer.
So I was going to low ball him on Dan's behalf and just be like, listen,
I know you have a vehicle that was a total loss, but I pulled the damage up.
And it was a rear hit down low.
So it hit the rear bumper pretty hard.
Maybe the subframe like underneath it.
But like it wouldn't totally scare me off for the right price because it like
tail lights were fine.
Decklid was fine.
Rear fenders were untouched.
So it didn't bend the car.
That's so weird.
25 Gs.
I'm in.
I am serious to buy.
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Cars as an asset class are ruining, well, they're not ruining car enthusiasts.
We've kind of made that, we've had that opinion before.
They are potentially ruining the enjoyment of cars for car enthusiasts, and I don't think
enthusiasts realize it because they're too excited about their cars going up in value.
Some of them say, oh my gosh, well, my car's too expensive.
I don't want to drive it anymore.
I'm scared to drive it.
But let's unpack that more and talk about the real risks and the real downsides of cars
going up in value, collector cars going up in value at an astronomical rate, which they are in
certain small segments.
I want to be careful and not go back on what I've said, which is cars are not good investments.
Cars are not fundamentally investments at all.
I'm not going back on that, but there are short periods of time in which cars can accelerate
in value rapidly, especially with what we're seeing now, where people are manipulating
markets and causing them to seemingly double overnight sometimes.
Again, I don't want to burst anyone's bubble here metaphorically, or literally, I don't want to burst
the bubble of their car appreciation.
I just want to be realistic about this, just as consumers and users of AI and social media
need to also be aware of the dangers of how AI can ruin our lives.
I think enthusiasts of cars who are happy that their cars are going up in value need to be aware
of the downsides to themselves.
So this is not a complaint or rant, but a fellow car enthusiast giving you a warning
that what you think you may want might be terrible for you.
Well, and I think as a member still technically of the 996 Porsche community,
everybody loved to talk about, now is the 996's time, it's coming, we're getting values,
and they did go up along with everything else.
But that, everybody seems so obsessed with that until I think it maybe gets out of hand.
Like even in the GT3 community, everybody's like, yeah, you know, these values are going to be
over 200k cars in one day, and I'm like, sure, but is that a good thing?
Yeah, some, but sure.
We've discussed other angles too much, so I don't want to, I can go on that for a while,
but I don't want to rehash what we've already stated.
The theory of today's discussion is cars as an asset class slash investment
destroy our ability to drive them because the gap between a clean title or clean history car
and a bad one has increased and gotten so astronomical that people are admittedly
afraid to drive their cars in fear of damage, not because of the damage itself,
but because of the diminished value.
It's not the same as, I have a thousand mile car that's original paint, I'm scared to get a rock
chip, it's, if I get damage, even if it's fixed right, it will cost me so much in diminished
value that I cannot take my original car out, because once it's not original, it's never original
again. Historically, this is not scientific, but we will unpack some actual data points,
but historically, if somebody asked me, well, what discount do I apply to a bad car fax slash
rebuilt title car? And I'd say, you know, 25 to 35%, maybe less for just like damage on car fax,
but probably maximum 35% for a rebuilt title on a specialty car. Now, I think it's a crazy amount,
and I want to look at a couple specifics for GT and Diablo 6.0.
Oh, you're talking about the like the mid 2000s for GT?
Yes.
Really hot one?
Okay.
Sorry, I feel like that's the only one that counts.
I mean, technically there was one later, but it's like a different car.
Okay. So let's start with a 4GT. So there's one with 13,000 miles on Bring a Trailer recently.
This one is not a perfect proof of my point, but it is a start.
For some context, is this a high mileage for one of these? Because I see that, and I think that's
like in a Porsche world that's still like cream puffy, got plastic on the seats, but
it is not collector level mileage. They made enough of these cars, and because it's an American
supercar, it was subjected to the same phenomenon that Plymouth Prowlers and Dale Earnhardt edition
Monte Carlo's were that so many people bought them and stuck them away. It's an American thing
that we love our I Never Touch. I mean, it comes from the grandma's plastic couch thing.
This couch has never been sat on.
Like then why did you buy it?
Anyway, that's a different discussion.
I've literally, people sell their cars still in the wrapper, original plastic on the seats.
Okay, okay.
So this is like kind of driver-ish, but not high mileage?
Yes, it's not high mileage for a 4GT because they're indestructible.
Can't get parts for them anymore, but they are indestructible.
But yes, from a collector standpoint, it is high mileage. Back to the Plymouth Prowler thing,
I always make the joke that like the highest mileage Plymouth Prowler on the planet has 7,000
miles because they just all have 500 miles. It's an exaggeration, but.
Okay, so this one has a clean title, but a accident on the car fax that resulted in
quote, minor to moderate damage. And it was, I guess the rear bumper on this one.
And they even, oh, that was a different one. Sorry, no 5.4 GT.
Anyway, this is yellow with stripes, one of the rarest color combinations and a very desirable
color. There's a premium for yellow. It's hard to really pin down a number here, except, yes,
it is. We have a good red comp sold for $380,000. A comparable one with a clean title would probably be
in the neighborhood of 500K. So again, not a perfect comp there, but around 25% for just
a bad car fax. There's even comments in this listing where people say that based on this low
result, they can't, they're afraid to drive their clean cars because of the fear of potential damage,
because this one sold so low based on the bad car fax. Like people are admitting it in here.
Let's look at two really good comps because they're the same color,
basically the same car, one with a clean title, one with a clean title, but bad car fax.
One, we're looking at a 6,000 mile, yep, 6,000 mile, 05, 4 GT in red, which is arguably the
least desirable color who really cares, but it is what it is. Clean title, bad car fax. The
car fax was due to minor damage, just the rear bumper. In Corvette and Porsche world like that,
we don't even count that as damage. You can't put a paint meter on a plastic bumper,
so nobody cares. It's just not a thing. They even had the rear bumper that was damaged. They
still have it as proof of like, look how little this bump was. I dig that.
You could have backed into a car in your driveway and done this level of damage. So it's not like
it's a rebuilt title. This one sold for $410,000. In contrast, a 5,000 mile red one without a bad
car fax could have had the same damage at any point and just not been reported to car fax,
but we'll assume that's a clean car fax. That sold for $461,000.
11% discount, which is $50,000 for what is essentially a rear bumper ding. It was a bump.
You're not kidding. I'm looking at this bumper now. It's like...
There was stuff on my 98 pace car that was worse than somebody used touch-up paint for.
It was probably a 5,000. Let's say it was a $10,000 repair. I don't know how hard for GT
bumpers are to get or were whenever the damage happened, but you figure it's 5x diminished value
in terms for the cost of the repair. Man.
That's crazy. Wow. Imagine having to go to your insurance company and say,
I need 50,000 in diminished value for what? I gotta scratch in my bumper. I bumped my bumper.
And what it's there for? It gets worse. Holy moly.
Two Viola Ophelia Diablo 6.0s back to back. It's a fancy word for purple,
and there's only a couple purple ones in the US. You got purple though.
So this is great. They both sold within a similar time period,
and they both sold on bring and trail, I think within 30 days ago.
Whoa. Purple seat inserts. Yes. So the one with the rebuilt title also did not have factory wheels.
It had aftermarket wheels, and the interior was a cream color, and it still is, but they did
purple seat or inserts, which were not. Those were not factory? Not super desirable. I'm sure
they could have been, but they weren't on that car. And it did not have the rear wing, which is
probably a 10K deduct, but it also only had 5,000 miles in contrast to an all-stock one with
clean title and car facts, and 18,000 miles. So the miles do play into this somewhat,
but are probably negated by the bad title. Okay, so we look at the 18,000 mile one.
Stock wheels, has the wing, clean title, car facts, purple.
Sells on bring and trail for $600,000.
The 5,000 mile one has a rebuilt title, as we said, modified interior with seat inserts,
aftermarket wheels. This one happened to belong to Missy Elliott, and it was wrecked not by her,
but it was wrecked by an unauthorized joyride. The article can be found on cheatsheet.com,
and it was apparently somebody she didn't even know. Nice. Yeah, so somebody,
valet, something? Oh yes, a shipper was, oh look at that, a shipper.
Yeah. What do you know? She hired a company to ship her $300,000 at the time, Lamborghini Diablo,
and a dispatcher for this company found where the company had parked her car for the night,
took it on a joyride, and wrecked it. The wreck really wasn't that bad. Again, we found the pictures
online of this wreck, and it was basically the front right corner. Didn't look like there was
anything structural, windshield was intact, you know, essentially beyond the A pillar was fine.
So while it did have and does have a rebuilt title, it wasn't like the car was bent. It wasn't
something that people would be scared of. In fact, even in the comments, people looked at it and went,
no big deal. It's not something that would total out a car today.
So $600,000, $18,000 miles clean title. Do you know or do you want to guess? No, I love title
one so far. God. $330,000. That's like 50% off. 45. This round to be exact. 45% discount
for rebuilt title $270,000 knocked off the price. I got to be honest, the wheels kind of
don't work. No, I don't like the wheels, but you can find wheels, you can find wings, like it's just money.
It's only money, Doug Tabbit 2025. There we go. All right. Since we're talking about depreciation,
but that goes into a bigger point though. As these diminished value claims increase,
the insurance costs will increase and the companies will cover these will go shoot,
we're not covering that anymore, our risk profile is too high. So again, it's harm
that comes as a result of something we think is good. So not everybody should want their cars
to go up in value. And honestly, it doesn't matter if all of them are going up because nobody's
profiting. It only matters if it goes up relative to everything else. If everything's going up,
it's just inflation. So anyway. Well, I think what people forget too, and maybe this is a point of
pride because they feel like my car is worth this. I drive some value from how much my cars
or things are worth, but the money only matters if you transact. If you just hold on to the car,
kind of doesn't matter. Like I'm of the mindset that I would just like my cars to maintain value
as much as possible with inflation. So I don't lose a ton of money from that aspect, but I'm
already losing a bunch of money in maintenance. Yeah. And whatever else. But as long as like
my goal with the cars that I'm into is to kind of maintain the value that I put into the purchase.
So far, that's worked well enough. It's not perfect, but the enjoyment that I derive is
worth it for that additional cost. And honestly, if my car's doubled in value, I honestly don't
want that. I'd be a little uncomfortable. Sure. It does complicate things. Nobody wants extreme
depreciation, but a little bit of it is generally healthy. Yes. Nobody wants extreme inflation.
A little bit of it is normal for an economy. Yeah, extremes are bad. Like my Diablo has
doubled in value since I bought it. However, if I look at what I could trade it for up and down,
I am not ahead because I could probably think I could have traded it plus 200k for a GT3RS
four liter at the time. And now I'm like behind. Yeah, like I could trade straight up for a nice
GT3RS 3.8, which to me is crazy, like a Diablo or a 911. Yes. Stradales have I could have traded
down to a Stradale and got a couple hundred grand back a year ago. And then sticks with it. Now,
I think I have to trade up to one. I think so, especially in an interesting color. So the only
like trade, which I've come out ahead where I feel like, okay, the Diablo has actually increased
to the point of profitability is an XJ220. Because when I bought the Diablo, I would have had to
trade up 200k to an XJ220. And now I can trade even or down 100 to 200, depending on the example.
That would be sick. I don't think you'd have it for very long, but that would be amazing.
That is the tough part about it is like the Diablo is a better car. But I just feel like, okay,
that's the way it's like when you're in traffic and all three lanes are blocked and you switch lanes
and you get ahead five cars, it's like you got to get back in the lane to realize your gains.
Yes. Even if you think this lane is moving faster. But ultimately, it doesn't matter because
everybody's just jockeying forward. And that's kind of what increase in values are on cars. It
really doesn't benefit anyone. We're all stuck in traffic. It's a really good analogy. I like that
a lot. Sure. Just came up with that. Props and Flops brought to you by Switch Cars.
And Switch Cars is the enthusiast dealership where we buy and sell cars that we like ourselves.
Check out our handpicked inventory at switchcars.com and be sure to mention
switchcast for special pricing when available. You can find more information online at switchcars.com
or come visit our showroom in snowy and cold, the Twinsburg, Ohio. Doug, what do we have for a
pick of the week from Switch Cars Inventory? One that just came in is a 2014 911 Carrera 4S.
That's a Porsche if you didn't know that. Seven-speed manual, 37,000 miles.
Beautiful amaranth red burgundy metallic over Luxor beige. Hot. And that will not stick around
long. We pretty much as soon as we get any 991 manuals, they're gone. They're gone. Our flop
of the week. This one sent to us from a loyal listener. This is E-Rod. This might be the worst
car I've ever seen on eBay. Those of you watching get the benefit of seeing it. I will do my best
to paint a picture for everyone else. It is a 2003 Porsche Boxster S. So I want to say M96. No,
it's a 986. Oh my God. It is yellow and red painted. It has Lambo door kits, a spider hump
over the top, a giant rear wing a la like the old 550 spiders that just had it like right in the
before they figured out aerodynamics. It was just like a plank. Yep, or the 718RSK or whatever it
was. Yep. So right in the middle of the rear deck lid. Janky chrome wheels. The front bumper
is covered in mosaic tile. On the yellow there is red painted like claw marks up the hood and fenders.
It's got a replacement engine. It has over 100,000 miles on it, I believe total. Oh no, I'm sorry.
It's a never raced custom garage queen. Yes, as 132,000 miles. But it's a custom garage queen.
And like fake carbon fiber on everything. Never before seen custom glass mosaic tiles.
Like glued on by a first grader. This is not a condo in Boca Raton. This is a car that has
got so much like fake carbon fiber and it's got the like quilted leather stuff in these
aftermarket seats that have been why is there a diamond like steel plate for the for the
here's the worst part. He's describing it as like what if they built a Boxster spider back then.
Oh my god. Just because it has the spider hump. That's literally the only thing. Everything else
he's done has made the car worse, heavier, more gaudy, has nothing to do with a spider at all.
It doesn't even have like the Euro recaro seats. It has aftermarket seats. Everything about this
car is terrible. The rear deck lid wing, which is in addition to the giant
back deck wing is covered in mosaic tile. The rear bumperettes are covered in mosaic tile.
I've never seen mosaic tile on a car in my life. I would think like on a hearse maybe but
good golly. The dude has a spreadsheet of stuff about the car and he put the tire pressures in
here. The spreadsheet is insanity, but there's there's nothing of value. There's nothing about it.
There's no performance anything. Oh my god. Why is there asking? Wait a minute. Wait a minute.
He's asking $130,000 for it.
And he has a NOS sticker on the rear fender above the wheels.
And he has in here drive cycle to reset codes after a clear.
I think it's probably because he drinks NOS energy drinks, not
uh, and his license plate. This is a good candidate for future plate to samples. License
plate is for spider. He goes to bingo tire or big O tires for all those things. Oh my god.
It's awful. It's awful. I want to go down the spreadsheet, but I'm not going to. Okay.
Holy Schneider. Get us out of this. What's our prop of the week? Our prop of the week
unexpectedly comes from Nissan. Not possible. Not. It does, Doug. So no car scoops.com says
that Nissan will double its performance lineup as it teases a mystery sports car. Wait, you can't
two times zero is still zero. Yes. Wait, are they not making the GTR anymore?
Are they officially done the final, final, final edition? Maybe.
So I don't know exactly what their sources are, but car scoops is saying that they're going to
double the Nismo lineup to 10 models by 2028. They have a target, which as we talked about much,
much earlier sales targets are kind of meaningless, but it's pretty, it indicates they're putting
some effort into this. They're going to get back into racing in a significant way with a prototype
car coming at some point in the next couple of years that will eventually become a new road car.
So it seems like the based on my read of this article that Nissan wants to try to get back
into the game by having racing drive innovation, drive their drive their road cars and make fun
things again, because I don't think they have anything else and they have nothing to lose.
Very little to lose. Certainly. If you're looking at their balance sheet, I want to be positive.
I want to believe this can happen because gosh, Nissan used to be so awesome. I'm not optimistic.
They said a couple years maybe for a prototype. So that, I mean, that sounds like a lot of the
boutique car manufacturers that we're constantly looking at. But sure, we'll be hopeful. Well,
Nissan's got to be hopeful that maybe all they have left.
The Sheffield brand was recently revived by Jake Turkbus, an owner of an original Sheffield
Allsport diver he received from his parents in 1970 when he was just 11, beginning his love of
watches. As an adult, Jay used his extensive expertise in product development and marketing
to revive the brand that started it all. He set out to develop watches with a high level of quality
and specification at a value price. His first effort and a successful one on July of 2023
was the debut of the Sheffield Allsport diver one. It had the kind of build and movement that
much more expensive watches use and his debut price of $108 was equivalent to the $13 his
parents paid in 1970. Since that debut, Sheffield has expanded to a wider range of
automatics and chronos, many designed around vintage Sheffield dials of the 60s. The Sheffield
well of clever and unique design remains his inspiration as well as maintaining the goal
of high quality, very affordable range of automatic and quartz watches. Sheffield watches value on
merit, not just price. I love mine. So get yours at Sheffield watches.com and be sure to mention
you found them on Switchcast. Thank you for joining us for Switchcast with Doug Tabott and Tyler
Sanders produced by Ethan Huffnagle. Switchcast is an automotive entertainment and opinion show
and nothing we say should be taken very seriously. We do not give tax, investment,
legal, emotional or professional advice and the only licenses we hold are driver's licenses.
The opinions expressed on this show are exclusively held by the people pontificating at that moment
and do not reflect the values of our producers or sponsors. Our theme music is provided by Emily
and Ivory. You can stream their full album on Spotify or SoundCloud. If you like this show,
you can stream it in its entirety on your favorite audio podcast platform.
Check out switchcast.live for more info.
About this episode
Doug and Tyler dive into the complexities of car ownership, discussing Doug's recent experiences with dealership challenges and the frustrations of cash flow in the car business. They explore the impact of rising car values on enthusiasts, warning that while appreciating values can seem positive, it may discourage people from driving their cars due to fear of depreciation. The episode also touches on notable car scams, the importance of due diligence when buying, and the evolving landscape of cars as an asset class.
Doug needs to vent about the "joys" of business ownership. Plus well discuss the real risks and real downsides of collector cars going up in value at an astronomical rate.
