How you can eliminate a lot of stress in your life and some of the latest car news that really hits home for most car owners

Hey folks, welcome to another edition of My Car Guru, where I have made a life decision

that I want to share with you.

I have decided to eliminate as many things in my life that I can that cause anxiety or stress

that I have no control over.

My wife looked at me the other day and said, well, you sure are on your phone a lot.

And I always have an excuse, you know, it's, well, you know, I'm doing business or catching

up on my emails and that type of stuff, but you know, that's not always true.

I'm looking at a news feed, you know, it could be any of them, you know, any of

the apps, I'm not going to go through them.

You know what they are, you probably check them out yourself.

But it's just, it's consuming too much time for me, just like TikTok.

I didn't even know what TikTok was two years ago, a year ago I downloaded the app.

It's very addictive.

It's just one video after another video after another video.

And most of it is very innocent, you know, most of what gets served up to me have to

do with business, cars, politics, Charlie Kirk.

And some of it just creates this anxiety that I have no outlet for.

And more importantly than that, no need for.

So I just eliminated it off my phone.

I am hopeful that I will be able to keep it eliminated.

Because not only does it rob time, it robs you or robs me of the focus that I need

to have on more important things.

You know, like my faith, my family, my friends, my business, my audience, you know, for my

Kharaguru.

There are plenty of wholesome things that I can expose my aging mind to.

And I'm just not going to hold my brain hostage anymore by loading it down with

problems that I can't solve.

So what am I going to retain?

Well, I'm going to keep Facebook because Facebook is important for my Kharaguru, for

the my Kharaguru group.

It also is a place where I offer automotive advice.

I try to inspire people with things and life experiences and that type of thing that

will maybe help them in their life.

I try to witness to my faith.

And hopefully provide uplifting things.

If somebody tries to attack me or I see them going aggressively political on things, I'm

just going to block them because I don't need that.

And I don't know what they think that does.

Who are they influencing anyway?

They're probably preaching to the choir, to their own agreeable choir, that is.

Now I'm a true believer that our thought life controls not only our mental health, but

our physical health as well.

So I don't need it blocking it, eliminating it.

And maybe you should too.

All right, I'll take my first break.

I'll be back here in just one minute.

Okay, I am back.

A couple interesting things in the automotive press.

Now I can't cut myself off of that.

That's something I have to pay attention to to stay informed about my business.

But anyway, the title of an article I was reading is this, underwater car trade ins climb to

highest level since 2021.

So according to this article, a growing share of American drivers are finding themselves

underwater or upside down on their auto loans, reaching a four year high.

What does that mean?

Well if you have a car financed and if you were to sell that car to an individual, more

than likely if you are considered to be underwater or upside down, you would not realize as

much or as many dollars for your car is what you owe on it.

Your payoff may be 20,000, but the most you can get out of your car is 15,000 because

that's what the market will bear.

And so you are $5,000 upside down.

Are you with me?

Okay, so when does this not matter?

Well this does not matter if, I mean if you are theoretically upside down, it only matters

if you go in and trade cars or if you try to sell your car to somebody and you have

to produce a title, which you'll have to pay off the car before you can do so.

But it doesn't matter if you're going to keep the car until it's paid off.

Now you may have made a lousy investment from the very beginning.

That happened the day that you picked the car up, but if you just, you know, wait the

entire 60 months or 72 or 84 before you pay it off, then you're never upside down, really.

I mean in terms of losing money, okay?

Just like if I have a share of Apple stock and the share goes down in value, have

I lost any money?

No, because I haven't sold the stock.

If I sell the stock, I might have a loss.

So fear not.

You know, if you buy cars and finance them and then keep them five or six years beyond

that date, you probably made a wise move.

You are ringing out all the additional value you can out of that vehicle.

So why do people do otherwise?

Why do people finance cars for 60 months or 84 months or whatever?

And they know that they never stay in a car that long.

They're going to stay in a car for two years, maybe three.

And they're going to have this consistent problem of carrying over negative equity into

the subsequent car loan, which is a recipe for a disaster.

At some point, you hit the wall.

You get to the point where you cannot trade.

You know, your salesperson says, well, folks, I'm real sorry, but you owe so much

on your trade end, we can't get the bank to finance you.

You know, when a bank takes on a car loan, they would love to see a little equity in the

loan because they know that people that have an investment in a car, you know, it's like

a commitment.

If you pay $10,000 down, you're probably not going to let the thing go back.

If you pay nothing down, then you still might not let it go back, you know, if

things get tough.

But you're more likely to than somebody that, you know, pays a whole lot of

money down.

So if you actually are way upside down in your vehicle and you have a negative down

payment, which is entirely possible, it just makes your payment go way up because

you're still paying off the loan that you had before, you know, it's a really hard

concept for a lot of people to understand.

But if you owe more money on a car than it's worth and you trade it in, the

difference between what you owe and what it's worth is going to be tacked on to

the amount you are financing on the new car.

It just doesn't disappear.

You're stuck with it.

Now I guess there's some ways to get rid of it.

You could come up with some cash.

You could, you know, a lot of people, when they go to a dealership and they

can't trade because they're upside down so badly, they'll say, well, I'll just

sell it myself.

So they try that.

They put it online or they put it out in their yard with a for sale sign on it.

And they find pretty quickly that, you know, a lot of those people that are

driving around and they see your car, they've already been online.

They've been looking for cars and they know that yours is overpriced.

And so it just sits there.

You know, I saw, I ride my bike a lot.

I rode 20 miles a day before yesterday.

And I saw a vehicle on a, just a deserted little one lane road and it had a truck

sitting in the front yard with a for sale sign in it.

Now I don't know what they know about marketing, but that's probably not the

most effective place to sell their car.

Maybe they had it online too.

So I'm assuming too much possibly.

But they're hoping for that drive by traffic, you know, and there's just

not that much except for people on bicycles.

Based on studies by Edmunds.com, they think that about 50%, somewhere around

50% of the people that are driving around in cars that are financed are upside

down and you may be one of them.

But that's okay.

You know, you don't have to worry about it when you're just going down

the road or going on vacation or whatever.

There's no reason to be concerned unless you're in the market to trade

cars and then you need to know.

And the best way to find that out, easiest way is just send me your vehicle

information.

I need your 17 digit VIN number.

Please count the digits.

Double check it because I get a lot of VIN numbers that are short of digit.

So do that and then tell me what the vehicle is.

What kind of equipment package does it have on it?

For example, is it an LX model or a DXL or just whatever?

I need to know how it's equipped.

Does it have a sunriff?

Does it have any extra options?

If you have a picture of the window sticker where you bought it, which you

should, if it was a new vehicle, it should be folded up in your glove box,

then just send that to me as well.

Sending pictures helps.

But I need to know like the condition of the tires.

Are the tires half worn out?

When did you put them on?

Have you spent any money on the vehicle?

Is there anything that you have done to enhance the value of that vehicle?

So maybe an accessory.

Maybe you put a winch on it.

Unlikely, but it's possible.

So in the overall condition.

And sometimes it involves a phone call, so we get to chat.

We can chat about your vehicle.

And then I'll tell you what it's worth.

I'll pull the vehicle history too.

You don't have to do that.

You don't have to pay to have that done through car facts or whatever.

I'll do it for you.

And I'll tell you what your vehicle is worth on the market today.

What you could expect to get out of it retail.

If you were to put it out in the front yard with a for sale sign on it.

Or listed online, which is the better choice.

Or what the wholesale value, what the actual cash value would be to a dealer.

Who is appraising your vehicle and

once you negotiate the selling price of the new vehicle.

Then you will be talking the same kind of numbers on the trade in.

Because when you lump together the selling price in the trade.

At a lot of dealerships, you don't really know what you're getting for your trade in.

Do you understand that?

Let's say for example, you're looking at a, I don't know,

a Nissan Frontier at one of my competitors who jacks up the window sticker by $5,000.

And you've got a, the actual cash value of your trade in is, let's say 10.

But he's willing to pay you 12 for it or 15 or some big number.

And then you go shopping around and other dealerships and you say, well,

you're not giving me enough money for my trade in.

I got you beat down the street.

No, you don't, you don't.

You got to look at the trade difference.

How much difference are you having to pay?

That's the real number, folks.

It's not necessarily what the selling price is.

And it's not necessarily what the trade value is.

It's the combination of the two.

Now, with my four target strategy, you're negotiating four different things separately.

You're not even talking about the trade in.

You're just talking about the selling price of the vehicle that you're buying.

And then you're talking trade in.

Then we're on the same page when it comes to actual cash value of what you own.

Because if you know that number and you know what your payoff is,

then you're going to know the real number that's going to be carried over to your

next car loan.

If you don't know the ACV, actual cash value, and you're dealing with some kind

of inflated trade value, you may think, well, you're not carrying over hardly

anything until you really dig down into the finance contract.

And you will see it.

You'll see it right there.

Or on the bill of sale, the buyer's order, different dealers call it

a sales contract.

That's the document, folks.

That's the one that you need to see.

You know, they come out and throw a four-square on you.

You know, where they have just a blank piece of paper with four boxes

and start throwing numbers.

What did I tell you to do about that?

You know how to make a paper airplane?

That's about all that's good for.

You say, sir, I don't know why you brought this out,

but I'm not doing four-square dance with you.

I never learned to dance that well.

So just go get me a sales contract that has a breakdown

on all the numbers, and then we'll dance.

We'll do the watusi.

OK, what else is in the news?

Oh, yeah, this crazy governor Newsom out in California.

You know, that's a very progressive state, apparently.

And they were all tore up because Trump said,

we're not paying any more EV subsidies, $7,500 tax credit.

That ends at the end of this month, September 30th.

So if you want your $7,500 tax credit on an EV,

you better buy it before September 30th.

If you don't, you won't get it.

Well, Governor Newsom said, well, we're going to pay it anyway.

We're going to pay it out here in California

with a multi-billion dollar deficit.

Well, he changed course.

He said, no, we can't do it.

We don't have the money.

He called what the federal government did federal vandalism,

meaning that they robbed the people of California

of their ability to buy electric vehicles.

So I'm glad they did.

He was going to try to create a $5,000 incentive

to help offset the loss of the $7,500.

But I think they started looking at their budget numbers,

and they realized, we can't afford this.

You know, isn't that what they do, though, a lot?

I mean, they promise all these big things,

and then they never really talk about what it's going to cost.

And when they figure that out, they have to backtrack.

And there are companies that do that.

Ford did it with their Blue Oval City out in Stanton,

Tennessee.

They built this, or started building this monstrous

factory to build batteries and an all-new electric truck

and possibly an electric SUV.

And they had to pull the plug on it.

They're still building the factory.

They just had to really scale back.

They over-promised and under-delivered what calls that

the market, the market spoke.

You cannot artificially create markets

with government subsidies because it won't work.

I don't know.

Maybe there's some examples out there where it did work.

I mean, TVA, Tennessee Valley Authority,

that was all paid for by the federal government.

But that was a good thing.

Gave a lot of people, a lot of job opportunities

back when it was badly needed during the Great Depression.

It provided Oak Ridge with the power

they needed to develop bombs to end the war with Japan.

Created some beautiful lakes.

We got some whoppers.

And they're wonderful.

And it's wonderful for tourism and just general recreation

and flood control.

You know, that's a really good example of government working,

doing what they're supposed to do.

Leave the markets alone.

Don't try to influence things.

You remember the cash for clunkers?

That was a disaster.

A lot of people think that really saved the auto industry

and kept the factories home, and it didn't.

What it did was rob Peter to pay Paul.

It took millions of cars.

Well, maybe that's an exaggeration.

I don't know how many cars, but a bunch.

Off the market and crushed them.

So that people who needed to buy cheap cars,

and there's a lot of folks out there that they just,

they needed to be able to buy $3,000, $4,000, $5,000 cars.

Well, ever since then, those cars don't exist.

What used to be a $3,000 car is now an $8,000 car.

What was a $5,000 car is now a $12,000 car.

And the payments on those, since typically they are financed

maybe through a buy here, pay here a lot,

or some type of a secondary finance company,

the payments on those cars have just gone haywire.

Just like payments on regular cars have, but even worse,

because those poor people have to pay anywhere

from 20 to 30% interest because of their bad credit habits.

And then you add on to that the cost of insurance.

My goodness.

I've got people coming in telling me

that their insurance rates for their cars

have gone up 100% over the last five years.

So somebody's out buying a car and they get real excited

and they just stretch to the limit on their payment.

And then they call their insurance company.

And their insurance company says,

well, you know, you were driving that older car

that was paid for as 10 years old.

And now you got a brand new car.

And this is what it's gonna cost.

And all of a sudden their household budget

is completely blown out of the water.

And it's too late to put it in reverse.

They've signed the contract, they've got the new car,

they've impressed their neighbors and their family members.

And now they can't afford the car insurance.

So they have to break that down into monthly payments.

Making matters worse.

And you don't have to buy an extended warranty.

You don't have to buy a gap insurance.

You don't have to buy any type of protection package

or something at the dealership.

But by golly, you have to buy car insurance,

especially when you have the car financed.

It's not an option.

So what should you do?

Call your insurance agent before you go car shopping.

Find out what vehicles have the lowest rates,

the best crash ratings, the lowest repair costs.

That might direct you to a different car

than you were thinking altogether.

It's not a bad idea.

Find out what the rate's gonna be

if you buy the car of your dreams,

you know, that you've been after.

You wanna buy a Jeep.

Wait till you see the insurance on that thing.

Might change your mind.

Do that first though.

That's the best advice I can give.

Okay, I'll be back in just one minute.

Okay, I am back.

I shipped out four copies of the My Car Gourou guidebook.

I had to print them out for those people who,

you know, don't have email and don't use a cell phone.

You know, they have a flip phone,

but they don't have a smartphone,

so I can't send them a PDF version electronically.

So I have to print out the My Car Gourou guidebook.

I think it's 32 pages now.

And print it out on just eight and a half

by 11 paper and fold it up and stick it

in an envelope and mail it.

And I'm perfectly happy to do that.

You can call the dealership at, sorry, yeah, 423-639-5151,

or you can call my cell phone, 423-552-2020.

Well, this morning I had three messages on my desk

from people who had called the dealership

and asked for the Gourou guidebook.

Why do you need it?

Well, you don't.

You want it.

You want to save money, don't you?

Buying, selling, trading cars, getting them fixed,

getting auto body repairs done,

how to tell if a car's been wrecked.

These are things you need to know.

Basic maintenance things that you need to do

on your car to preserve its value

so that you aren't upside down at trade done.

Or at least you can minimize it.

So use me and abuse me.

Preferably just use me.

423-552-2020 or send me an email to Lenny, L-E-N-N-I-E,

Lawson, L-A-W-S-O-N, 2020.

I just shortened it by saying 2020.

At gmail.com, you take the guidebook, you read it,

read the section that you need to,

you know, when you need to.

There's an appendix, is it appendix?

Yeah, at the front of the book.

If you're getting ready to go in and buy a car,

then read that section.

Buying a new car, buying a used car, negotiation.

It's just, you will be at such peace

when you go into the dealership.

It doesn't matter what they throw at you, you'll be ready.

You'll have the words.

And maybe, just maybe,

you can enjoy this car buying experience

like none other that you've ever had before.

Well, thank you for listening to this edition

of My Car Guru.

I look forward to being with you again tomorrow.

Nissan Frontier

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