WAIT 30 DAYS TO BUY A CAR | Episode 950

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It's noon-o-one here in Ventner City, New Jersey on our nation's capital,

Washington, D.C., and this is Car Eng Live for Friday, October 24th.

Dara and Zach's fourth wedding anniversary, not the Zach you see on screen,

because he's not married, ladies and gentlemen. With your host, me, Ray, here

in Ventner City, New Jersey, and Zach hanging out in D.C. or Savannah, Georgia,

or somewhere. I'm in D.C. You know I'm in D.C., and yeah, you have to clarify. My

sister's name is Dara. Her husband is named Zach. I am not. We're not going to

entertain the idea that I'm married to my sister. Love her dearly, but no, no, no.

Dad, today's show is brought to you by uscaredge.com. Folks, we continue to be

running. It lasts for the remainder of this month. Our $300 off car buying service

and 30% off Car Edge Pro promotion back at caredge.com. The topic of today's

show, Dad, we're going to be talking about 60 days ago. We told people to wait

60 days, or 30 days ago, we told people to wait 60 days before they wanted to buy

a car. Today, Dad, I'm going to double down. We're going to tell people they should

wait 30 more days before they buy a car, and I'll see if you agree. The data that

I want to reference to help drive this conversation is dealer profitability and

when is the best time to buy a car? You and I have been talking about this for

years. We've got guides all over the Car Edge website that explain the best time

to buy a car. Let's start there, and then we'll look at the dealer profitability.

Let's talk about the best time to buy a car. End of month is what we've got here.

Wednesdays during the week, December means deals. Help us understand, Dad, the best

time to buy a new or used car. Well, as I explained to my brother once, the best

time to buy a new car is on February 28th in the middle of a blizzard. Okay, but

the likelihood of those occurrences happening at the same time are pretty damn

remote. So the best time to buy a car is typically the end of a month, the end of

a quarter, or the absolute best time to buy a car when dealers are motivated the

most and manufacturers are motivated the most is the last month of the year, in

particular, the last week of the year. So assuming that what has happened

historically in the past will continue to happen moving into the future, then yes,

it makes sense to wait 30 to 45 days before you start to buy a car.

And I think that's the operative word, right? Start. So if you're a do-it-yourself,

if you're someone who's going to roll up your sleeves and do all of the work, it's

not like you wake up on Monday and you buy the car on Monday. Typically, if you want

to get yourself the best possible deal, there's a lot of work that gets involved

here that you have to do. And so starting the car buying process, I mean, for many

people that it's a month-long endeavor, locating the car, contacting the dealerships,

beating your head up against the wall to get the out-the-door price quote,

negotiating the price down finally, so they know if you've got a trade and you

have to negotiate that. So I think to your point 30 to 45 days from now, because again,

it was 30 days ago that we had a live stream go out. I'll pull it up on the

screen actually, give me a second here, wait for it.

You know, I can honestly say I don't remember, but then again, I'm 74 and I'm not

supposed to remember as well as I could when I was a kid.

It's right here, Dad. One month ago. Yes. Wait 60 days to buy a car. I was in Arizona.

You were wearing green and blue. We look nice. You and I. Yeah. And now it's 30 days later.

And I think we are spot on. Wait another 30 to 45 days to start your car buying process.

That being said, yes, you can still take advantage of our promotions for the services

we offer today and you know, implement it in a month or two, but also start doing your

research today, figure out what cars you can afford today, figure out what's going to be a

good fit for you. Go get the test drives done today because the ultimate leverage is right

around the corner. And Dad, we've been talking about it all week long. It seems like for the

first time in a long time, we have a buyer's market instead of a seller's market. This chart,

car dealership guy tweeted this out or exed it out or whatever. He did something to it.

Yeah. What you're looking at here is average car dealership gross profit per vehicle.

The white line is new vehicles and we've got from 2019 through Q3 of 2025.

Look at the gross profit. How much money these dealers are making per new vehicle sold before

the pandemic? It was around $1,500. During the pandemic, it got up to $4,600. It went up 3x.

Where are we back down to? $1,840. That is good demonstrable evidence that we're in more of a

buyer's market than a seller's market used vehicle gross profit is actually down back to where it

previously was at $1,300. They're making more money on FNI, finance and insurance products,

so obviously let us help you navigate that part of the process, know it to negotiate there. Dad,

this chart shows you if you wait those 30 days, you've got more leverage this year than you certainly

did back in 2021, 2022, 2023 or even last year in 2024. What's really interesting about this chart

is there was a comment yesterday or the day before in regards to when we were talking about

auto nations earnings and how their earnings were up, yet their gross profit per new vehicle sold

and used vehicle sold were down. The comment was, well, how can all that be down

and they're making more money than ever? Well, one of the ways and they make more than this

national average, the national average at new car dealerships today or franchise dealerships

today is $1,666 that a profit that is made through the finance and insurance department.

That's the department where you go in to sign and complete all the paperwork for your transaction.

That's the loan, that's the warranty, that's the... Yeah, the dent and ding, the tire and wheel,

the lost key fob, whatever it is, the gap insurance, whatever they can think of selling you.

The friends and family advantage packet, yeah, the list goes on.

It's all getting sold in there and so the average profit nationally in FNI is $1,666.

At AutoNation, it is, I believe, in the mid to upper twos. Okay, so it's $2,500, $2,600 per car sold

and then the other area that people forget about that dealerships do not and that's parts and service

and I guarantee you if you look deeply into the numbers at AutoNation or any of these

dealer groups, they're making huge money in parts and service. So if you're trying to

time things so that you can get a deal where you're allowing them to make less gross profit

than they had been, you are heading into that time of year and we can see from that chart

that average profits per new car and used car are down significantly.

Yeah, so regardless of the fact that these car dealership groups make a ton of money

in parts and service, today the message is very clear for our community.

If you can continue to wait as we are in the fourth quarter here, again, this is like the

challenge of our business. Dad, we're running a promo. I want people to sign up for our services.

I really, really do. It helps our business have a good strong end of the month and everything

like that. But folks, if you are looking for the absolute bottom dollar best deal, you've got to

wait until the end of the year. It takes about a month to go through the process if you're doing

it on your own to buy a car and you can look at this chart. It's a buyer's market, not a seller's

market. So the news is good for our community and I think that message needs to come through clearly

regardless of the fact that car dealership groups are making more money than ever before

on parts and service, whatever. You know what? We'll do a different channel in the future maybe

that you know how to save money when you own a car. But this is a really good sign for our

community. And again, I encourage everyone to take advantage of the different specials that we

offer back at CarEdge.com and as you're doing your research as well. But the message is clear.

Q4 here is a buyer's market and the absolute best time to take advantage of that is as we head

into the end of the year, end of the last month. And I think Igor's got a great comment here in

the chat, Ted. Never go in on the weekends because that's when it's busy. Monday, Tuesday.

And I think we really recommend Wednesday. Wednesday is a dead day at the dealership.

You know, I remember working as a closer at a dealership in Mesa, Arizona. And

you know, we used to work shifts. It was eight to nine or eight to eight. It was a long ass day,

an LAD, a long ass day. And I remember that we never seem to sell cars in the morning

for whatever reason. You know, people don't get up, brush their teeth, have a cup of coffee and

say, Hey, I'm going to go buy a car today. They just don't. Okay. At least not Monday through

Friday. And then Wednesdays were like the slowest day. It was like, you know, we could have showed

up at noon and we wouldn't have missed anybody. So there are days during the week where it's

slower than other days. The busiest day is Saturday. That's the last day you want to go

in to try and buy a car because, you know, I've worked with salespeople that have sold three

or four cars on a busy Saturday where they're juggling customers at the same time. And they're

really good, you know, at juggling them and not dropping any of them. Okay. So the point is

try and figure out times that are slow at the dealership where it would be encouraging for

a salesperson and a sales manager to get a deal done by 10 o'clock in the morning.

Show up. I mean, I came up with the idea to encourage people to buy between 9am and noon

that we should offer them additional discounts in the form of dollars that could be utilized

as a credit within the dealership for parts and service. Anything to try and improve business

during the week from 9 to noon. Trust me. You could have shot off a can in

and in a lot of cases you wouldn't even have hit a car let alone a person.

All right, Dad. Let's switch gears here now. We are starting a new Friday portion of our

programming. If you're not on the CarEdge Community Forum, you should be. Every single week we're

going to be doing a Q&A here on Friday. So there are a bunch of questions posted over, Dad,

on the CarEdge Community Forum that you and I are going to jump through here in just a moment.

Before we do, a couple of questions and comments have come through on the chats. Let's pull those

up quickly. But then we're going to focus on those that have been posted over on the Community

Forum from Michael, however, first. Is it true there's about to be a huge crash? And if so,

should I cash in on the $6,000 trade value my car currently has in order to upgrade on a brand

new Camry? This is the interesting dynamic of all the advice we give. All the advice we give,

all the market analysis, is there are typically, for most people, three components of their car deal.

There's the price of the car that they're buying, which is what we counsel everyone to

negotiate the out-the-door price. There's usually the price of the car they're selling. A lot of

people, not everyone, but a lot of people have a trade in. How do you maximize the value of your

trade in? And then there's the interest rate on the financing, because most people finance the

purchase of their vehicle. How do you time all three of those pieces? So, Dad, if you're Michael,

and we just said wait 30 days by your next new car, we know, Dad, that wholesale values and

retail values for used vehicles are going down, which would indicate that you would see trade

in values going down. So talk to me here. Talk to Michael here. How do you approach those three

aspects, especially when you're in a position now where you know your trade is worth more than what

you owe on it? Well, let's start by first saying that I don't think there's going to be a huge

crash in the prices of cars. Yeah, we have seen over the course of time that new car

prices keep going up, and ultimately that impacts used car prices, because there's always going

to be a spread between new and used. So do we see a correction? Do we see prices going down?

Do we see a just yes? Does that translate into a crash? Not at the moment. If we continue to see

frailty in the credit markets, and what I mean by that is more and more loan companies

going out of business, going bankrupt, major lenders increasing their loan loss provisions,

because they're expecting fewer and fewer of their customers to actually be able to

pay for the loans that they have at the moment. If that were to happen, if that were to get worse,

then yeah, at some point there could be a crash similar to 2008, but I would not expect that at

the moment. So I would say that there's caveats to that, because the first question that we're

going to end up looking at over on the community forum comes from a community member that's

reminding us that Jeep year over year just discounted the selling price of their Grand

Wagoneer by $25,000. $25,000 price drop year over year does create a crash for the values of Jeep

Grand Wagoneer. That being said, Michael is buying a brand new Toyota Canary. Can we anticipate seeing

a crash in brand new Toyota Canary prices? No, Toyota is the brand that has the lowest days

supply, meaning the least negotiability. That being said, can you still score over $1,000 off

from the dealer? 100% just to take some work. Yes, but that's not going to, that's,

Camry prices are not going to crash. Toyota prices are not going to crash. If what you're

looking to do, Michael, is purchase a vehicle that will be incoming, and let's say as opposed to one

that's already on the ground. And you know you have $6,000 worth of trade equity now or trade value now.

If you're looking at an incoming vehicle, negotiate the price of the incoming vehicle,

okay, to whatever it is you can agree upon. Negotiate the value of your trade as to what

it's worth today. And you can do what's known as a pre-trade, if you're in that position,

where you trade the car for the value that's associated with it today, as opposed to hoping

that it's still going to be worth that 45 days from now. Because as time goes on, the value of

your car is going down, it's not going up. So if you can afford to do it, if you have other means

or modes of transportation, you can do a pre-trade as an agreed upon number today,

so that you can be guaranteed you're going to get the maximum value for your trade

when that new car comes in. If you are looking to buy the car on the spot, well,

the value of your car is only going to go down between now and the end of the year.

You have to weigh what the savings, what the additional savings might be on that

Camry against what the continued depreciation would be on your trade.

My advice here is fairly straightforward. Go do the deal now. I don't think you're going to see

a meaningful difference in what a Camry price will be between now and the end of the year.

I do think you could see a meaningful difference in the value of your trade in between now

and the end of the year. The reason I say that and say that with some level of conviction that

is because I think the volatility of the new car market for Toyotas is not that high. I think the

volatility for used car prices from all the data we see is quite high. To give some context here,

here are the recent Toyota deals that our concierge team has been able to accomplish.

Just for some pressure testing here. Toyota RAV4, this was in Florida, $2,100 savings off of MSRP.

Toyota Tundra, we know you can get a Tundra significantly below MSRP. Dad, look how recent

this was. That was today. $2,200. Highlander out in California, not as much negotiability,

only $1,000 off. Sequoia, $2,500 off. Camry, here's a Camry, California, $1,500 off.

I would debate, what's the dollars, the donuts, isn't that the same?

Yes, that's the same. I think Michael can get the same $1,500 off,

but I don't know if his trade-in is going to be worth the same amount of 30 days from now.

So I take the target. It will not, and that's what I was saying. If your trade goes down $300,

do you think you'll be able to get an extra $300 off on the Camry? My suspicion would be not,

but you're trying to maximize, and sometimes it's better to trade just before you hit peak value

than to trade after you've passed peak value. It's hard to time it perfectly. I agree with you.

If you can find a deal today and you like it, then buy the damn thing. That would be advice

that I would give to anybody, whether it be on a new car or a used car. We say wait 30 days.

If it's a used car, the same used car might not be there in 30 days or 45 days, and if it's a

well-run dealership, it won't be there. So if you can find a car that you like today at a price

point that is acceptable to you, then just buy the damn thing and quit beating yourself up over

trying to maximize to every penny the amount of discount you're going to get, because if you wait,

you could end up missing altogether. Let's do the Q&A from the Community Forum, Pops. First one we

got here. Yes. I wanted to talk about Thursday, the 16th show about Jeep Grand Wagoneer. We talked

about that back on Thursday, it's on the 16th. Excuse me. Jeep has cut the price by $25,000,

but is still one of the least reliable vehicles on the market. Jeep has to greatly improve the

quality of their vehicles before I would consider buying one of them. Yeah, I think that's spot-on.

Yeah, absolutely. By cutting the price of those Jeeps that we're talking about,

it is akin to putting lipstick on a pig. It's still a pig, okay? I get it, so that maybe they

have to cut the price $50,000 for the quality of the vehicle that they're asking you to purchase.

I don't know, but they are moving in the right direction in trying to make their vehicles more

affordable than they had been. Whether or not it's a good vehicle, I think we can all agree

that there has been quality issues with a lot of the Stalantis products for a very long time.

Let's keep moving here, Pops. I'll keep scrolling down from Jim. I'm looking for a new mid-sized SUV

hybrid sport model. The 2IC highly recommended are the Honda CR-V and the Toyota RAV4. Three

questions, Pops. Do you agree about these two models? Should I get the 2026 or 2025? Do you

have a recommendation of either of these or something else? I should look at mid-sized SUV

hybrid powertrain. One thing, one vehicle that I would add to that list would be a Mazda CX50.

That's sort of mid-sized and the hybrid system that it utilizes is a Toyota's hybrid system.

That's another vehicle that I would consider. I don't think you could go wrong with any of

those vehicles. We know there's a certain level of reliability associated with most Asian brands,

not all, but most. I would think on the Honda, the Toyota, or even the Mazda, you would be okay.

I think you're spot on. I'm just pulling up over here, folks. Just our depreciation or resale values

data back on CarEdge.com. Just went to research and then clicked on resale value ranks, depreciation

ranks. We know Toyota has the best resale values, RAM, with some of those heavy duty pickup trucks

end up up there, but Honda and Mazda. You're looking at the brands that have the best resale

values for perspective here. I can go down, I can see specific vehicles as well, or if I hit

back, I can click on insurance rankings, for example, which brands are going to be cheapest to ensure?

Mazda, Honda, not seeing Toyota in the top five there. I would spend a minute and look and do

some of this research as well to help inform that decision. I agree with you completely,

that the CX50 would be the other one to get on that list. For 2025 versus 2026,

GotRise has some good info here. For Honda, the 2026 CRVs have been on dealer lots already.

The 2025s are still being sold at Toyota, and there hasn't been a big push for the 2026s yet.

So that's where we're using the car search to do some analysis is going to be really helpful

as well. So I'll jump back over here, click on shop new. Let's just take a peek at that really

quickly. So we're talking about a Toyota. Grab four. Thank you, pops. Hybrid. Yep. I'll grab the

hybrid powertrain under engine and drivetrain hybrid. Okay. So then if I go year here, let's see,

how many 20, yeah, I can't even have any 2026s. You see that? Hmm. Aren't even any 2026s, just

2025s. Now let's flip over. Let's get rid of that. Let's change Toyota to Honda.

And we're talking, what was it, CRV? CRV. And then let's go again, engine and drivetrain, hybrid.

So we got more inventory over at Honda, 35,000, and 33,000 of them. So yeah, you're either going

to do, if you don't look at the Mazda, you're either going to do a 2026 Honda CRV, or you're

going to do a 2025 RAV4, or you're going to pull the Mazda into the mix and look at that as well.

But that shows you perfectly. It got rice. Thank you so much back on the community forum for this

comment. Yeah. You're not going to find a 2026 RAV4 right now. There you have it.

Let's keep going here, pops. From Katie, I'm helping my son, Lisa, purchase a car in December.

I'm considering using the Concierge service. When should I engage with Carriage Concierge

to ensure the deal in December? I would say you can sign up anytime between now and

end of November. If you're signing up in December, excuse me, we're probably going to be

really, really, really swamped. I mean, we are making sure that we're prepared for that, but

to make sure everything goes smoothly, I would sign up between now and the end of November.

You can take advantage of what promotion we're running now and use it,

use the service later next month there into December. But Katie, I would time it up like

that, excited to help your son. And it's worth mentioning, the Concierge service works for

leases, as well as cars both work for leases. From John, what makes you and Zach, what makes you,

Zach and Ray, keeping up with car news, with the car news? Probably because it's our job.

I'd say at this point, it's our job. It's what we do. This is like our livelihoods. This is who

we are. We inform the world about what's going on in the auto market. This is just who we are.

At least we attempt to. We attempt to. This is just our lives. This is our lives.

What we live for. From Larry, Dad, Hyundai Tucson 2026 SEL. How is performance and pricing?

Handling, gas mileage, road noise. Give me a second, Dad. I'll pull up some data on this,

but do you know anything about the Hyundai Tucson? I do not.

How long? I needed a little filibuster, but... Well, here, can I do a risk check?

No, I already got it pulled up. Here's what we've got on the Hyundai Tucson. Give me a second here.

No target discount quite yet. MSRP ranges from $29,200 to $48,300. We can see the dealer invoice.

I'm going to scroll down here, Dad. What trim level were we looking at? SEL. Look at that, Dad.

So the SEL, the MSRP is $32,050. The invoice price, $30,768. So not a ton of markup on these vehicles.

Ranks number 91 in terms of resale value, 27 miles per gallon. It's going to cost you about

$44,814 to own the dog-on thing. Got a couple community deals, but nothing too crazy

from the discount side of things. Yeah, it's brand new. Some good data here, though,

that you can get back on the car edge. Website. All right, now you can do a risk check.

Okay, risk check today. This is a Nixon, N-I-X-O-N Nixon field watch.

Quartz Japanese movement. It is what I would call a car, and that is a cheap ass watch. I think this

whole thing was about $175. The Quartz movement keeps good time. It's not particularly attractive,

but it is green, and I wanted a green-faced watch. There you have it, ladies and gentlemen.

He's honest, not particularly attractive, but he knew what he wanted. Let's come back, Dad.

Let's keep going through the Q&A. From Justice. Thank you, Justice. Where's the best place to

get a Philly cheesesteak in Philadelphia, and what EV should I drive to get there? That's for you,

Pops. Well, I think the EV that you should drive to get there is your own, damn it.

And I know you have one, and you just have to plan it out. On a map, it looks like it's far from

Sacramento to Philadelphia, but when you're actually driving it, it'll only take a few days.

There are any number of good places for cheesesteaks in Philadelphia? The best cheesesteak from what

I hear. I have not eaten there, but my son has would be Angelo's. They have not only the best

cheesesteaks in Philadelphia, they also have the best pizza in Philadelphia.

Yeah, Angelo's is incredible. I highly recommend everyone take a peek at Angelo's if you're in

the Philly area. Holy cow, is their food delicious. Hey, well, Pops, let's call it a show for today.

Again, if we can help you all out with anything, check out our website. Six years of doing this

nonsense, folkscaredge.com. And I encourage you, if you're contemplating our car buying services,

meet the team, meet the experts behind the scenes that we've worked with for years now. And of

course, please, please, please book your free consultation to see if our services are a good

fit for you. And as always, use the car buying research tools that we have. Click on caredge.com

and then go to research or learn more about car edge pro, but Pops, let's call it a show for

today. I am on a flight to Los Angeles this afternoon. I have my first board meeting for

those of you that are curious. I joined the board of Lung Cancer Foundation of America. So lost my

mom to lung cancer a long time ago, eight years ago. And now get the privilege of being on the

board of this organization, dad, which is really awesome. You can really support members. I was

going to say, if you scroll down, we might actually see that, that, that handsome mug of yours. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, bunny. Pretty proud of you for that. Yeah, super, super proud of this. It's going to be

really fun. We'll, we'll raise some money in my mom's memory later on this year. We typically do

it for Massachusetts General Hospital. I think we'll do it for LCFA this year. And yeah, really

exciting stuff. All they do, all we do, excuse me, all we do, I got to get used to saying that

all we do is fund a lung cancer research debt. That's all we're doing. All the donations go

towards funding researchers. So I'm really proud of that. Got to get to, got to get to know the

researchers and oncologists that were trying to help my mom when she was doing early stage

lung cancer trials. You know, I'm thinking about Dr, what was her name? Dr. Lin?

Dr. Lin and Dr. Shaw. Dr. Lin and Dr. Shaw. Yeah. So Dr. Shaw actually used to be involved with

LCFA. So it's really awesome. She used to be on their advisory board. So anyway, if anyone's

interested, you can learn more about Lung Cancer Foundation of America right there. And yeah,

flying to LA to have our first meeting. So really excited. They've been doing this,

they've been doing this stuff for decades, man. What a privilege. What a, what a privilege and

an honor to be a part of it. It's kind of like one of those unfortunate full circle moments.

Yeah, definitely. But you know what? Going to work my butt off and try and help them out as much.

Help us out. I got to figure out how to say this. Yeah, you figure out. We're going to,

we're going to make, we're going to bring more awareness to lung cancer research.

Yes, indeed. And we should. All right, Dad. I love you. Enjoy the afternoon. Enjoy your

live interview on News Nation in an hour. And I'll talk to you later on today.

Absolutely. Have a great flight, young man. And don't give any of the steward eye any crap.

See you guys.

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WAIT 30 DAYS TO BUY A CAR | Episode 950

About this episode

MSRP

car buying process

out-the-door price

seller's market

buyer's market

gross profit per vehicle

tire and wheel protection

dent and ding protection

gap insurance

FNI

Toyota Camry

trade-in

financing

interest rate

wholesale values

retail values

Jeep Wagoneer

Jeep Grand Wagoneer

trade equity

pre-trade

Toyota RAV4

Toyota Tundra

Toyota Highlander

Toyota Sequoia

peak value

Jeep Grand

reliability

Honda Crv

Mazda Cx50

CarEdge.com

resale value

hybrid powertrain

dealer invoice

markup

Request an Explanation

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