Exploring the potential impact of a recession on the car market, this episode features a candid discussion between hosts Ray and Zach, drawing from past experiences in the automotive industry. They analyze recent consumer confidence data suggesting a downturn, and how fear can lead to decreased spending on big-ticket items like cars. With insights from Ray's time managing a dealership during the Great Recession, they highlight the stark contrasts in new and used car sales and the widening gap in affordability for consumers. The episode provides a thought-provoking look at economic cycles and their effects on automotive sales.
Today on CarEdge Live, Ray and Zach discuss what happens to the car market if there is a recession. Tune in to learn more! Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com
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"... Savvy, Toyota says you can have it all, with the Camry, the Corolla, and the Corolla Cross."
The Toyota Camry is a popular car that many people choose because it's comfortable and doesn't break down often. It's a good option for anyone looking for a reliable vehicle to get them from place to place.
The Toyota Camry is a midsize sedan known for its reliability, comfort, and fuel efficiency. It has been a best-seller in the United States for decades, making it a staple in the automotive market and a popular choice for families and commuters alike.
"...ota says you can have it all, with the Camry, the Corolla, and the Corolla Cross."
The Toyota Corolla is a small car that many people like because it's easy to drive and saves money on gas. It's a great choice for anyone who wants a reliable vehicle without spending too much.
The Toyota Corolla is a compact car that has gained a reputation for its affordability, fuel efficiency, and dependability. It is one of the best-selling cars in the world, appealing to a wide range of drivers, from first-time car buyers to those seeking a practical daily driver.
"Was it also on the used car side that significant or was it more just on the new car side that you saw the impact?"
Used car sales are when people buy and sell cars that have been owned by someone else before. These sales can change a lot depending on how the economy is doing.
Used car sales refer to the market for pre-owned vehicles, which can be significantly affected by economic conditions. During economic downturns, consumers often opt for used cars instead of new ones due to lower prices and financial constraints.
"It was the great recession, people were scared to death, people weren't spending money, banks made it more difficult to qualify for loans."
The Great Recession was a major economic downturn that happened from 2007 to 2009. It caused many people to lose their jobs and made it hard for them to buy things, including cars.
The Great Recession refers to the severe worldwide economic crisis that occurred from 2007 to 2009. It significantly impacted various sectors, including the automotive industry, leading to a drastic decline in both new and used car sales as consumers faced financial uncertainty.
"...banks made it more difficult to qualify for loans."
Qualifying for loans means being approved by a bank to borrow money. During tough economic times, banks make it harder for people to get loans, which affects car buying.
Qualifying for loans means meeting the necessary criteria set by banks or lenders to borrow money. During the Great Recession, stricter lending standards made it harder for many people to secure loans for purchasing cars.
"We talked about Volkswagen the other day. They've struggled with their EV investments for another."
Volkswagen is a car company from Germany that makes many popular cars. They are working on electric cars to help the environment.
Volkswagen is a German automotive manufacturer known for producing a wide range of vehicles, including the iconic Beetle and the Golf. The company has been making significant investments in electric vehicles (EVs) as part of its strategy to transition to sustainable mobility.
"could lead to a significant buyer's market, because they're just going to be so desperate to find people who are willing to buy these things."
A buyer's market is when there are lots of cars for sale but not many people wanting to buy them. This usually means prices go down, and buyers can get better deals.
A buyer's market occurs when there are more goods available for sale than there are buyers, leading to lower prices and better deals for consumers. This can happen during economic downturns or when specific industries, like automotive, face challenges.
"Dear Unstoppable, the Toyota Tacoma is raring to go. With more muscle and more metal, this legendary beast is styled for the wild and built for the bold."
The Toyota Tacoma is a type of pickup truck that is strong and can handle rough terrain. It's great for people who need a reliable vehicle for work or outdoor activities.
The Toyota Tacoma is a midsize pickup truck known for its off-road capabilities and durability. It is popular among those who need a versatile vehicle for both work and recreational purposes.
"An available i-Force Max hybrid powertrain belts out up to 326 horsepower. Add a truckload of attitude, and you'll leave less arrivals in the dust."
Horsepower is a way to measure how powerful an engine is. More horsepower usually means the car can go faster and accelerate better.
Horsepower is a unit of measurement that indicates the power output of an engine. In automotive terms, higher horsepower generally means better acceleration and performance.
"Does leasing get even more popular in a recession? No, I don't think so. I wasn't there the month they sold 18 cars, but my guess is that the percentage that leased them wasn't any greater than in any other month."
Leasing means you pay to use a car for a certain time instead of buying it. At the end of the lease, you can either buy the car or give it back.
Leasing is a method of financing a vehicle where the customer pays for the use of the car over a specified period, typically 2-3 years, rather than purchasing it outright. At the end of the lease term, the customer usually has the option to buy the vehicle or return it.
"But leases obviously get marketed at a specific payment trying to get to that, which I think is at the root of Justin's question. Do people become more payment shoppers and do manufacturers provide more leased incentives?"
Leased incentives are deals that car companies offer to make leasing a car cheaper or more appealing. This can mean lower monthly payments or less money needed upfront.
Leased incentives are promotional offers provided by manufacturers to encourage customers to lease vehicles. These can include lower monthly payments, reduced down payments, or special financing rates to make leasing more attractive.
"Ford and General Motors got approval from the federal government to actually have their own bank charter."
General Motors, or GM, is a big car company in the U.S. that makes many different brands of cars and trucks.
General Motors (GM) is a major American automotive corporation that produces vehicles under various brands, including Chevrolet, Buick, GMC, and Cadillac.
"Many other automakers, Nissan's, Delantis, are trying to follow suit..."
Nissan is a car company from Japan that makes many different types of vehicles, including electric cars.
Nissan is a Japanese automotive manufacturer known for producing a variety of vehicles, including sedans, SUVs, and electric cars like the Nissan Leaf.
"Many other automakers, Nissan's, Delantis, are trying to follow suit..."
Stellantis is a large car company that makes several different brands of cars, including Jeep and Dodge.
Stellantis is a multinational automotive manufacturing corporation formed from the merger of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles and PSA Group, producing various brands like Jeep, Dodge, and Peugeot.
"...more aggressive financing offers from the captive lenders from GM and Ford because now they actually have their..."
Captive lenders are banks that are part of a car company, helping customers get loans to buy cars from that company.
Captive lenders are financial institutions owned by a parent company, typically an automaker, that provide financing options to customers for purchasing vehicles.
"...this is a 2026 Toyota Prius that for the past three weeks yes going back and forth with a Toyota dealer..."
The 2026 Toyota Prius is a car that uses both gas and electricity to drive. It's designed to save fuel and be better for the environment compared to regular cars.
The 2026 Toyota Prius is a hybrid vehicle known for its fuel efficiency and eco-friendly design. It features a combination of a gasoline engine and electric motors to optimize fuel consumption and reduce emissions.
"...the reason why I want to bring this up is because I want to show you what can happen at the beginning middle and end of a car deal and negotiation..."
Negotiation is when you talk to the car dealer about the price to try to get a better deal. It's about agreeing on how much you will pay for the car.
Negotiation in car buying refers to the process of discussing and agreeing on the price and terms of the sale between the buyer and the dealer. It's a critical part of getting the best deal.
"...this 2026 Toyota Prius plug-in hybrid $43,410 ultimately dad we were able to get the dealership..."
A plug-in hybrid is a car that can run on electricity and gas. You can charge it by plugging it in, which helps it drive longer on electricity alone before switching to gas.
A plug-in hybrid is a type of vehicle that can be charged from an external power source and also uses a gasoline engine. This allows for extended electric-only driving range compared to standard hybrids.
"...the first pencil on this 2026 Toyota Prius plug-in hybrid $43,410 ultimately dad we were able to get the dealership..."
'The first pencil' is the first price a car dealer gives you when you're trying to buy a car. It's usually just a starting point for talking about the price.
In car sales, 'the first pencil' refers to the initial offer or price presented by the dealership to the buyer. It's often the starting point for negotiations.
The Toyota Corolla Cross is a new type of car that is like a small SUV. It has more room than a regular Corolla and is good for people who need extra space for passengers or cargo.
The Toyota Corolla Cross is a compact SUV that combines the practicality of a crossover with the efficiency of the Corolla. It offers more space and versatility compared to the standard Corolla.
Select text to request an explanation
Dear Savvy, Toyota says you can have it all, with the Camry, the Corolla, and the Corolla
Cross.
You've got the tech, you've got the drive, and you've got Toyota value that spells affordable.
You ready?
Find yours at Toyota.com.
Toyota, let's go places.
You know that goal you set at the start of the year?
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It's noon here in Ventner City, New Jersey, and our nation's capital, Washington, D.C.
and this is Car Edge Live for Tuesday, February 3rd with your host, me, Ray here in Ventner
City and well, Zach, hanging out in his living room in Washington, D.C.
How are you today?
I'm going to use the word that I get people hate when I use it, but how are you today,
Hansen?
I'm doing so good, Dad.
Happy Tuesday.
Thanks, everyone, for being here with us.
We appreciate it.
Tomorrow, Dad, I will be in Las Vegas at the National Automobile Dealers Association
Annual Conference Question to Our Community.
Do you want to see content from NADA?
Do you want to see behind the scenes what's going on there?
Let us know in the chat.
Let us know in the comments down below.
Dad, a friendly reminder, today's show is brought to you by us, caredge.com.
Car sites show you fake prices.
We will get you the real one.
If you're unfamiliar, Car Edge provides a car buying service that takes care of vehicle
research, dealer outreach, and even negotiation.
We'll learn what matters to you.
Contact dealers, compare real offers, and help you get the best deal without the stress.
Do you think I'm going to get people coming up to me and cursing me out, Dad, at NADA?
I'm nervous, honestly.
You're nervous?
Yeah, I'm afraid that some dealers are going to come up to me and be like, hey, stop making
those YouTube videos.
I'm nervous, man.
You're a celebrity, buddy.
Are there some dealers who might be at NADA that hate our flippin' guts?
Absolutely.
Well, and those dealers that hate us, hate us because they're probably the dealers that
we're complaining about all the time.
There are a lot of dealers that love Car Edge, that love educated customers that just know
what they're talking about, are easy car deals for the dealership.
There are a lot of dealers as well that ... Okay, anyway, let me know in the chat.
Let me know in the comments if you want to see a content from any of the dealers.
If you're asking me, do I think any car dealer is going to punch you?
No.
I'm not very punchable, man.
This face is too cute, I think, to punch.
Well, we're handsome, anyway, but I'm sure there'll be some people there that won't have
nice things to say to you, and there'll be many others that will have a lot of nice things
to say to you.
Fingers crossed.
Yeah.
All right.
The topic that I wanted to start today's show off with, excuse me, is what happens to the
car market if there's a recession?
You, dad, ran the dealership through a recession, and actually, the last time I checked, you
got let go during that time, Baird, so I can't wait to talk about that.
But I want to bring this up because there's the recent Consumer Confidence Index that
Cox Automotive referenced in their weekly auto market update, and I'm just going to
read this right here.
The Conference Board's Consumer Confidence Index dropped almost 10 points in the month
of January, falling to 84.5 from an upwardly revised 94.2 reading in December.
The December reading showed a gain against November, but the observation was reversed
in January.
Looking at the present situation and expectations indexes, both measures were also down nearly
10 points in the month of January.
The forward-looking index fell to 65.1 points, significantly below the 80 threshold level
that usually signals a recession.
The data that Cox Automotive is putting out says that it seems likely that there's going
to be some sort of recession.
What happens to the car market when that happens?
Dad, and please, as willing as you are to be vulnerable about your experience running
dealerships during the recession, what happened then and what do you think would happen now?
Well, what happens when there's a recession in the car industry is people question whether
or not they should actually be making large purchases.
And typically what happens, at least in my experience, is that there's so much information
out there that will be consumed that says either we're in a recession or about to go
into a recession that it literally becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
If people weren't told that you shouldn't spend money, they would keep spending money,
the money they don't have.
And so when there's a recession, the buying public becomes fearful, and they tend not
to spend money to the same degree that they did in the past.
And I can tell you at the dealership that I worked at, for Penske, at that time, we
had topped out at it was, I think, 104 new cars a month on average.
Name the dealership then.
It was accurate, North Scottsdale.
We were averaging 104 new cars a month and 50 used cars.
100 new cars a month and 50 used cars.
Yes.
And when I was let go because of the recession, we were down to 50 new cars, and used car sales
had dropped to like 35, 40 a month on average.
And after I was let go, and this was during the great recession, just a couple months
later, the new car sales had dropped to 18 for a given month, I think it was the month
of August, which is typically a little stronger than that.
So, you could see how the impact was like it was an 80% decline in sales, which is huge.
Was it also, do you remember, was it also on the used car side that significant or was
it more just on the new car side that you saw the impact?
It was the great recession, people were scared to death, people weren't spending money, banks
made it more difficult to qualify for loans.
That was one of the things that came out of that at the time.
So if you weren't well healed with a lot of money down, you weren't getting a new car
or a used car if you wanted one.
Well, yeah, that was my question.
Was it equal against new and used cars or was the drop off, do you remember, being more
significant for new cars or for used cars?
You know, being the new car manager at the time, I paid more attention to the new car
side of things as I was watching the inventory build up and the sales decline over time.
But yeah, I mean, just the amount of floor traffic declined dramatically.
Obviously, sales of both new and used cars declined dramatically.
Some people had to take the fall for it.
And when there's a recession, it's got nothing to do with the management of the store, it's got
everything to do with whether or not the buying public feels comfortable enough to spend large
sums of money.
And during the great recession, they did not.
Now, if we have a recession in 2026 or sometime moving forward, would I suspect that new and
used car sales will decline?
Absolutely.
I mean, we see ourselves today on the new car side of things where, you know, approximately
13 to 15% of the population is what's supporting new car sales.
The vast majority of the American consumers are not supporting new car sales because they
can't afford to.
They can't afford to participate in that market.
So, if there's a recession, would that 13 to 15% that does participate, would they still
feel compelled to participate, even though their income might be going up or down or
neutral, would they think it's still a good time to make a purchase?
My suspicion would be that they would not and that sales will decline.
And then that would probably put pressure on used car sales as well and people who don't
have enough money to buy a new car now and are looking at used cars because that seems
to be what's affordable to them on a monthly basis, well, they're not going to be able to
buy used cars either.
So, if there is a recession, it will look like my ugly mug.
It'll be ugly.
It'll be ugly.
Do you think it'll be similar to what you experienced back in 070809?
Because again, what you shared, which I appreciate your vulnerability, is that the store you were
managing lost 80% of its sales during the Great Recession.
Do you think that's the type of fallout we could see here?
Which again, the reason that we're talking about this this morning is because Cox Automotive,
every single week, I'll scroll out and up just so everyone can see it, they do an
auto market weekly summary.
I love that they do this.
It's so instrumental for me every Monday I read this and it helps me get a temperature
check of what's going on in the United States of America with regards to the car market and
with regards to our economy.
And this is the bullet point that I saw that just kind of perked my ears up, looking at
the present situation and expectation indexes.
Both measures were also down nearly 10 points in the month of January.
The forward-looking index fell to 65.1, significantly below the 80 threshold level that usually signals
a recession.
So do you think it would be similar to what you experienced, like an 80% drop-off in sales?
Like that sounds crazy to say out loud, but that's what happened to you.
Could that happen again?
Yeah, history has a way of repeating itself.
Yeah.
You know, before the Great Recession in the late 20s, 1920s and 30s, there was the Great
Depression.
So, you know, history does have a way of repeating itself.
We know the chasm between the haves and the have-nots has never been greater in this country
as far as the ability to be able to purchase either new or used cars today.
So, if there is a recession, do I think it could be that it could impact automotive sales
the way it did during the Great Recession?
Yeah, I think it could because that chasm is wider than it's ever been.
There are more people today who are more frustrated at their inability to be able to
afford the things that they need, let alone a car, you know, but the complaints of, you know,
food is too expensive, rents too expensive.
It's, you know, if everything's too expensive and then we have a recession and the economy
contracts, well, yeah, it won't be good.
And I'm not convinced that the 13% to 15% of the population that props up new car sales in this
country now will be able to continue to do that moving forward.
Now then, we recently did the Car Edge Car Buying Index.
This is a quarterly survey that we do, and we got our Q4 results back recently.
And I just want to pull up some of the information that we got here.
So, we've got 82% of respondents say vehicles are less affordable than a year ago.
That's up eight points from the prior quarter.
Only 13% feel affordability has stayed the same down from 22%.
66% are dissatisfied with vehicle availability, and only 24% believe the next 12 months will
be a good time to buy down from 20%.
So, it's interesting to see this data through the lens of what you're describing, which is,
our economy macro, I'm not going to be very clear.
I'm not an economist to take this with a huge grant.
So, my understanding is these are cycles, there's boom times and bust times.
We are in a position right now where there's an indicator.
Again, just one indicator, but it came from Cox Automotive.
So, I treat it with a lot of respect that says,
this usually signals a recession, anything below 80.
Well, we're at 65.
And then you pair that with this, which is people can't afford stuff.
And so, it just makes me wonder how deep of a bust period this could be for retail auto,
which to be clear, we're coming off the heels of, where is it here?
I had this pulled up.
Yeah, dad.
Oh, man.
We're coming on the heels of this.
Dealers struggle to recoup EV investments as consumer demand lags.
Well, it's not just dealers struggling to recoup EV investments.
We talked about Volkswagen the other day.
They've struggled with their EV investments for another.
So, it's an interesting confluence of events here,
that if there is a recession, and if there is a recession in the car market,
could lead to a significant buyer's market, because they're just going to be so
desperate to find people who are willing to buy these things.
Yeah, but when it is a buyer's market, and during the great recession,
it was a buyer's market, there weren't any buyers, okay?
Even though it was a buyer's market in the month of August,
after I had been let go, only 18 people in the Scottsdale area of Arizona,
which is a pretty well-heeled area of Arizona.
Yeah, a fluid area.
Yeah, only 18 people thought to themselves,
it was a good idea to buy a new car that month, a new Acura that month.
So, it just doesn't bode well.
It is as if no one really has their fingers on the pulse of the public.
And you can read the headlines, you can read different things,
and you can hear the pent-up frustration of people with the cost of housing,
the cost of automobiles, the cost of rent, and we deal on the automobile side of things,
the cost of automobile insurance, the cost of maintenance for the existing automobiles.
So, if people were already screaming that there was an issue, and the manufacturers and no one
has done anything to alleviate those concerns, if we get into a recession,
it will just be exacerbated.
It will look eerily similar to 2008, 2009.
Perhaps the banks that have been going crazy lending 150%, 160% loan-to-value ratios,
the banks that have been loosening their lending criteria,
will suddenly tighten things up again, and you'll have to really honestly,
truly be credit worthy to be able to qualify for a loan, which, just between you and me,
is probably the way it should be.
But if it were that way, then the economy would just come to an absolute standstill,
because everything that seems to happen in our economy is based on convincing people
to buy the things that they can't afford while using other people's money with the hope that,
well, they'll actually make the payments.
Dear Unstoppable, the Toyota Tacoma is raring to go.
With more muscle and more metal, this legendary beast is styled for the wild and built for the
bold. An available i-Force Max hybrid powertrain belts out up to 326 horsepower.
Add a truckload of attitude, and you'll leave less arrivals in the dust.
Some call this a whole new breed of tough, we call it the Toyota Tacoma.
Find yours at Toyota.com. Toyota, let's go places.
You know that goal you set at the start of the year? You can still do it,
whether you're committed to a through-hike with friends,
lifting heavier, or simply walking more.
It's not too late to stick with it and make your future self proud,
especially with the all-in-one nutrition shake from Kuchava.
Because quality nutrition shouldn't be complicated.
Just two scoops of Kuchava's all-in-one nutrition shake,
and you've got 25 grams of protein, 6 grams of fiber,
greens, adaptogens, and so much more.
Plus, it actually tastes delicious. No fillers, no nonsense.
Just the good stuff your body craves.
So, instead of adding to your back stock of supplements that over-promise and under-deliver,
simplify your progress with just two scoops of the highest quality ingredients.
Stick with your wellness goals.
Go to kuchava.com and use code NEWS for 15% off.
That's kuchava.com and use code NEWS.
K-A-C-H-A-V-A.com code NEWS.
Now, let's come here to the chat.
First from Justin, and then Scott gave us a kind contribution, has an interesting question.
First from Justin. Good to see you here, Justin.
Does leasing get even more popular in a recession?
No, I don't think so. I wasn't there the month they sold 18 cars,
but my guess is that the percentage that leased them wasn't any greater than in any other month.
It's just during a recession, whether it's a lease or a purchase,
the customer makes a decision that they just don't feel comfortable spending money that moment.
But leases obviously get marketed at a specific payment trying to get to that,
which I think is at the root of Justin's question.
Do people become more payment shoppers and do manufacturers provide more leased incentives?
I think that's probably, yeah.
Here's the thing, and I'm going to make a point from someone that I communicate with
occasionally Antonio, you know, Antonio Morifle.
And one of the things he and I have gone back and forth about is that with leasing,
and a lot of the specialized lease payments we see,
they're oftentimes based on $3,995 down or $4,900 down.
Well, the reason they're advertised at that payment with that amount of money down
is so that they can advertise that cheap payment.
And so if you have to put $5,000 down plus fees on a lease to get a cheap lease payment,
that's not really a cheap lease payment because you shouldn't have to put down a lot of money
in order to get a reasonable lease payment.
And, you know, Antonio's point to me is these are just fictitious leases
to make it seem as if there are affordable payment options out there for people
when in fact there really aren't because what did I put down on my lease, the first payment?
You don't put down $3,000, $4,000, $5,000, $6,000 the lease accord.
That's just like, that's handing the money to the lease company to say,
I want a cheap payment and I'm going to pay $5,000 up front to make that happen.
Let's keep moving here, Pops.
I want to come first to Scott's question, which was really kind of a contribution
and also a peasant. Hey, guys, when time permits, I'm curious about the FTC talk
to allow GM and Ford to create their own banks. Have you seen this, Ted?
I have not.
Okay. So interestingly, what we've got, my cursory high-level understanding
is that Ford and General Motors got approval from the federal government to actually have
their own bank charter. So they're actually a bank instead of having to rely on another lender
to provide them with financing. They are actually the financer. They're actually the bank.
Many other automakers, Nissan's, Delantis, are trying to follow suit and the intent here is
because then they can get access to capital at a lower interest rate. There's one less middle
man involved. This I thought was very interesting because ultimately it could lead to more aggressive
financing offers from the captive lenders from GM and Ford because now they actually have their
bank charter. They are the bank. They're not going through another third party to facilitate that,
which could play a huge role if there is a car market recession. They're going to need every
percentage point of discount they can get helps them move more metals. So this was a really
interesting... I'll study some articles so you can read about it. It's really interesting.
It seems to me just off of what you said that it's just another way for Ford and GM and others to
find additional sources of revenue, totally, that they could abuse for their benefit.
The reason I say that is we know that there are many rules and regulations on the books
federally and state and locally concerning consumer affairs and consumer affairs protections,
but there is little to no enforcement of these existing rules and regulations because
the state governments or the federal government, they just don't allocate enough funds to be able to
actively pursue incidences where something should be done. So if you allow General Motors and Ford
and others to suddenly get bank charters and become banks and even though there's rules and
regulations regarding banking, it's no different if there's no enforcement. So it just seems to me
that there would be another avenue for things to happen that shouldn't happen and it's at all
saying the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. It's just the rich will invent more ways so that
they can get richer and this would just be another. To be clear, I mean any corporation that spends
as many years as they've spent pursuing this does it in pursuit of one reason and one reason only
and that is to make more money and so of course it's capitalism at its finest but it is an
interesting. Well I might go off it's capitalism at its finest but it's capitalism.
Let's come here dad from Bill. Thanks for this Bill. Why has the number of new car sales been
stagnant for the past 45 years while the population has nearly tripled? Not sure if the population
has actually tripled but it's grown significantly. Yeah, new car sales have been stagnant for 45 years
ever since you started in the business dad. New car sales relative to population growth
has been stagnant to actually down. Yeah, based on population growth the new car sales are actually
down so why is that? Is it because they've grown too expensive over time? Is it because the length
of time it takes to finance a vehicle to have it at an affordable payment keeps getting longer?
Is it because they're only concerned with selling X amount of cars to a smaller percentage of the
population because they can obviously they're still making a tidy profit doing that but yeah
there has been based on population growth from the last 45-50 years you would think that we
should be well past a seasonally adjusted sales rate of 16.2 million new cars a year
but we're not. So what are what are some of the reasons for that? I think the number one reason
for that is it's affordability. It is what has made Chinese automakers so sought after for their
products. The affordability of what they're building that's what has allowed them to grow
as quickly as they have. We don't know the quality per se but we know that it's more affordable.
Dad Jim Farley, if I'm not mistaken he came out was it a year ago two years ago and he said
like the quality of the Chinese automobiles blew him away and that there was a lot of work to be
done here domestically to compete there and the only reason that they don't compete here
in the United States is because the federal government pretty much blocks them out through
tariffs and other mechanisms. So no I mean affordability has caused I think a tremendous
stall in what's going on here in the United States. Yeah and it doesn't appear as if anybody
really wants to address it other than lip service. I keep saying it we keep hearing manufacturers
say well we need to try to address affordability but their actions never tend to actually match
their words to any great degree. Other than our dear friends at Stalantis who you always
remind me well look they keep lowering the prices of jeeps well that's because they raised them
beyond the ability of their customers to buy them. So yeah I'll stop there.
From David we don't address the chat as much as we used to now David we're here sometimes I just go
get a little tunnel vision so sorry about that and from Justin reviewing the best February car
deals right now so many good leases for those of you that don't know caredge.com slash guides
we post new content all the time Justin leads the team doing that we will obviously have
the latest deals there in just a second. Dad I wanted to take a second and I wanted to just
shout out the work that we've been doing with caredge pro back at caredge.com for those of you
that are unfamiliar we provide market data to help you negotiate as well as an AI agent to contact
dealerships this is a 2026 Toyota Prius that for the past three weeks yes going back and forth with
a Toyota dealer Jim Coleman Toyota and there are a lot of messages here but the reason why I want
to bring this up is because I want to show you what can happen at the beginning middle and end
of a car deal and negotiation so the first pencil on this 2026 Toyota Prius plug-in hybrid
$43,410 ultimately dad we were able to get the dealership while through the middle give me one
second yeah middle here so 43 410 yep let me get the right PDF we got it down to 40 951 yeah
and then look at the deal we were able to get at the last day of the month this is
the the craziest thing last day of the month here you ready yes 39,351 so that was $4,000
less than the first one exactly man almost 4,000 over 4,000 nearly 4,000 over 4,000 right
to $4,000 yes dollars off this was entirely negotiated via text and email by the AI agent
and it just shows what can happen a if you negotiate yes importance b what happens at the
end of the month like that discount just to pull back up here this is the end of the month one again
and the discount you can see here $3,067 the other discounts we were getting we're not there you
know we were at $2,399 or the first pencil we had no discount on it whatsoever so pretty crazy
what's what's possible here when you have persistence when you keep working and I just
wanted to share love what we've been able to build I don't necessarily love the fact that
it's 90 pages of you know texts that have to read through so we're working on a fix for that to
make it more intuitive but holy cow man that's incredible that is and and the the difference
between say the AI agent and a real person negotiating the car deal is the real person
would have given in long before the AI agent it and would have probably would have accepted
the middle deal as opposed to the end deal and that and that's simply because people get worn out
doing it the good thing about an AI agent it's not no any better it doesn't experience that
type of mental fatigue because it doesn't know any better it it doesn't need a nap
it doesn't need to get eight hours sleep at night it just it just needs to keep spitting out what
it spits out until it gets what it's after and that's the that's the difference between an AI
agent and an actual human being the human being will give in earlier than the AI agent will
definitely yeah no this this one was like a surreal and just to pull it up on the screen here
um do you ever help the agent do you adjust the messages no I let it run on autopilot and see
what the heck happens which is so interesting to me and obviously this one I got the notification
that it got a new OTD and I was like what I didn't even realize it was still negotiating
for being honest and it saved another thousand bucks I was like how the heck so yeah pretty cool
I just wanted to highlight and share and you know shout out to our team but man do we still
have a lot of work to do because again all these messages like I don't have time to read all this
like too much too much too much too much so anyway just wanted to share that I was really proud of
the outcome that this was able to I'm proud of that outcome as well and and also what that outcome
shows look at that this is from Mario from space that discount is $600 over what I would target
on a pheave model so there you go it's getting the space seal of approval here it's indeed pretty
awesome and what I was going to say is is that we don't know what we don't know okay and and so
as human beings sometimes we we give in sooner than we should and the AI and and here the sad
reality is it shouldn't take that many messages so it's it's I once had a conversation with a gentleman
give me two minutes that with a gentleman that was part of a finance company and my conversation was
why do we have to rehash a deal with the buyer at your bank five or six times until they give us
what we asked for initially and they give in and give it to us after the fifth or sixth rehash
if ultimately that's what you're going to do why don't you just give us that approval up front
and the same holds true here if ultimately the dealer was going to to offer that type of discount
in order to secure a car deal why not just do it initially and so the deal can be over and done with
in a day as opposed to however many days or weeks it took to secure that deal
so that that was simply the point that I wanted to make if you're going to end up doing it do it right
away all right folks we're back tomorrow with more car edge live appreciate everyone tuning in we'll
see you back here then thanks pops thank you everybody thank you handsome
dear savvy toyota says you can have it all with the camry the corolla and the corolla cross
you've got the tech you've got the drive and you've got toyota value that spells affordable
ball you ready find yours at toyota.com toyota let's go places
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