Earl Stewart on Cars - 03.05.2022 - Your Calls, Texts, and Mystery Shop of Wallace Cadillac of Stuart

Episode Date: March 5, 2022

Earl and his team answer various caller questions and responds to incoming text messages. Earl’s female mystery shopper, Agent Lightning visits a local Cadillac dealer to see what they have on the lot and how much over sticker they will charge for a new 2022 Cadillac XT5. Earl Stewart is the owner of Earl Stewart Toyota in North Palm Beach, Florida, one of the largest Toyota dealerships in the southeastern U.S. He is also a consumer advocate who shares his knowledge spanning 50+ years about the car industry through a weekly newspaper column and radio show. Each week Earl provides his audience with valuable tips that prevent them from "getting ripped off by a car dealer". Earl has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, U.S. News and World Report, Business Week, and other major publications. He has also made numerous appearances on CNN, Fox News, CBS, and other news networks. He is frequently called upon by local and national media to comment on major trends and newsworthy events occurring in today’s rapidly changing auto industry. You can learn more by going to Earl's videos on www.youtube.com/earloncars, subscribing to his Facebook page at www.facebook.com/earloncars, his tweets at www.twitter.com/earloncars, and reading his blog posts at www.earloncars.com. Sign up to become one of Earl's Vigilantes and help others in your community to avoid getting ripped off by a car dealer. Go to www.earlsvigilantes.com for more information. “Disclosure: Earl Stewart is a Toyota dealer and directly and indirectly competes with the subjects of the Mystery Shopping Reports. He honestly and accurately reports the experiences of the shoppers and does not influence their findings. As a matter of fact, based on the results of the many Mystery Shopping Reports he has conducted, there are more dealers on the Recommended Dealer List than on the Not Recommended List he maintains on www.GoodDealerBadDealerList.com”

Good morning. I'm Earl Stewart. I welcome you to Earl Stewart on Cars, a live talk show all about how to buy, lease, maintain, or repair your car without being ripped off by a car dealer. With me in the studio is Nancy Stewart, my wife, co-host, and a strong consumer advocate, especially for our female business. We also have Rick Kearney, an expert on how to keep your car running right. I dare you to ask a question that Rick can't answer about the mechanics or electronics of your car. Also with us is my son, Stu Stewart, are linked to cyberspace through Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, and Periscope. Stu is also the Spymaster Director of our Mystery Shopping Report. He dispatches our secret shopper weekly to an unsuspecting self-forward a dealership. And now, on with the show. Good morning, everybody. Earl Stewart on Cars, that was my recorded voice you were just listening to. This is the real me, live, and I'm in the studio with almost everybody.

My son, Stu, is run a little late. He'll be coming through the door in about a minute. I guess he ran into some heavy traffic. A lot of heavy traffic in South Florida this time of year. But here he comes. There's Stu. So we're very informal, as you can see. We don't have a plan.

We don't have much of agenda. We have a general agenda. Most exciting part of that agenda, by the way, is our mystery shopping report. and Stu Stewart is in charge of that. So I'm really glad he's here. He dispatches our secret shopper and chooses our targets and writes up the reports for me to read. I'm just a pretty face.

I read it on the air. And we got Rick Kearney to my right. You heard about him on my recorded introduction. If you got a question about a car, the operation of a car. I heard somebody the other day on television says, you know, cars today, I always called them computers on wheels. They're starting to call them a giant battery with a computer on wheels. And so that's going to be kind of like the future. And the future is kind of here.

My son is driving a Tesla. I'm driving a Tesla. And a whole lot of people are starting to think electric. And then if that's not crazy enough, we're talking autonomous. Boy, what a change. you know, you use these words loosely, watershed moments and things like that in history. But we're here. The 21st century will be a huge

change in the whole world. I mean, I'm not talking about COVID. I mean, that's big enough. A lot of things going on now. We focus on some of the negatives, but we don't focus on the positives. I love it. I like the positives. I like the knowledge explosion,

the internet. Did you know that the sum total of human knowledge used to double, I think it was back in the 40s or 50s, the sum total of human knowledge used to double at the rate of about every 40 years. Do you know what it's doubling at now? Last time I checked it was every 12 hours. Now, if that doesn't boggle your mind, and you talk about the cloud, you say, where's all that knowledge going? Well, it's going up in the cloud. And that sounds mysterious enough, but all that.

means is it's readily accessible to everybody. You see this, that's my iPhone. I have access to this cloud with the sum total of human knowledge, which will be double tomorrow with this little device here. Scary, isn't it? So hang on your hats. This is some of the things we'll be talking about. Right now, this show is dedicated to really kind of an old-fashioned thing. that's called how car dealers retail cars. And we won't have a show before much longer. I don't mean hours or days or weeks, or maybe even years. But certainly by the mid-21st century,

there's not going to be any car dealers retailing cars the way we retail them. I mean, Rick won't have a job. I won't have a job. Stu and Nancy, Jonathan. We're all going to have to find a different way for our transportation. And if everybody has a different way for the transportation, maybe temporarily like ownership, like timeshare, where you just say to your iPhone, come pick me up at public, some autonomous electric car picks you up, and you say, take me home or take me to the drugstore.

That's what's going to happen. But we need to fill in the gap between then and now, and that's to tell you how to make your car buying experience. nicer. I don't think it's ever going to be perfect the way the retail system is set up today but we're going to tell you how to buy, lease, maintain, repair your car in a manner that will be easier for you. You make the show, you've heard me say this, my regulars and your calls really are the essence.

And the main calling number is 877-960-9960. That's 877-960-99-60. Write that number down, unless you're driving. Memorize it if you're driving. And then give us a call. We'd love to have you. We like to have the real voice, especially from the lady callers.

Nancy's going to tell you more about that in just a minute. But you can text us at 772-4976530. Stu is monitoring those texts. as well as Facebook and for that minute Rick's monitoring YouTube so these are all the ways you can communicate with us anonymous feedback is another one I know I'm making you dizzy here but your anonymous feedback.com why you you are a N-O-N-Y-M-O-U-S feedback dot com you can say anything you want to us ask us anything suggest anything anything and remain totally anonymous.

I kind of like anonymity sometimes. Usually I don't. I'm not as big on privacy as most people. It can't be. If you're, I'm kind of a public figure. I mean, I give out my cell phone number to everybody. I'm on the air. I give it out on the air.

So I don't really have one of those exclusive private lives, but some people like it and I respect that. Your anonymous Feedback.com. Stu sees those, and I see them too. I can't see them because I'm not looking at my computer. And if you do your anonymous feedback, we already have some in the bank because they come in all week. And Stu will read your anonymous feedbacks on the air. So I'm going to go to my left this time.

Nancy Stewart, we chat about the show every time we come in. It's about a 20-minute drive, 25-minute drive. and we talk about what we're going to talk about and try to get better. We try to make the show a little bit better every week. Kaizen, that's a Japanese term, word, for continuous improvement. So we try to get a little bit better. That's what a good reason for anonymous feedback right now

would be to tell me, Rick, Stu, Nancy, Jonathan, everybody here, what can we do to make the show a little bit better? We love constructive criticism. I can't say it doesn't sing sometimes. I mean, and tell it like it is. You don't have to pull any punches, especially with anonymous feedback. But if you have a suggestion, I promise you, we will read it, we will consider it, and we will talk about it, even if we don't do it.

We'll tell you, we'll tell everybody this was suggested. And yes, we can, no we can't, or we can compromise. So there we are. Nancy Stewart, sitting at my lap, will tell you about what she does on the show. which the most important thing is, is give a voice to the ladies in the audience. The females are not getting a fair shake these days, and they haven't for a long time. Nancy and I are watching an old TV series now called Boardwalk Empire, and it took place during the 20s, and if you want to talk about,

if you don't think women have come a long way, watch Boardwalk Empire. Shortly after women got the vote and see the way women were treated in the 20s and 30s, and now you can see you have come a long way and Nancy Stewart is one of the reasons you have the mic is all yours thank you good morning everyone thank you for joining us you are such an important part of the show I'm going to get right to it and let our ladies know that they can win themselves $50 this morning for the first two new lady callers $50 so take advantage of that call and say hello or share some of your well experience in the auto industry that you maybe bought a car, leased a car.

I think you get my point. I want to mention the automotive news and how, well, impressed I was with the NADA Academy graduating class, and there was one woman, one woman who graduated in that class, and her name is Shannon Broome. so we are moving forward it's a bit slow not well everyone has gotten the memo in the 21st century and unfortunately it's not quite even plain field and that's what i strive for every saturday morning and throughout the week when i talk to the ladies and i just want to let you know that we're all in this together building this platform for women because women well we're out there and And we're looking for more than just inner peace. Yes, we're just looking to be treated equally. So with that said, and the corruption that still exists in the industry,

you're going to find women here and there in this industry. And I do, without saying, have to mention someone who is very important to me. And she is a part of General Motors. and she's a CEO. I'm sure all the ladies know her, Mary Barra. So she also leads the, well, our goals that we want to achieve every second of the day as women. We, speaking of women, I want to mention we have our calls backed up. Everyone be pretty patient.

We're going to move as quickly as we can. 877-960-99-60, and you can also text us at 772-497. 6530 and we're going to go to our first female caller who has won herself $50 this morning and her name is Robin. Good morning Robin. Oh, good morning. Welcome. I didn't even know about the $50 until you just said. That's what really makes the call great. Thanks for being part of Earl Stewart on cars. Oh, no problem but I have a genuine, irritating question about, you know, when you walk into a dealership and your female, they talk down to you a lot of times. But I have a Hyundai Tucson, 2011, and a couple months ago, the airbag warning light came on, and I took it to the

mechanic that's been working on the car for years, and he has the updated computer, and he identified which sensor it was, and he told me he could not fix it. He did not charge me, to diagnose it because he couldn't fix it. And he said, you kind of have to go to a Hyundai dealer. And he said it's a sealed system, but he identified which sensor was coming up

wrong. So I had a recall notice for a software update on my car, so I took it to do you want me to say the name of where I took it? Please. It was horrible. The criminals at Naples at Naples. Anyway, all of us

knew that was what you were going to say. we were all in sync please don't even get me started on them oh please we encourage you well i took it this was the one on north lake instead of the one by my work because it was a day off i think it was um wasn't president's day martin luther king day they were open and i was off from work so i took it there to get the recall thing and they said in the letter from corporate hunday that I would get a complete safety check while I was there. So I'm thinking they're going to see the light on, right? Yeah.

But they don't. They said they performed the software update. Everything checked out great, and it's good to go. And so I'm walking to my car, and I just turn on the car, and I point to the light, and I say to the service guy, I said, what's that? And he's like, well, you didn't bring it in. for that you brought it in for the software update and I said yes but what about the safety check where you're supposed to tell me what that is yeah and he's like well you can make an

appointment and it's going to be a $189 diagnostic fee it says free I already yeah I already know what it is and so I'm just really angry so my question is is it true that I have to take it to a dealer to get it fixed because what if it's a $5 part and they're charging $189. I mean, that was the trick with, you know, your computer from Apple. It didn't matter what was wrong. If you took it to the Apple store, it was $700 to fix it because they wanted you to buy a new computer. Yeah.

Now, you can, I mean, the recall stuff has to be done by the dealer, but anything else just, you know, it can't be warranted, but anything that you're coming out of the pocket for, you could take it to another technist, another mechanic. Yeah, Robin, we talked about this last week about the Freedom of Information Act. If you're politically connected, you know, writes your congressman and say that we want to see that Freedom of Information Act passed. The idea behind that is to make other people besides car dealers have access to the information, training, machinery, diagnostic equipment that car dealers have. And if they did that on recalls, they'd get a whole lot more recalls fixed because some people just don't like to go to car dealers. and to have someone

I said I wonder why yeah and so have somebody like Firestone or Goodyear or you know any of these independent repair shops you'd have to you they have to train their people they'd have to invest

to the equipment but wouldn't it be nice if you had a Hyundai and you hated your Hyundai dealer you didn't have to go back there you could go to the Goodyear dealer and he could fix your airbag that's the way it should be so write your congressman for the freedom of Information Act

is that the Freedom of Information Act? Right to repair. Right to repair. I'm sorry, freedom of information. Right to repair. Everybody should have the right to repair anything if they're trained and have the equipment. So I didn't mean to do a commercial, but your complaint is so typical of a problem that most people have. I got a problem with a car, it's a warranty, it's a recall, and the dealer is abusing

me, and where else are you going to go? You have to take it to the dealer. Well, this is a scary thing as he told me that when they ran their diagnostic, it came back 100% okay. Now, the mechanic that I take it to said, if that light is on, your airbags aren't going to work.

Oh, boy. That's, Nick is a nod in his head. Is that right, Nick? I mean, have you ever known the diagnostic to be wrong? I'm just wondering who Nick is, but actually, that is completely

correct if the airbag system detects any sort of malfunction and it turns on the light, it will shut down the system because the safety protocols, they don't want the airbags to accidentally deploy when they shouldn't. So it would rather put the system completely inert until it is repaired. Right. And I don't mind if the repair for the sensors $189, but they're just saying they're not giving you any idea of what if it's this sensor it's this much if it's that sensor it's that much they know darn well how much it's going to cost to fix it but they won't come out and be honest about it up front and I'm probably just going to get rid of the car and Robin this is

Nancy I have to share with you that your presence certainly confused them you sound like a very educated consumer and out. You mentioned how you were treated. You know, these are some of the characteristics that are part of the old school attitude. And, you know, you're helping me and you're helping so many women out there. And I do definitely appreciate it. So I just wanted to say that. It sounds like you've got everything handled. I certainly hope that you don't have to, you know, take drastic measures and sell your car but you can stay in touch and let us know how this goes do you have any other questions well the last question is if i bring it up to you can you fix

the airbag sensor rick uh without knowing just what's wrong with it i don't think we'd be permitted uh i think uh if uh if it's it's a it's covered under the warranty with the Hyundai and uh I don't think it is. Mine said 2011, if it was covered under warranty, they would have fixed it and charged Hyundai. Right. I'm not even, I wouldn't, I wouldn't take it to anybody but a Hyundai dealer. I think that there could be a liability issue.

Yeah, on a safety thing, that would be, yeah, that's another consideration. I mean, other things, there are like foreign specialists. They're Hyundai specialists that are independents. But I'd be very, very careful on. Yeah, definitely, I agree with the guys, Robin. If you want to, you know, take this to the limit, I'll stay with, you know, the dealer. Thank you so much for the call. I'm sorry to hurry you.

We have calls backed up, and please stay in touch, and please get that information to me, and I'll get that check out to you. How does that sound? Oh, perfect. All right. That's your contact information, and you can do that simply by emailing me at Nancy S at ES. Toyota.com. Have a wonderful day. You too. And thank you for calling. 877-960. We're going to go straight to Phil, who's been holding.

Thank you for your patience, Phil. Phil's calling us from Jupiter. Good morning, Phil. Good, good. How are you all doing this morning? I'm glad to know you if you're still here alive. Thank you. I just had my car. I have a 2017 Prius, and I bought it in for the 55,000 mile check on Thursday and so while I was waiting I wanted to walk over to your used car area and just see what was going on and the first thing I noticed is you actually have used cars available now I bet that put a smile in your face yeah and but what I saw

there I saw a Tesla Y look like brand new right in front of the showroom and I've got one ordered myself I've been waiting five months for it and still hadn't come in so that caught my eye immediately, so I started walking over that way, and there's a salesman talking to a young lady about the Tesla. And so I just sat there a minute and went to see what had happened, and he walked off and had to do something with that paperwork, so I just walked over and talked to her and told her that I had one ordered, and I said, what's your situation? And she said, I've had one ordered for six months, and I got tired of waiting.

And I saw this at Earl Stewart, and I'm buying it, period. And she said, I'm buying it. So I was walking around with her and everything and talking to her. And so the salesman came up. And so I just walked back over to the showroom. And there was another one of your people there. And I just asked him, I said, how much did y'all, how much did you get for this car? I mean, it looks like it's brand new.

And he said, it's a 2021. And I said, how much? He said, $68,000. I said, no kidding. And I said, because my brand new one's going to cost $57,000. So that's a $10,000 increase in value of that Tesla. And back in 21, that car was only $54,000. So basically she's getting $14,000 more for that car than when it was new.

And it just blew my mind. I mean, I knew these things were hot, and I knew they were hard to get. But standing there in front of it, you see it in a living color, I just couldn't believe it. That's amazing, Phil. What do you see when the Mark Corolla's up? The corollas are worth $15,000. The car dealers are actually taking new cars to the auction because they can get over-list price for the new cars, and the other dealers buy them, and they sell them to you for over-list price plus-plus, plus.

So it's a topsy-turvy world we're living in today. Unreal values are off the chart. And buyer beware. If people want something bad enough, they're willing to pay the price. And that's the reason that used cars literally are selling for more than the new ones. I mean, what is the new one worth to you if you can't get it? Well, that's right. Right.

So it's crazy. before. She wanted the car. She didn't care. It was $58,000. I mean, I couldn't believe it. And another thing I mentioned, while I was standing there, the salesman, he said, well, you haven't seen anything. I said, what do you mean? He said, see those, right?

I think you had some lot, late model rail fours over there. And he said, they're selling for over a sticker because people can't get them. They don't want to wait for a new one. Exactly. Yeah. So. But then the other thing

I wanted to tell about your dealership is, I took it in to get the 55,000-mile check, and, you know, they do all that inspection stuff while they're there. And I want to take care of the car, and I told Anthony the technician. I said, now, look, I want anything done if that car needs to be done, if it needs whatever it needs. And I said, I think it needs an alignment. So about a half hour later, he shows up, and he said,

you don't need an alignment check. I said, what about anything else? He says, no, everything's fine. Now, he could have, I gave him a blank check, basically, to do anything he needed to do, and that's how honest your dealership is. Well, thank you. He could have said this, and he said that, and he said, no, you don't need anything. The only thing we had to do was change the breakthrough.

That was it, and rotate the tires. So I just wanted to commend you for that, because that was unbelievable. The whole experience was unbelievable. Well, thank you, Phil. I was really kind. I appreciate it. Okay. Well, call again, and we appreciate your comments.

Very interesting about the used cars selling more than due, and a lot of people that don't know that, and they're getting in the market, they should realize that. Now it's not a good time to buy a new or used car. So if you want it bad enough, you're going to have to pay the price. Please call again, Phil. Thank you very much. Okay, sure.

Thank you. 877-960-9960, and you can text us at 772-497. 530 and I've got to say we're officially in a bubble as far as purchasing on used and new. We're going to go to Paul in North Palm Beach. Good morning, Paul. Thank you for your patience. Yes, good morning. I have a technical question on your hybrids like your Toyota, Sienna.

Can you plug them into an electrical source or is strictly got to? gasoline. No, only the prime models have a plug-in feature. That would be the Prius Prime and the RAV-4 Prime. And is the Prime all electric or is that a hybrid? No, it's a hybrid that can be plugged in so you can charge up the hybrid batteries overnight. And then when you go to drive the car, it's going to do like the first 30 or 40 miles will be run strictly on electric because that hybrid battery will be fully charged. Then once it gets down to a certain level, the gasoline engine will kick in to start recharging the system.

Yeah, Paul, you get a very small mileage on that type of hybrid with a prime plug-in. You only get, as Rick said, 30 or 40 miles. Electric cars now, if you buy an all-electric car, you can get up to 350, 400 miles on a charge. But with the plug-in hybrids, you're only going to get 30 or 40 miles. On all-electric, but you'll get... Yeah, right. 500, 600 miles with the hybrid gas. So say if you had a short distance to go to work and back,

you know, say five or 10 miles round trip, you literally would almost have to take the car on a weekend and go drive somewhere to use up the gasoline or else the gas. My son had to do that. He just drove to high school and back, and he did it all electric all the time. I think that's a great option. Thank you for that.

And another question, I'm watching, or I'm listening to you live on my computer, but I can't see the video when I usually watch you later, and then I can watch the video as well as hearing you. Can you tell me, is there a way to watch the video when you're actually live? I watch on old 95.9. The easiest way is to go to either YouTube or Facebook, and so. search for Earl on Cars. YouTube would be, of course, the quickest manner.

Just go straight into YouTube and just search for Earl on Cars. And you'll see the live stream pop up and you can click on that. You'll get the video and the audio. Great. Thank you very much. You're welcome. You're going to do your show. You guys do a great job.

Thank you, Paul. Thank you so much for your interest. We're going to go to Paul. Or did we talk to Paul on North Palm Beach? We talked to Paul. Okay. I think we have Bob who's waiting. And John and Palm City, hold on, be patient. Good morning, Bob. Good morning. How was everyone this morning?

Moving around very quickly this morning. Thank you for the call. I was curious as to why the woman with the Hyundai, Tucson, 2011, with the L.A. bag issue why you did not suggest the HUD that she could probably resolve that problem by going to YouTube there's a there's about 10 videos on how to fix that she's not the first person on this planet that's had an airbag light come on in a 2011 Hyundai Tucson the other these these issues are redundant on a lot of these vehicles. Yeah.

That's a good point, Bob. You go to YouTube, and they'll show you what it is, and show you how to fix it. She can bring it to her mechanic. She may have to buy the part from Hyundai, she might have to buy the part from them, but most likely her mechanic can resolve it. And even if you can't, she'll know exactly what it is, and then she can approach the dealership and say, I don't need you to diagnose the problem, I know what it is, how much is a course to fix this issue.

And then she'll have an idea of exactly what it's going to cost to fix the if it is a sensor, which it probably is. That's a very good point, Bob. You're absolutely right. You're obviously a cyber savvy. You understand computers and YouTube and Twitter and Facebook

and all that sort of thing. And there's a, with that knowledge, and Google, I don't know where I'd be without Google. Unfortunately, a surprisingly high percentage of the population, especially the older folks are not

able or do don't understand how to do that, but if you Earl, Earl, yeah. I'm old. Well, I am too. But they also, listen, they also have these forums. You can go to Google, you can go to

like a Hyundai forum. And they'll also have other people that go on there and say, oh yeah, I had that same problem with my my 2011. This is how I fixed it. This is what the dealer charged me. So she can get plenty of information. She can do her due diligence. No, you're right. She makes the decision on how she wants to proceed. That's a great point. Bob, Bob, tell me. You know, you don't sell the car just because you have a sensor. Listen, tell me how many your friends can navigate to YouTube or

Twitter or Google. How many of your friends that you graduated by school with? well I have a college degree I mean most of my friends to educate I mean I have most of all college graduates that I know and I would say probably even the ones that just have a high school degree I would say it's got to be over it's got to be over 85% one of my best friends is a graduate of Georgia Tech and he still has a flip phone and has no idea what YouTube or Twitter is so you're you're ahead of the game I uh I salute you I wish More people understood YouTube. Boy, what a treasure that is of information. You're absolutely right.

Right, well, she could always get a friend or a grandchild or a kid to help her. Exactly. I mean, this way is it doing it. You can go to, matter of fact, you can even go to the library. I don't know if they have the computers back up. They had taken them down because of the COVID. Yeah. But you could go to the library and you have computer access.

And the people that work at the library would be more than willing to help. Absolutely. You know, Bob, I have to thank you for calling Earl on cars, and we love our callers. And I have to point out to you that you definitely, if you're not, a candidate for Earl's vigilantes. And Earl has his hat with him this morning. He'll put that on and show you what you can win. Excuse me. Here's your hat, Bob.

We'll send it to him. What you can have free. I'm recovering from stage four back of the tongue cancer, so I'm not in very good, you know, physical conditions. to get involved in too many things. I'm sorry to hear about your mission. Yeah. Well, thanks. I'm in remission now, but it was really terrible.

I did have one question. I had a repair done on my Mustang over Mullinex. I had it. The car was under an extended warranty with Ford. And it cost it was much. It cost me $100. I had $100 deductible. And I just found out that what I had repaired now is become a recall by four.

And I went over to Mullinex. and ask them about how I, if I was going to get reimbursed for that $100 that I gave them to fix it, because it should be fixed under the warranty. Right. You know, any type of recall should be. And their answer to me was that they didn't really have anything to do it. It had to come from Ford. And so I'm still waiting for Ford to send me the notice on the recall.

Hey, man, they know, I saw it online about a month ago. I still haven't heard anything. How much was, did you pay? I pay, I had a $100 deductible. There was the break. Yeah, I don't understand why they wouldn't. It's such an easy thing to take care of. You know, like, here you go.

Yeah, well, the dealer didn't want to get involved with it. He says it has to come from the manufacturer. Well, you know, Cheap's good. Bob, contact the manufacturer directly and give them your information, and they will contact the dealer, nudge them a little bit, but the dealer's wrong. You're absolutely right.

You should be reimbursed, but you use the 800 number and give them your detail information. measure. Rick has a point, a quick point. I know with our recalls, if in the recall it states that if the customer has already had the repair done, then they get reimbursed directly from Toyota

and there's usually a letter that they send into Toyota. That's the law. The law requires it. So, I thought so. The only problem is they haven't sent, sometimes it takes them after they, you know, they finally admit that they have to recall something.

It takes a long time before they actually send out the notices and the letters. There's a lag. Sometimes it could be four to six months before you get notified. Exactly. And then people have to have the things fixed

if they can get the parts. I had one friend where he had the same problem on his Mustang and he had, they didn't have the parts and he had to rent the car for three weeks before he could get it fixed. You know, but they, you know, they took their, you know, the Ford people,

the Monex people did take care of him on that situation but it was the problem with the brake uh the brake pedal is a little plastic piece that breaks off because it only happens in the southern hemisphere where you have the heat and the humidity and what happens is the brake lights stay on all the time you're always riding around with your brake lights on and they and ford had this problem for years with some of the other models and you used to be able to just go buy the plastic piece it was it was like a a bumper, and you could replace it with like a five-hour deal. You could put it in yourself, but now they don't sell it anymore,

and they require you to replace the whole brake assembly. Bob, do me in favor. Call again. You're a great caller, extremely knowledgeable. Well, you promise me you'll call again next week. We've got to move along to John and Palm City. He's been holding for a long time, but I love to talk to you. Call next week. We love your views, and stay healthy. I'm so glad you're in remission on that. Yeah, God bless you, Bob, and we hope to hear from you again. And thank you.

And I hope you get some super's in pretty soon. I'd like to come over and look at a couple. Okay, we'll be knocking on the door. We'll work on it. Patience and flexibility is what we're talking about here. We're going to go to John in Palm City. Bye-bye. Bye-bye.

We're going to go to John. Thanks for waiting, John. Good morning to everyone. Thank you all for being there. That's the reason why two years ago that I got rid of my Mustang. It was always in the deal, I couldn't take it anymore. But that's another story. I want to ask a question to Rick.

People talk about radio tires. Rick, can you describe actually what a radio tire is? Basically, it has to do with the direction that the belts are laid down inside the rubber when they're manufacturing the tire. There's like a polyester bias ply tire where the belts are actually done kind of on a crosshacket. angle and in radial tires they usually have one set of belts that are going straight across the tire horizontally and the other set go 90 degrees from it along the direction of the tires rotation it is just all it has to do really is it's describing how the belts are laid out when they manufacture the

tires off are most of them radial or most of them the other most most new tires now are all radial yeah because I used to hear radio all the time like it was something new and I guess when they all became radio then that's a when I was a kid I thought they were saying radio tires yeah right on the commercials okay does anyone know who you can hear him quite well I'm sorry do anybody know who invented the radio tire um yeah it's John James Radio John James Radio no the answer is Michelin that's my second point I recommended last year issue of consumers report which we all know is the Bible I'll recommend I recommend it in every category, the tire that I buy, Michelin.

Michelin has so many different models and performance tires for high speed. I personally buy the all season. But what I want to say about Michelin, in every category, Michelin comes out. You may 10 to 15% more, but it comes out with less hydroplaining, shorter stopping distances, increased gripping, longer wear. And I want to just say to people, it's very confusing. DOT writing on the side of the tire.

It's put on there just to confuse everybody, including the day code. If you go to a good tire dealer, he will explain every one of those symbols to you, including the day code. You can even tell the plant that manufactures it, the speed of the tire. And what the consumer should look for is three ratings on a tire. The temperature, the treadware. and the heat range. All of those threes go by an A, B, and C. Naturally, A, B, and the top, some even have a double A. And these are very important. Why are they important? Because of the tire and the safety. Treadware, the higher the treadwear, the more, it lasts longer, but

naturally it costs more for the tire. But every tire is approved by DOT that's sold in America. and the symbols that are on it are not only confusing, it can tell you every particular thing about it, make sure that the tire that you buy is the exact size that the manufacturers recommend, including the last symbol, which is the speed of the tire. That's very important also.

John, tell me anything the government has ever done that wasn't confusing. And everybody should consider it is Michelin, not only because it's a great tire, but it's because it's recommended by consumer reports. Last year's issue, you can check it out, and in every category, they came out at number one. So I just want to mention the Michelin Tire Company. Good advice.

Thank you so much, John. And we thank you for your call. And I tell you where you can buy those Michelin's cheapest is at Costco. Yes, until the 16th of this month, they have $150 off on it. they do the tire and balancing free, and you get a lifetime warranty on any flat that you get. And this is, I'm talking BJs now. There's a temporary sale that goes until the 16th of March, and it's $150 off. And BJs, believe it or not, is not equal to Costco, but BJs is an authorized Michelin, the tire distributor.

And what I say by authorized, Michelin actually runs a school for tire installers to train them properly to mount and demount the tire. And you know why that's important? My friend has a two-year-old Cadillac, and he got a flat, and it's an aluminum rim on it. And believe it or not, whoever he went to replace the flat, they scored the rim on it.

I wouldn't call him a dummy, but the guy that doesn't know how to do tires when he demounted it, the machine, like slipped of something, and it put a gouge in the aluminum or magnesium wheel, whatever it is. By the way, the wheel, he happened to look at the inside of it, it's a Cadillac, one guess where the rim is made. John, listen, we've got to move along here, but I agree with everything you said. Michelin's a great tire. Costco's a great place to buy them, and we appreciate your call very much.

We've got some people holding here. Right. Have a great weekend, John. Thanks for all your knowledge every Saturday morning. We'll afford to hearing from you next week. We got some requests from our listeners from everyone on luxury brands. And so we answered your request, and this week we do have a mystery shopping report from a luxury brand, and that's mystery shop goes to Wallace Cadillac, so stay tuned for that.

Also, as far as Consumer Report is concerned, I do have to mention this, and if anyone out there has experienced this situation, give us a call. Did you know that Consumer Report purchases vehicles for their testing program, but more importantly, they just recently purchased a BMW, that's a 22 BMW, and they found that one of the perks on this vehicle, one of the options is a XM

radio. Well it was deleted and there are a lot of features that are being deleted unbeknownst to the consumer the person who's purchasing the vehicle if you encountered this, give us a call toll free at 877960 and you can also text us

at 772-4976530 I would imagine that Stu's probably has some texts, and so does Rick, has some YouTubes. I always kick it off with Anne-Marie's text. Good morning, Ann Marie. And Anne-Marie got one in early, and yesterday, so here it is. Good morning. Here's an update on the Felicity Ace.

The ship burned for 13 days, carrying $401 million worth of vehicles, including Aldi's, Bentley, Porsches, and Volkswagen. This ship encountered rough seas listed. starboard and sank in the water, about 10,000 feet deep, about 220 nautical miles off the Azores on Tuesday, March the 1st. Reportedly, insurance will cover the loss. Porsche cars in North America released a statement that they were working to replace every car affected by this incident. Porsche customers in the United States were being contacted by their dealers with very, very depressing news. Surprisingly, incidents where cargo ships loaded with cars sink are capsized or not as rare as one to expect in September 2019, the Golden Race.

the Golden Ray capsized off Savannah, Georgia with a cargo of 4,300 Kia, Chevrolet, GM, Mercedes-Benz, and RAM vehicles. It was declared a total loss. The Golden Ray was in shallow enough water so it could be cut up and everything was scrapped. These two incidents prompt me to ask, how much of your inventory vehicles in parts still comes from abroad? Great question, great lead-up to the question. Most of the cars that we, the new cars that were selling, the Toyas, are manufactured in North America. United States, Canada, Mexico, and there's still a few that are manufacturing. Aren't the hybrid still coming?

Oh, there's so hybrids in North American hybrids as well. Actually, a Toyota is exporting cars to other countries. Out of the USA. So USA is probably a net exporter instead of importer. They have more plants here than they do practically anywhere except Japan. Yeah, and on the parts question. That's a whole other story. A lot of our parts come from overseas, especially anything such as even air filters, oil filters, some of the very basic items.

A majority of the parts on Toyota are built in the United States. All right. So there's your answer, ma'am Marie. Great question. And yeah, and I love your questions. Yes, I do too. Okay, we'll jump to another text here. It says, so I know electric cars are getting.

very big in the industry. So how many people like myself are going to be able to have an electric car because of how expensive they are? Like the Prius. They started out higher priced and actually Toyota, when they came up with the first hybrid, the Prius, it cost them more to build the car than they sold it for. And not more than what the dealer sold it for because the dealers market up way over MSRP. But with the economy of scale, sale, manufacturing volume, pretty soon the prices came down. That'll happen with all electric cars, too. If you're the first guy on the block to have that new electric car of that particular manufacturer,

you'll probably pay a lot of money 10 years from now. It'll be just like a combustion engine car. Rick. I've got a post here from Donovan that kind of ties right in with this. It says, this week Ford announced the company is splitting internally into two distinct divisions All legacy cars will operate under Ford Blue, and everything new that is electric will be under Ford Model E. This is the first step in Ford reinventing itself as an EV maker, and the first step in spinning off the legacy internal combustion engine business. It's, let's see, this move will allow Ford to cut $3 billion from the ice side of the business, internal combustion engines. Very few new gasoline-powered Ford models are coming.

It's just about to the end as far as new models go. More automakers will likely be following this move. It's a daring move, and everybody's excited about Ford. Nancy and Stu and I know Jim Farley, the CEO of Ford, and we knew him back when he worked for Toyota. And he had the Sion Division. But he's an amazing guy, extremely customer-oriented. He really cares about customers.

And I wish Toyota would steal him from Ford. I think he's an amazing man. Now, whether we'll be able to do the hat trick that he's trying to do and become viable in the all-electric market, time will tell. But I bet on Jim Farley, I bet on Ford. Also, to answer the question of the texture on the affordability of electric cars, yet they will come down price as they're always explaining them and also a used vehicle market now is not the time to look at a used electric vehicle by the way but eventually things will normalize and that the used vehicle market prices will come down and right now I mean if you're

thinking your head look how much is electric car costs I think most people would probably say 100,000 80,000 a new electric leaf starts around 28,000 dollars it's not a cheap car there's the 22 all electric mini cooper which I'm not advising are you talking in the MSRP these are MSRP so that's not what they sell for though I understand that and but right now they're selling for over for over a year from now it could be they could be selling them for thousands under so we don't know but anyway the point of the matter is like there are there is a range in the in that normal price range for new vehicles and it's going to normalize over time and come down yeah that's a good point yeah that's because I was asked that same question this past week. And, you know, people that I spoke to are led to believe that it's going to be outrageous. They're not going to be able to afford it, but they will. Definitely will. Yeah, you can't afford anything right now. I think that was, that was my dad's point there a second ago. But, yeah, things will become, eventually it's going to have to. Yeah, Rick. Another one tying in perfectly here. Tom Steckle says, good morning from Orlando. Disappointing

news, Lexus of Orlando slash Winter Park is now charging $5,000 over MSRP on their new vehicles. Wow. And they went from MSRP. Just a couple weeks ago, Tom I told us that they were going MSRP. Wow. I wonder what happened.

Sounds like somebody won an internal battle. Like somebody was saying, we can't go over MSRP and then... Is that an auto nation store? Can we Google that? Which one is Lexis of Orlando? Yep. I'll see. Okay, let's Okay, while Stu's doing that

I'm going to put Rick on hold for a second We're going to go back to the phones And let me remind the ladies that I need one more New caller, $50, please give us a call at 877-960-90-60 Win yourself $50 this morning, ladies And a shout out to Denise, stay in touch with us on your situation with the Lemon Law

that I suggested to you This middle of the week. We're going to go to Frank, who's been holding from Jupiter Farm, so he's a regular caller. Good morning. How are you, John? I mean, Frank. That's okay, Sally. Oh, I like that.

I'm sorry. Well, you know, like Sally Ride with the Mustang. Anyway, I have a litany of stuff. Your radio station absolutely triggers all this things and thoughts on my mind. I'll go to one of the quick ones you just mentioned about things being built. deleted on luxury cars due to the shortage. You might know that we, a week ago or so, bought a brand new Audi SQ5 up in Stork at MSRP,

which is almost unheard of anywhere nowadays. But they did have some deleted. There was an item called the wireless phone charger right on the console. And because they don't have that, they took $250 off and you get a little wire to plug in somewhere. it's like you do on the house phone. So, yes, even on the high-end cars,

there's things that can't make it because the chip shortage is. Exactly, exactly. And with that, I would like Briggs advice on two things. What about ceramic coating for the paint on the car?

Is that really worth the money, and is it going to be more expense than work than it's really worth, and then I'll get back to also something else about the car. I don't have a lot of experience with it. I can answer that. Alan Napier, who used to be on this show for years, he's our collision manager at the dealership,

and he does have a lot of experience. He says the ceramic coating is good. He says it's overpriced. It's very expensive, but it is good. So if you have a Ferrari or Meserati or you just have a car that you love dearly and you want to be, have the best of the best, it's really a good product it's just crazy expensive for my taste and i think for allans too i think a good wax and you would have to do it more often and uh it wouldn't be quite the ceramic

but you know some people just say i don't care what it costs i want the best and if you're one of those people ceramic is a great idea okay well there won't be any ceramic on this with that in mind with that in mind i did go down to tint world on ok chobie because four years ago i did ceramic on a mercedes and on the pickup truck up in steward at a tint world up there that was a unique nice big dealership and i will admit the cars look good and we got it down from 2000 down to 800 because it was the end of the year and they were trying to anyway with that being the case lifetime warranty but i didn't read fine print because they went out of business if you don't take it in twice a year and have the prevent of maintenance done at $300, your warranty is worthless.

Fine prints should be illegal, but the laws are made by lawyers, and lawyers make their money with the fine print. So it's the curse of mankind, fine print. But why was that tent world? I walked across the street to the BMW dealership there, and I asked them about the ceramic coating. They said, well, we don't put them on BMWs is too expensive. Well, BMWs are not, you know, a cheap car. They go, go next door to our, what do you call that place? Where they're a really fancy car.

Re-conditioning and Rolls-Royces. Someone in there. Oh, my goodness. They saw me walk in and they go, I was not dressed to look like a Bentley or Rolls-Royce customer, but that's all right. But I spoke to this guy, and this is where it's coming in for you guys. He told me, and I texted a few earlier, a ceramic coating place down in a park. Winter Park area. So I went down there and met the guy and they loved Tesla. And here's where it's really coming in. But by the way, the ceramic coating is between $6,000 and $8,000. So you're right. There's going to be a lot more wax jobs than $8,000. But here's, they got this window tint by 3M that they put on the Tesla's. It reduces the heat in that car so considerably that the battery life is increased by 20%. Because it's a heat that really messes up the battery. So it's something you guys might want to. The thought that pops into my mind is it legal.

You know, there's a tent law. The cops hate tended windows, by the way, even though they got tinted windows themselves. But I understand why they don't like tenant windows. But every state has a different rule on how much you can tend a window. So be careful if you get something that's really super tended, if you travel out of Florida, it might be illegal in Florida, then you get arrested in Georgia.

Oh yeah, that's very true. And here's one for Rick. With a new car, the Audi and also my pickup truck, it has a battery start, stop thing at red lights. And for me, it's annoying to a degree, but the battery in the truck didn't last two years, which is unusual. And I'm just wondering if the wear and tear on your starter and the battery life is really impacted by these start-stop switches, stop switches or if you can just turn it off and see your battery and your starter. What do what do you guys think about that? My opinion if I a couple years ago bought a new RAV for my wife if that system had been in that car I'd be divorced by now because she

didn't she'd have either divorced me or killed me. It's annoying as I'll get out and one of the things that again they don't tell you is that there is actually a lifespan now for the battery and the starter. There is a recommended replacement service interval on those two items where Toyota's just like doing an oil change granted it, I'd have to look up

the exact numbers on it, but they say replace it does decrease the life of money. Yeah, so it does and it's really, to me it's just not worth it. A friend of mine, he has that system in his wife's car, and the first thing they do when they get in is they turn it off immediately.

Okay. That's where we're heading, so that's good. While we're back to that alley, we got it, and it's only a little over a week old. Anyway, we were figuring out, trying to figure out how to switch the phones in there. So we went to the Palm Beach Audi. We didn't buy it there. We put it up in Stewart. And remember about a week or two weeks, I told you, they had a RS8 out there for $100,000 over the MSRP.

Yeah. It's sold at $100,000. I don't know where the money's coming from. I guess people had too many stimulus checks or something. But in any event, it sold. I couldn't leave it, and it's gone. But they really didn't want to help us anything with the car. They said, you didn't buy it here.

So I was a little disappointed in that attitude, but, you know, then again, we're in Palm Beach. That's a stupid attitude, and it's just bad business. But you get that from a lot of businesses, unfortunately, mainly car dealers. But, you know, but sometimes it's just not good. going up high enough you get the right guy in the dealership like a service manager who has some common sense might take care of it for you oh and real quick this goes back to one of your shows about two years ago i'm trying to think of the guy's name it was the four dealership you did a what do you call it a secret shopper report up in i believe store there or maybe in fort

pierce yeah and the guy was an older time guy who was really nice and i actually was there getting my battery replaced up there as opposed to down here. And I met him, I'm trying to think of his name. It might be, oh, golly. Anyway, it'll come to me as soon as I hang up. But he was so good about showing me things on my King Ranch pickup truck that the dealer where I bought it from didn't have time to. You'll probably remember if you think back.

He was a really good old-time fashion salesman that really took care of the customers. And like you said, it's a good thing to remember wherever you shop, and even if it's not for cars. But, you know, I remember car dealerships are made up of a bunch of human beings. And the average car dealer has about 60 employees, and you're going to have a few rotten apples in there. And there are also some really, really good people that care about customers. And it's like a delado. You go into a business.

If you get a good ticket, you get a good person that cares, and that same business could give you the rotten apple that will make you never come back. I keep telling my employees that in my dealership, you know, all it takes as one person. I've got about 150, 150, 160 employees. And all it takes as one rotten apple meet a customer, and I never see that customer again. So I always believe in giving a business a second chance. And I always try to go up the ladder because you're doing that owner of that business

or the supervisor of that business a favor by reporting a rotten apple to him. It helps him improve his business. So that's a very good point, Frank. I know exactly how you must have felt. Yeah. And one last thing that you just mentioned about the Lexus of Orlando. I believe I brought it to your attention also like the other guy. Yes. I was up there in October with Amory and with her Lexus has been at your dealership service for years and years with Randy being the advisor.

And they were giving the cars at MSRP. No dealer fees. And if you're a military like myself, a thousand more off. And as a Lexus owner like Amory, another thousand. So they really, the pendulum is really swan. up there if they're getting over MSRPs and Frank do you know if they're an auto nation dealership are they owned by Auto Nation for Toyota of Orlando I'm not sure about that in fact there was a gentleman named Josh which made me think of one of your sentence yeah and that was cool on us to see about if we're still what at Alexis and so you know at this point now no we don't but we're gonna find out why they did that change but yeah it was a big fabulous dealership I really

it's owned by Jimmy Brian Oh, Jimmy Bryant. Yeah, I texted you. Yeah, it looks like a mall. It's humongous. I don't know if you ever saw the, I think the biggest one in the world is Lexus of Carlsbad out in the near San Diego, Carlsbe, California. And that looks like, well, that is a mall. It has a realtor's office, a party event office, boutique, shops, restaurants, a bar.

And it's a Lexus dealers. See, nice thing about being an old guy. I have, I remember everybody. Jimmy Bryan started out with a Toyota dealership, and I remember him very well because he was the only Toyota deal that was driving a Rolls-Royce, and he invented the $9.99 oil change, which was a bait-and-switch to get you in and sell you everything in the manual to get you in on the 99-9-9-0 oil change. But he was a real character. I'm talking 50 years ago. I'm surprised he's still alive, but Jimmy Brian owns. Toyota Verlando. I did not know that. I don't know if there's a Jimmy Bryan senior, junior thing.

Probably a junior, yeah. We don't know. Been around a long time. Frank, thank you so much for the call. You all have a nice weekend, as always. Thanks for being there. Thank you. 877-960-99-60, and I do have $50 for one more lady caller.

877-9-60. We're going to go to Mark and Palm Beach Gardens, and then we're going to go to get back to Stu and Rick. Good morning, Mark. Good morning to all. I'm just calling, kind of with my usual thing of. I just wanted to touch base again on the program for the vigilantes. I know each week we get new callers, new listeners,

and I just wanted to, you know, throw a bone out to the program that everyone should understand. that if they have problems or questions or concerns, just like on the radio show, that they may not have enough time to get an answer that you can go on to their website, and I'm not sure which website to go on to get the list of the vigilantes.

Erl on cars. But, you know, the vigilantes are here to help the consumer and any time you have any questions, free repair or post repair, service, sales, questions about considering a new buy, that the vigilantes are educated people that are familiar with the car industry and just to let the listeners know the programs there for you to use

and we're all more than happy. I know myself, I enjoy getting a call or email asking for help. So I just wanted to, you know, let the new listeners that may not have heard about what the program is about. That it's there to help you, free of charge, vigilantes or volunteers. And so anyway, that's really all I wanted to say. Thank you, Mark. I don't want you to keep up to time on the, I know. Some of the callers have been long-winded, and I don't want to be one of those.

But anyway, one last thing, Earl, is I have the show on my big screen TV, and I'm seeing you all. But as you're talking, I'm looking at you, and all I can think of is in the mornings and the song of Ain't She Sweet. So anyway, it's amazing how you can wear so many. any hats. Yeah. What Mark's talking about is Nancy and I, we video the sunrise every morning, and we've been doing it for years and years, and Mark is a member of the International Sunrise Club, and all your listeners out there, if you'd ever like to go on Facebook to wear

the International Sunrise Club and see the sunrise. We do it every single morning, and Mark is, we have a bunch of people, have a lot of fun, don't we, Mark? you're certainly right and it's a great way to start your day that's for sure all right you guys all have a nice weekend enjoying the show take care mark thank you so much you definitely jump started our day we can't we can't say enough about you

you certainly are an educated consumer you've helped so many out there and we need more people like you you're so dedicated And Mark is part of Earl's vigilantes, and you can get in touch with him any time. Go to Earl on Cars, and you can sign up for Earl's Vigilantes, and I want to go back to the phones. And I want to talk to Michelle, who's a first-time caller? And Michelle, you won yourself $50. Thank you so much. You're welcome.

That's exciting. And before we get started, make sure that you send me your contact information. my email address that's nancy s at e s toyota dot com okay thank you you're welcome what can we do for you this morning so i am the proud owner of lexie and that would be two lexas uh-huh lexie lexie they are older cars but i maintain them one's a 1999 rx300 the SUV and the other is a 2008 SC430. Both of those cars have the older key fobs

and it's annoying because for whatever reason the battery seems to go in those key fobs often. Maybe because I use them every day, drive the cars every day, but is there an easier way than taking the key to the dealership to replace the battery?

Can it be done by the consumer? Oh, sure. Those batteries, they're basically like the little silver watch batteries that you'll find pretty much anywhere. Those little tiny disc batteries, any place can replace those for you. Matter of fact, any auto parts sore, they usually will pop them out and replace it right there for you. If you have a Batteries Plus near you that you walk right in there, and it's like $5 or $6. for the batteries. Yeah, I buy mine on Amazon, Michelle.

They'd be more than happy to do it. And you get them cheaper. And Amazon's so amazing these days. Nancy and I are getting stuff with same-day delivery, next day delivery, more often than not. So I'd go on Amazon and get my battery number off my remote, and you'd probably have them the next day. Yeah. And to take it apart to put the new battery in, I guarantee you'll find YouTube channels all over to show you that. And it's a very simple operation that just requires like a little pocket screwdriver or anything that's just got a small, flat edge to it.

So I'm not going to destroy the key fob by opening it up. No, not at all. It's hard sometimes. They get stuck and stiff, and you have to have strong hands and be patient, but it's not the easiest thing in the world. Sometimes you can't even figure out how to open them up, but that's just a little thing. pet peeve of mind the way people that design things don't think about having to take them apart again. Right. And Rick is an expert, too.

Well, that's why if you're not really comfortable with doing it yourself, going into somewhere like in the batteries plus shops, they do those all the time. And I don't think they even charge labor. They just, it's five or six dollars for the battery and pop, pop, it's apart. They take care of it for you. Or you know, ACE is a place with a helpful hardware, man. You know, I was a hardware. I was just going to mention that, Earl. I found myself in the ACE hardware.

But prior to that, you know, you're doing that at home yourself. I found that being really focused as to what I'm doing, what I'm taking apart, and what I'm putting in. And the smallest, I got all kinds of gadgets everywhere all over the house. So the smallest gadget that opens that, you know, avoids any destruction. I can be destructive sometimes. So good luck with that, and it isn't as expensive as, you know, one would think it would be. Nope. Well, I'm definitely going to try it, and I learned putting together something else.

Once I opened it up, I took a picture of the interior with my cell phone, so I had a point of reference when I was replacing the parts. Excellent. So I'm a great idea. That's a fantastic idea. That's a great idea. Also, I have a texter came in and says Ace Hardware will replace your keyfob batteries while you wait. You go in there and just buy the batteries and they'll do it for you. Yeah, I've been in there more than one time for a series of things that I've needed with my car, and they're right there to help you.

That's great. Okay. Well, I really appreciate all the ideas and your help and enjoy listening to you every week. Oh, thank you so much, Michelle. Spread the word. We love all the ladies to help build this platform here. have a great weekend I'll let them know thank you so much

you're welcome we're going to get back to Stu sure or excuse me did I cut you off not really we got we got a couple here and Stu's got a couple okay all right the text that just let us know that you could

take your Keeffe up Ace Hardware and they had replaced the batteries also sent us a picture of a doing a little recon for us from Green Acres Nissan a picture of their addendum and send me a bunch of pictures. They're on all the cars,

but they're adding $5,000 for door-edge guards, window tent, and leather-slash-fiber guard. And so that's quite a bit of a markup on a $24,000 Nissan Kicks. So it's everywhere. That's crazy. Thanks for the recon. Then we have a question from Rick, for Rick. Rick in Stewart, Florida wants to know.

He says, I have a 2002, I'm sorry, he has a 2002 four-runner. with the security feature that automatically locks all the doors 30 seconds after either turning off the engine or exiting the vehicle and closing the doors. This occurs even when the keys are in the vehicle so there's always the possibility I could get locked out. Is there a way to disable this feature? Something's wrong there. Toyota has never had a factory security system that automatically locks the doors.

What might have said? It's a Toyota forerunner. 2002, forerunner. Is it possible that this was an aftermarket or a port feature? An aftermarket or dealer-installed aftermarket device that someone put in. Or it. Maybe it would be crazy. Nope, port wouldn't have done it.

There's not even port installed. I mean, this is 20 years. And not as a dealer-installed option that came from the port even. It would have to be a dealer-installed an after-market device that they bought elsewhere. so I would look to see if you've got anything after market and that's where I'd start looking at getting that straightened around because Toyota Factory has never had a system that will do that. The only thing they will do is if you're outside the car,

if you hit unlock and you don't open any doors, 30 seconds later it will rearm and relock the system. But you're already outside the car at that point. But they will not lock the keys in the car because Toyota's never had one to do that. Yeah, I guess I get somebody to take a look at that, and Rick, and thanks, Rick, for helping out Rick. My pleasure, Rick. And you, too, Sue.

Okay, great. We have a text here here, says Earl. I have a BMW convertible with 13-year-old Michelin tires with 35,000 miles on them. There was plenty of rubber left, but I bought new tires because the old ones could not be balanced in the car vibrated at 35 miles per hour. Was that a smart move? And could the old ones have been dangerous? why could they have not been balanced? I did have them balanced to no avail.

I'd be more worried about the aging factor because six years is the estimated, you don't want to buy a set of tires that six years are old, according to the Department of Transportation or NHTSA, one of those government agencies. And most people don't know how old the tires, and we had a call earlier talking about the code. And I always forget the code, but Rick remembers it, If you're going to buy a set of tires, Rick, tell them about the code, will you?

On the DOT number, you'll see there will be several numbers that are raised up, and in the last four numbers are usually in the little oval, and they're embossed down into the rubber. Excuse me. It's going to be four numbers. The first two are the number of the week of the year that the tire was made, and the last two are the most important. That's the actual year.

that the tire was made. So if it says something like 2520, that means it was the 25th week of 2020 is when that tire was produced. And only the government could come up with a stupid code like that. Now that you know the code, or you can ask the tire dealer,

just be sure you don't buy, and you've got 16-year-old tires, you definitely did the right thing by buying a new set of tires. Yeah, because the sidewalls on those could start to wear and crack And when you start having those issues, it's better to go ahead and get rid of those tires. You don't want to take a chance on tread separation and having that tire literally just disintegrate,

especially if you're at highway speeds. The other thing that irritates me about this whole thing. There is no law. See, the Department of Transportation and the NHTSA says six years is as long as you want to keep a tire. But they don't have any rule for the tire dealers saying they can't. sell a six-year-old tire. Right. It's only a recommendation. Recommendation. So you can go out and buy, somebody could have bought those 16-year-old tires from you and put them on a shelf and sold them to somebody else. The government makes no sense.

Any wish hebers for them. Okay, I just want to give a shout out to any government workers out there to give us a call. 877-960. I want to hear from my postman. We've heard from him. Okay. It was ugly. All right. We have some anonymous feedback, and we'll get to that. First one says, if I order a car from you out of Florida, can the car be delivered directly to me in that state?

Or does it have to be shipped to you first for dealer prepped and then shipped out to me? If so, who pays for this additional transportation charges? Well, the answer to that is ordering from us, particularly, it has to be delivered to us or a dealer within our distributorship, which are the five south-eastern United States. The dealer, if you order it from, arrange what they call a courtesy delivery with the other dealer, he pays that dealer $100. I don't know what they, depending on what it is. That's about average, and then you can pick it up anywhere you want to.

But if you're outside of that region, the cheapest way to do it, because the cost would be paid by you to ship it, and the smartest way to do is to try to get it courtesy delivered to a dealer closest to you. Say you lived in New York, we could get one courtesy delivered to one in North Carolina, which would reduce the shipping cost. Okay, the next anonymous feedback says, I'm looking for a new car when the madness is over. I'm making notes of which dealers are price gouging vehicles now, and I will not step foot in those dealerships when it comes time for me to buy. I think everybody should do the same and punish the greedy dealers for their short-term thinking. Yeah, that's what we were kind of scared of, so that's what's governing our

behavior and also we're nice guys and gals you know they're they're really getting a lot of attention a whole lot wall street journal everybody it's almost like as if that everybody is listening to this show um as far as the new york times wall street journal home beach post and uh there's really a lot of attention to these dealers that are selling over msrp and uh boy it is a negative negative of advertisement. This kind of word spreads like wildfire. The manufacturers are paying lip service to this and they're being quoted of

the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times and on television. They're saying, you know, we really wish the dealers wouldn't charge over a MSRP. But they're doing that for the PR that they're getting from the public. If they really wanted, they could push a little

harder. And the manufacturers are like anybody else. Follow the money. The deal that sells the most cars, they're going to take good care of them. And the dealers that are selling the most cars now, if you talk about the big dealers, all of them are charging way over MSRP. The biggest Toyota dealership in the country is either Hollywood or Al Hendrickson. Or Longo.

Or Longo, yeah. There's those three. I don't know about Longo, but I can speak for the next two, because we know that Hollywood Toyota and Al Hendrickson Toyota are charging thousands of dollars over MSRP. And if you think the Toyota head guy has got enough courage to go to these two dealers and say, don't do that anymore, you're wrong. They won't do it. And by the way, you don't have to take notes of who is charging an MSRP.

Well, like Earl says, they all are. But we're taking notes for you. So we'll have all this information in perpetuity. Yeah, exactly. For those who will remember, we will have the wall of shame. It'll be our latest page on Earl on Cars, and it'll be. the guys and um i love that and how much of their charge of msrp can we call the wall of shame yeah oh great yeah um yeah the the pandemic criminals um you know there's going to be all sorts of

tribunals and accounting to be had hey i'm talking about criminals uh the minivan uh can you even imagine uh how how the price i can't even put it into words how high the price is gone on a minivan just since january uh i mean it was on national news. It was on local news. Consumer report has had it, you know, for the last couple months, but it was interesting last night on TV. The minivan is up 69%. Sixty-nine percent. It's just unbelievable. I don't even have time to go through the laundry list of other vehicles, but they're well over. Sixty-nine, seventy-five. It's robbery. Yeah.

And many bands seem, it seems, we're past the big minivan craze of the 90s in the early 2000. Hawaii, why? 69%. SUVs are taking over. Okay, another one is. No, I'm referring to the increase in price. A rising tide lifts all boats. So we have one for Rick, I think.

It says, I have a 2014 RAV-4 SUV. The radio suddenly stopped working. The screen turns on and off, just showing a blue, quote-unquote, key, board what is happening and what can I do uh truth be told your best option is not to go with a factory replacement because and these radias pretty much that's the only option once it starts acting up uh Toyota would would simply do a replacement um I would investigate something at like Best Buy with an aftermarket call the geek squad basically yep they'll come out and install in your house it's your house yeah but

You can get a 2022 technology radio that's going to have all the latest features that you didn't have in 2014, and you'll have a much better radio system installed in your car. So it's a good thing that your radio broke. Yeah. Right. Okay. Another anonymous feedback, and then we'll jump over to you, Rick. No industry has taken advantage of the pandemic as much as car manufacturers and dealers.

The chip shortage is long over. you can order computers and electronics by the boatload. It's only cars and parts that you can't get. Manufacturers and dealers continue to take advantage of what was a shortage to make more money. Before you jump in, I just want to say one thing, regardless of the truth of where the ship shortage is right now, yes, the inflated prices you're seeing are not a result of increased cost. These are its inflated profits, and that's why it's not just car dealers,

It's businesses all across the country are having record profits, and that's part of the inflation that we're seeing. And that I'll turn it over to the economist on the show. Well, it's a supply and demand. It's economics 101. You have a very low supply of anything, and you have the same demand you had before the low supply. That just raises the price. That's the rule economics 101. So, yeah, it's an automobile use far more microchips than any other product I can think of.

and so yeah it's fighter jets fighter jets have gone way up too selling for way over a sticker oh yeah they're like 13 billions over so anyway to me the interesting question is how far down will this come we talk about prices are coming down all the dealers are praying that it doesn't go down below MSRP and everybody

in the industry would like that, but it's going to go back way below MSRP because everybody's greedy. The manufacturers are all going to build as many cars as they can. When the microchips become abundantly available, they will build too many cars, and they will make the dealers take them, and the dealers will have too high supply, and then they will change incentive systems, so they have to sell the cars, and they start tearing each other apart competitively lying and cheating and stealing from the customers. So trust me, things will return to normal. It's going back to the old hell that we used to know. Yeah, it is.

And it is really depressing when you said, I started to cry when you were describing what's going to happen. Oh, it's just awful. Yeah, and Fantasyland, they would stabilize at a higher price, but Fantasyland. I did look at year-over-year profits, wondering and hoping that, well, maybe with the reduction in incentives, the manufacturers were making out better, now and they're not their profits are are down the manufacturer of all of them Toyota is down I just looked at Toyota so Nissan is way up huge yeah yeah yeah I think they're well they're I think they're right so it's probably like the manufacturers that were more reliant on incentives got a better deal you know Toyota wasn't that

you know heavy in incentives so I'm all caught up with all the anonymous feedbacks and text yeah so if Rick's got anything over there I got a couple here Two of them, they'll kind of tie together. Kyle in Pennsylvania says, good morning, everyone. I just tuned in, but I was wondering how the demand looks on the new and used car side. Has it slowed down at all yet? And Jose Huerta's is basically asking a similar question. Good morning.

Do you guys see any change in the chip shortage? Well, on the demand side, things seem to be the steady demand. We're speaking just for ourselves and our dealership. we maintain about a constant list of about 500 orders at any given time and it's replenished as we deliver the car so it just seems to be in a nothing seems to be changing much as far as the availability of the cars we're also kind of like in a steady state here it's improved slightly but we haven't seen it jump up yet the second part of the question I refer to the

economist no it's just The forecasters are saying, and they don't know any more than we do, really, but they're saying this will continue through the end of 2022. Wow. And we see, you have too many variables here. You have, everybody's got a job that wants to have a job. Everybody's making more money. People have gotten a huge amount of money from the government in the cities. And so when your pockets are full and your bank accounts full and you got a really good job and you got to raise and

What does everybody want? They want to buy a car Everybody wants to buy a new or used car. So you have all that with a microchip shortage and a short supply and you have skyrocketing the demand So who's to say? I mean when prices do come down which they will people are going to be complaining about a whole lot of other things like too much unemployment, too much inflation, I mean, we're always going to have problems. So every set of problems is good for somebody and bad for somebody else. Right now, it's great for car dealers and great for manufacturers and it's terrible for the consumers. That's the way it is. And Kyle in Pennsylvania also says, I bought a Toyota Corolla hybrid from you guys recently. before I bought it, I got a cold call from Ed Morse Toyota

asking me if I wanted to buy one, or here it comes, 7,000 over MSRP before other dealer fees were added in. I just... Rick's face looks emboggled. But let me say this. You know what? You didn't buy it, but somebody else did. and that's that's that people don't realize that they say you're insulting me now there are a lot of

business men out there that are listening and you know who you are CEOs you're the fat cats you know you're you're you're in Palm Beach you're Jupiter Island you're Beverly Hills and you make a lot of money and you got a business answer this question just between you and me if you could raise the price of the products that you're selling watches, TVs, whatever it is, and double it, and still sell everything you had, would you do it? So, there's a lot of people out there that are being very quiet. A lot of car dealers are big, very quiet. And I have to say this, as a car dealer, I have mixed emotions.

I'm, you know, I feel good and I feel bad. I feel good that we're making record profits. I feel bad that I'm charging MSRP because I feel guilty about I've never charged people MSRP for cars before but I also feel guilty that I'm not charging more than MSRP because the businessman and me

yeah the businessman and me says hey supply and demand economics 101 so it's a topsy-turvy world and nobody knows what they're doing including me Well, thank you for those profound words. Okay. We got quiet, so Nancy passed me this article she found in Palm Beach Post.

The ex-N-N-S-N-E-S-A. This is a follow-up. The former CEO of Nissan, his name is Carlos Gones, spelled G-H-O-S-M. He's on the run. Yeah, he's on the run. He'd been charged with high-growing. crimes in Japan found guilty but he's found himself in a country and uh he's behind he's been on extradition treaty smuggled himself out in his speaker cabinets and the judge in

the Tokyo corridor I said said some terrible things about him anyway I just we looked at that and Nancy and I both chuckled about because he is only one of many Volkswagen had some people go to the slammer. The morality of the manufacturers in the world are amazing. I mean, Hyundai had a guy go to jail. Nissan, we just talked about. A lot of manufacturers have had people that have done terrible things. Ethics and morality, I don't know.

What can I say? Just a little, too, but we're getting near the... I have to ask you a question. How many people do we know? personally that is in the slimmer or has served time? We know personally. I don't know that many. You're not going to admit it here.

Okay, I thought I'd throw that out there. Not been any. Okay. Okay, folks, we are going to get to the mystery shopping report. Well, let me do this. Then we'll get the mystery shopping report. We had hoped that a woman named Gail could call in. I spoke to her and she wasn't able to her.

Maybe she tried and the lines were busy and if that were the case, Gail, we were very busy today and I know I asked you to call in. Anyway, Gail, I salute her. I won't use her last name because she might not want me to, but she is an educated consumer. And she had a lease car that came back in and she wanted to buy it because she knew was a 2018 Infinity Q50. And she wanted to buy it because she could resell it or keep it,

and it was a huge bargain. So she went to Schumacher, Infinity, and they said, okay, we'll be glad to get you that car, we'll buy it back, and we're going to add $2,500 in fees to the price. Well, she doesn't like that, because she's smart. So she went to Infinity of Stewart, and they said the same thing we're going to charge you

these fees to do that so she got this is a reason I love Gail she did exactly what she should do she called infinity leasing and said what's going on here I've got an option to purchase this Q50 from you

you're the lessor I'm the less fee and this is my purchase price and your dealers down here are trying to add thousands of dollars to my purchase price and they said well we don't like that Gail call the dealer in Gainesville. Isn't that interesting?

So she called the dealer in Gainesville, the Infinity dealer, and he agreed to buy it back for her and take the vehicle off her hands for the true purchase option price. Then, as a footnote, post-script, Infinity of Stewart must have got the word, probably from Infinity leasing, and they called and said,

okay, we won't charge you a dealer fee either. Now, I don't know if Schumacher ever got the word from Infinity leasing, maybe, maybe not. But if you have a lease that you want to buy and you do have an option to purchase it, chances are it's a bargain. You should exercise your option and sometimes you go directly to the leasing company and there's no nonsense. If you have to go through a dealer, find a dealer that won't charge you the extra fees, $2,500 in Schumacher's case. and you can take that lease buyback, lease option, and resell it at a nice profit or just keep it, and you've got a bargain. Okay.

If there's nothing else, I can... There is. I'm going to mention one thing that I didn't during the show, and that is www. Florida Law Protectingcarbuyers.com. Write that down. W.W. Florida Law Protecting Carbuyers.com is worth your while. Earl did a column not too long ago on this very topic, and you want to place that in your contacts. You'll use it, and you'll find it very useful.

Now to the Mystery Shopping Report, and folks, it's important that you vote on the mystery shopping report. We love hearing from you. So, text us with your grade 772-4976530 now for the mystery shopping report. Okay. Wallace Cadillac? Mystery Shop of Wallace Cadillac. And again, I want to thank my son, Stu, who is in charge of our cyber shopper reports and dispatches agent Lightning and chooses the dealers and writes the report up.

And I've got that right here in my hand, and I'm reading Stu's word. he's very eloquent it was sometimes too eloquent but he's great he's got some sucky last night it was entertaining this morning for me at 3.30 I read it and reread it I just loved the wording read it like right after I said it no I promise we're not picking on Bill Wall I was unconscious you and still want to leave the studio let me read this yes I promise we're not picking on Bill Wallace or the Wallace or the Wallace automotive group. We've been meaning to Mr. Shop, a luxury brand for some time now, and Wallace Cadillac was, for logical reasons, good choice. Logical, because they're in

Martin County and Agent Lightning doesn't have to leave town to do the shop, so it worked, and that's what we did. We shoped Wallace Cressler Jeep last week, and I opined about the reasons for the backslide we've seen among the Walsh dealerships. Most of you know the regulars that I know Bill Wallace. He's got several dealerships, and we've had some good reports back in the day. Now, he slipped. And the most obvious reason being the difficulty of running, he's got 13 dealerships, and that's just too many for one person. You have to have right management in place in all 13, and sometimes you can't do it. I tried it, I couldn't do it, and now I just have the one dealership. And even that's a handful.

So, Bill, I understand. The real reason we shop walls Cadillac this week is because we promised our listeners to deliver a luxury dealership mystery shop. It's been a while since we've investigated a luxury brand. And I'll give you my standard spiel about this. We'll shop luxury brands less frequently because the brands like Honda and Ford are what most people buy. And luxury cars represent a relatively small percentage.

So we try to reach and help the great majority of people. That's why we shop the middle price and lower price cars. When you have a radio show, you're trying to maximize the number of folks. You're trying to help every week, and that's what I just said. And we're going to do more electric cars. I think we fell behind. Cadillac is an American luxury brand other than Tesla, and you miss Lincoln. Lincoln is another luxury brand.

And speaking of Lincoln, I started to mention this too about all the money news. Here's a little side note, because we've got time. Buzz Aldrin, how many of you know who Buzz Aldrin is? I know Buzz Aldrin turned 92, and he wanted to buy himself a birthday present, and he wanted to buy a Lincoln. And so he bought a Lincoln from a dealership in California, and he waited, and he waited, and he waited. Now, there's a double message here. After four months, the Lincoln didn't come in, and he called the dealership. was Aldrin arguably one of the most famous men in history or maybe ever in

history you know the man on the moon or one of the few men that's ever walked on the moon such a modest guy he just called the dealership while the dealership finally wised up and called Ford and Ford said whoops Buzz Aldrin has got a Lincoln on order and they built a Lincoln for him and they gave it to him so I know that's an aside story but that's human interest I thought it was pretty cool. God bless Buzz Aldrin. I need to enjoy that Lincoln. The expectation back to the shopping report, the expectation at luxury brand dealerships

is that the customer experience will be better than at non-luxury brand dealerships. This expectation has proved more accurate over the course of many mystery shops. Luxury dealers are nicer, more honest, and easier to deal with. I don't want to get into a psychological study of why that is, but if you go in Tiffany's, Everybody's real nice. You go into Wilson Jewelers, maybe not as nice. I don't know. I think it's the matter of the store. But it does happen that luxury dealers of all products seem to treat people better. A lot of the good in the car business comes from these dealers and sell luxury cars. Not to say that there are not some crooked luxury car dealers out there, I assure you there are. But just not as many. Many of the common and not so common dealership amenities we come to expect at car dealers were pioneered by luxury dealers, fancy cafes, Starbucks, so on them got Starbucks, valet services, massages and manicures, yeah, true, believe it or not.

We've also documented a higher level of respect given to our mystery shoppers at luxury dealerships. The salespeople and managers seem to be less condescending and more patient. the advertising and the showrooms are quieter everything seems to be easier okay so with the request of multiple listeners and because we're dying to know if luxury dealers are price gouging as much as everyone else

we sent Agent Lightning to Wallace Cadillac this week and that's in Stewart here's our report I arrived speaking as if I were Agent Lightning before lunchtime was immediately greeted by a salesman named Ted he introduced himself led me inside to his desk.

Ted got to business right away, asked me for my driver's license, he diligently filled out an intake form, kind of a high class name, intake, with my personal information. Then he handed me his business card and pointed out his cell phone.

Interesting. His personal cell phone number. He cautioned me, listen carefully, he cautioned me to not call the main dealership number. Otherwise, I'd receive a, an avalanche of unwanted solicitation calls. Now, we've never heard this before on mystery shopping reports.

And Nancy and I talked about this at length as we drove in this morning to the studio. I got to hand it to a guy that will give his personal cell phone number out because it means that he's obviously not going to take too much of advantage of you because he doesn't want you to drive him crazy with his personal. cell phone. And I advise people, and I've written a blog or two, where I tell consumers, when you're going out, see if you can get the cell phone number of the person you're dealing with. If they won't give it to you, a little bit of a red flag. Now, Bill Wallace, I'm not going to, I probably shouldn't have used his name. Bill Wallace wouldn't like this because

dealers and business owners don't like salespeople that think, they own the customer. If this salesperson were to leave that dealership and go to another Cadillac dealership, he would probably bring a lot of his customers with him. And that would not be good for Bill Wallace. So just an interesting aside, because we've never seen this happened before in a mystery shop. This car salesman actually gave the mystery shopper the personal cell phone number, his personal cell phone number. Okay, back to Ted and Agent Lightning. We talked about the vehicle shortage, how it could affect my sale. Ted promised to work with me, despite the difficulties the shortages presented. He said that the days of getting a car below

MSRP are long gone. True words were never spoken. But he would work with me, as he said before, on the addendum. I asked him what the addendum was. He said, I'll show it to you when we look at the car. Ted said that today was the first day of the month, and the dealership hasn't sold its first car. He hoped I'd be the one to break the ice. We settled on a new 2022 Cadillac XTS premium luxury, a fancy SUV. It was white. I headed out on a lot to find it. MSRP was 58,525. Again, an aside, I'm surprised that a Cadillac would cost that little. Are you, Stu? Um, no, but... I was. I was. It's a smaller RCV. Yeah, I think Cadillac and a luxury and 58,000. The average car price today is, I think,

48,000. So it's only 10,000. The addendum that was a fixed next to the morning label was short, not so sweet. It simply added $5,000 for a market adjustment. No mud guards or auto butler, nitrophil just five grand because we can do it. Supply in the ban, you know, if they really want to be arrogant, they'd say, $5,000 plus economics 101. Take it or leaving, you know, just in your face. Ted was enthusiastic and knowledgeable when he presented the vehicle. He said he owned one himself and loves it. Interesting.

It was obvious Ted's doing well. It was obvious we went on the most informative test drive I've ever been on. Another very, very positive thing about Ted. I mean, hey, personal cell phone. number, great knowledge of the product. Hey, can afford to buy a Cadillac. He's a good

man. We returned to the dealership, found his desk. Ted offered to print a copy of the window sticker because the tent on the window vehicle of the vehicle made the original hard to see. I pointed out to the VIN on the printed adroning label

didn't match the one on the car. Eagle Eye, Agent Lightning. Got an eye, I tell you. nothing. You can't put nothing past as your lightning. This set off a scramble. This is good. I enjoyed this. This set off a scramble among Ted and the management staff, because apparently, listen to this, and we've done this. So I'm, I mean, I'm, you're laughing out of familiarity. Exactly. They had recently sold the

twin to my, Cadillac XT5, and we're not concerned they sold it through the wrong person. And we've done that. You know, you get two identical cars with different vans, and you write it up with the wrong VIN and you talk about creating problems for everybody I mean you, the customer, the insurance, the finance company it is a bloodbath so everybody got real excited everything was sorted out however in a few minutes

and they discovered the era was online and everybody calmed down. During the confusion, Stu used kerfuffle he likes to use cute words like that. Oh, I like that work, come on. I reached back into the past Yes, he did. And my grandfather.

I made small talk with Ted. He said he was a sales manager there for many years. But now he's working as a salesman until his youngest kid graduates from college. I'm starting to like Ted more and more. Everything about Ted I like. He was very kind and professional, the kind of person I'd buy a car from. Ted left to get the worksheet. The top line was MSRP, 58,500,000, 525.

he gave me a $1,000 discount and a $500 rebate, so $1,500 off the marked-up price. But then he went ahead and added the $5,000 market adjustment. When I say he, we're talking about the manager, the dealership. He's following orders, even though he was a manager. He's following orders. He also added $849 dock fee, $159 electronic filing fee, and a $145 in dock stamps.

I didn't see that on the worksheet. I didn't look carefully. That's especially egregious because it's one thing to mislead about something being a government fee is something else to flat lie. There are no

dock stamps involved in the transaction unless the car is financed. And those are the dock stamps they're charged by the bank. We've seen that at a few dealers. We have, yeah. So Dock Stamp is a double lie. It's a hidden fee, and it's telling the customer that it is for something that does not exist.

And North Carolina has actually passed a law saying you can't call your hidden fee a dock fee. You can call it anything else. You can call it Bugs Bunny, but you can't call it a dock fee. So another little interesting insight. that you're probably not at all interested in. I am. Yeah, you are, yeah. Ted acknowledged a high price.

He said that buying a car now works best for people who have a trade, true or worse, whatever spoken. He said their customers are overpaying for cars, but at least these premiums are all set by a big trade in value. Well, I'll tell you what. Depending on the car you're buying and the car that you're trading, sometimes you could actually get a good deal that way. I mean, sometimes you could get so much for your trade in

because you shop it right, and you can get a relatively good price, like close to MSRP with a new car. You could just find a dealership that was charging MSRP and get all the money for your trade. Yeah, and all the money for the trade. So it's like that's finding, you know, a needle in a haystack, but good luck.

It can't happen. I agree to get my car appraised, waited for him to get me new figures. Ted returned after about 15 minutes with a new worksheet showing a $20,000 trade-in value for my 2018 Volkswagen Atlas. Now, Stu. I didn't have our experts look at it, but I am an expert. Okay. And it looked like a fair trade indict.

Really? Wow. No, I haven't asked Jose or Vincent to see what, you know, with the effect of the market. But me looking at MMR and the black book, they were in the pocket. Yeah, that's important. So we'll clear this up later, but it's not way, way off. I don't think it's off. It's not way, way off. This whole trade-in thing and buying used cars is a feeding frenzy.

And Carvana, I mention that almost every week. They're the headlines of the Adena News this week. They bought for $2.5 billion, Carvana bought the second largest auction group in the country. Adessa. Mannheim is number one. Carvana has got so much cash from their IPO. They bought Adessa. They're like a bunch of

drunken sailors. They pay two and a half billion with a B for a auction company so they could have reconditioning resources for their used cars. So that's mind-bottling. And they're also charging prices

off the chart from you when you have a used car. So if you've got to use car, always check Carvana. You can do it online, and you might get a stupid high price. So Carvana, we buy any car.com, Froom, V-R-O-O-O-M, dot com, CarMax, shop everybody. I mean, what fun. It's a seller's market. If you get to be a seller, enjoy it.

Yeah, if you're a seller, you know, just for, you know, you can become a broker. You could go out and shop a car at Carvana and you don't have one, then you go buy one on Facebook or talk to your friends. You can start your own business. Yeah, buy it from your friends. Hey, if I can get you $50,000 for your car, will you give me $1,000? So exciting. Anyway, that's it. I thank Ted for all the help.

I need to think about it and went home. We've got to vote on this, and it's interesting. Wall's Cadillac in Martin County, Stewart, Florida. What do you think? Well, I have no question about it. I think they deserve an A. They're over, I mean, they're over MSRP, but they were just honest and there was no surprises and there was no pressure. Fundamentally, they're doing the same thing that everybody else is doing, but they're doing it with class.

And maybe that's what we were talking about. At a, you know, luxury dealership, they just do things just a little bit nicer. Okay. Who else got to have any votes? And you know, Rick? Got Tom Stuckel. Says, C-minus, good salesman and very up front, but I don't like the fake fees, dock stamps. Brian said Lacko, Ted gets an A.

The dealer gets a D for the extra fees. Tim Gilliland, Tim and Yuma, still too many hidden and not-so-hidden fees for me, C. Mark Anderson is Mark from St. Louis, a C-plus, and I've got Nate Miller with a B-plus. and Negan says, I would say C for where's my caddy? Myself, I'm going to give them, I'm going to give them the B. I think a B rating, Ted gets an A, but the dealership gets a B, just too many extra fees on there and that 5,000 to add it on. I forgot about the splitting up between the dealer and the salesperson.

I might modify, we have grades coming hand. Mark, this is A for the salesman, B for the dealership. Frank says actually a great shopping report. It gives them an A. Anne-Marie says A for a great salesman, but D for games with fees. The bottom line, C, she averaged it out. And Bob says A for Ted and B for the dealership, pointing out doc stamps. And that's a little, I'll give them a B-plus.

I'm changing mine to a B-plus. Okay. I'm going to give them a C. And, you know, I just don't like the $5,000. a market adjustment and all the other fees. So something stinks. I hit them a C. And I've also got Wayne Veit with a B-minus and Mark Smith with a C-plus.

Yeah, I'm going to go with, I'm going to agree with Nancy. I'm going to go with a C. I almost said C-minus, but I think that the dock fee got it for me. I just didn't like the double deception there. And I think that, granted, it wasn't a crazy high price over MSRP, but we have found dealers that are selling cars at MSRP. And until this week, Toyota of Orlando was one. I believe J.M. Lexus is selling them at MSRP.

There are a number of luxury dealers out there that are being a little bit more reasonable. And Frank from Jupiter Farms actually bought an Audi below MSRP and then bought it again at MSRP. That's a long story. And they quoted high over MSRP, but they came down. So I give them a little bit of credit. I don't blame people so much for asking over MSRP, but if you come down to MSRP or, or actually go a little bit below, you've got to give them points for that.

So I'm going to give them a C. Okay. There it is. The final grade. Okay. Okay. Hey, I like this picture in the automotive news of Buzz. Buzz Alderman.

Yeah, there's Buzz. Take a look at that. If you just tuned in, I talked about Bud Altsman. He bought himself a Lincoln in California for his birthday. His 92nd birthday, and he's such a cool guy. He looks great. he's such a humble, nice guy that he never even called for.

I mean, think about it. He could have picked up the phone. He could have called Jim Farley, the CEO. Hey, call Jim. This is Buzz Aldrin. May I speak to Jim Farley? Yes. And they put him through.

And Buzz would have said, Hey, Jim, Buzz Aldrin, I ordered a car from yesterday. Oh, you did? What was the dealer? What was the, oh, you'll have it next week. And then he'd have stopped the assembly line, and they would have said.

And they would have delivered it. to his driveway. They would deliver to his driveway. So anyway, that's what a cool guy is. Buzz Aldrin, he's one of my heroes, and I wanted to hold this up. It would be nice if he called the show. Anybody know, Buzz? Please call the show, Buzz. Please call the show, Buzz. It would make my daddy's day. Yes. It would make all of our days. Yeah. Okay, what else we got to do, fill the time between now and the theme song? What about the government workers? How I hate the government workers? I know I have something here that I could talk about.

You've got to have something over there. Okay. Okay. We're running at a time. Oh, yeah, I got one. Here's what I'd talk about. I knew you'd talk to something. There's an ad in automotive news about they're offering extended warranties for dealers to sell on electric vehicles.

And so the dealers are getting real nervous because the electric vehicles won't have anything to fix. And you won't have to have. the warranty and they'll last longer and they'll be better. So Ford has come out with an extended warranty for the dealers to sell the customers. And then in the list of selling the extended warranty plan to the dealers, they have in their advertisement no hidden fees. So Ford is telling the dealers. Not to do that. No, no, no. When they sell it to Ford, when Ford sells it to the dealer, they're not going to charge the dealer any hidden fees i think that's what it was yeah i've got it

on page lead by example it's on page five uh we'll see what it is but but uh oh here it is right here ev protection for uh here it's right here no hidden fees there's the ad so when they're oh it's charging the charging stations yeah that's their hey maybe that's a Subliminal, like, a thing that just to, you know, like I said, lead by example. So our manufacturer didn't hit us with a dealer fee. Maybe we shouldn't do the same thing to our customers. Okay, folks, we've had a great time this morning. I hope you did.

And we love your company, that's for sure. I want to thank Elise, our producer. And also, I'd like to thank our mystery shopping, Agent Lightning. She does a fabulous job and to the spine master general Thank you and our certified technician here That title doesn't even do them justice

And of course our digital operation The guy here, this president He does so much for us in the Well, behind the scenes Thank you so much We'll be right back here next Saturday morning At 8 a.m. Have a wonderful weekend. Bye bye, bye folks.

Red Do you? Red Dumbled Red Dumbled Let's come! Whoa! No more away Woo-ha-ha-ha!

Thank you.