Earl Stewart on Cars - 06.07.2025 - Your Calls, Texts, and Mystery Shop of Palm Beach Mitsubishi

Episode Date: June 7, 2025

Earl and his team answer various caller questions and responds to incoming text messages. Earl’s female mystery shopper, Agent Lightning visits a local Mitsubishidealer to see what they have on the lot and how much they will charge for a new 2024 Mitsubishi Mirage on their car lot. 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, and reading his blog posts at www.earloncars.com. To purchase Earl’s book, “Confessions of a Recovering Car Dealer”, go to www.earlsbook.com. This will forward to Earl’s Amazon page to complete your purchase. All proceeds from the book go to Big Dog Ranch Rescue. For more information or to adopt the dog you have seen today or any of their other dogs, please visit their website at www.bdrr.org. “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”

Hello, 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 listeners. We also have Rick Carney, 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, our link to cyberspace through Facebook, YouTube, text messaging, and our encrypted anonymous feedback service. Stu is also the spymaster director of our mystery shopping report. He dispatches our secret shopper weekly to an unsuspecting the car dealership. And now, on with the show.

Good morning, everybody. Well, we're back, and sometimes I think we should start the show before we do start this show, because we do start the show, The conversation in the studio amongst ourselves is informative to everybody. We're talking about AI now, and it's kind of a frightening part of everybody's life today. Then I have to remind myself that you listen to the show because it's pretty basic. You're probably thinking about buying a car. Maybe you just bought a car. where you have a car

everybody's got a car right so if you have a car you probably have got some questions about the performance are you getting the fuel economy or is an EV are you getting the range your battery how much of a charge

can you get or you get a noise or a whistle or a smell and you wonder oh boy how much is it going to cost me to get this fixed so that's what the show is our show is nuts and bolts It's fun to talk about AI.

It's fun to talk about autonomous vehicles. And I don't say we don't talk about it. I really can't help myself because I've got a thing about science, and I love innovation, and I love even scary innovation. We were talking before the show started about AI taking over. I mean, you know. Rick said we could be in a museum, and we'd be the obvious. objects in the museum and the AI robots would be looking at humans as being a prehistoric

creature. So you never know what's going to happen. But that's for another show. That's another thing to talk about. What we're here for you today is to help you get your car maintained or repaired by a qualified person at a reasonable price. And if you're thinking about leasing or buying a car, we want you to be a to choose the right car that fits your needs and get a fair price.

We're here for the nuts and bolts, and we'll be doing this. You and us, we'll be doing this for a number of years. I mean, the future is fun to speculate about, but it's going to be 20 years before it's going to hit us full, and it will. I mean, it will be exciting. I won't be around to appreciate it. Some of you will, but this is nuts and bolts. Rick Kearney is a certified diagnostic master technician.

And most of you who are regular listeners know what that means. He knows virtually everything there is about cars, including battery electric vehicles and hybrid electric vehicles. And, of course, the old-fashioned combustion engine, because that old-fashioned combustion engine is what's 99% on the road today. I mean, if you look at all the vehicles, I'm not sure of the exact percentage. It's a mostly all, virtually all, combustion engine. Maybe there's a fraction more hybrid that I should have credited it for. There are a lot of hybrids out there, too. Anyway, here's a number

I want you to write down. And you won't have a question right now. If you're not a regular listener, you don't probably have the number. So if you can write this number down and give us a call, Rick Kearney, if it's a car about maintaining your repairing, and that number is 877-9-9-60-99-60. 877-9-60-99-60. Don't be timid. If you haven't called the show before, we really, really would like you to. You'll find out it's not as bad or scary as you think,

and we're not like a lot of talk shows. We're not, you know, we like you. We know you're the light blood of the show. Our callers, we wouldn't be here if I were for the callers. I mean, you get tired to listen to what we had to say if we were solo. So we're not solo.

We do a duet with you, and you are literally more important than we are because without you, we wouldn't be here. So please write the number down. 877-960-9960 that's 877-960-960-960 and for you texters a lot of people like to text it's easier it's quicker and we get to the text by the end of the show we're on for two hours we just started at 8 a.m. Eastern Standard Time and we'll be here until 10 a.m. Eastern Standard Time and the text we'll get to that text we will get to it the text number is 772 area code

772 4976530 7772 77530 772 497 6530 so we'll collect them sometimes we get to them earlier but the phone we answered immediately Nancy Stewart She's my co-host, she's also my wife, and she is our female advocate on this show because of the importance of females in today's market. They just about control the market because they might be the silent majority. That's a good way to put it because they don't make as much noise as men do about cars, but they do a lot of thinking and they do a lot of studying. research shows that women are better qualified, prepared to pick the right car for their needs. Us guys, we like, you know, I like a fast car. Fast and furious.

Yeah, fast and furious. And I like a sexy looking car. And I like, you know, I'm a typical guy. Nancy on the other hand, most women are looking at the fuel economy, safety, reliability, cost of operation. They're kind of like a consumer report's sort of a way to buy a car. which is the way you should. Sometimes you can combine the two. I mean, there are exciting cars and fast cars

that are also good cars. And consumering bars will help you there. But Nancy Stewart has built the female audience to 50-50 over the years. We've been doing this for about 20 years. And my son, Stu Stewart, will be here today. And Stu is active in our dealership. Nancy and I both are part of the dealership, but Stu sees a day-to-day operation, and he sees the interaction with other dealerships and the advertising, the new models that are coming in.

And if someone calls Nancy or me about, I want to buy a car, we usually ask Stu, because he knows about the newest models that are coming out. We have a dealership, and obviously, if you've been listening just now, but we're not an infomercial. We don't do anything on this show if you're a new listener to sell you a car. Our dealership is a Toyota dealership. It's in North Palm Beach, Florida,

and we've been doing it for almost 50 years with selling new Toyotas. So we know what's going on both sides of the aisle. You know, we've got the dealers on one side and the consumers on the other. the consumer side this is a consumer advocacy show so what better way to get advice on buying your car than from a dealer see I'm a turncoat I defected it the dealer ranks but I still sell cars but I know what I did back in the day

when I was doing it the wrong way the you know the deceptive way and I know what I should tell you as a consumer to avoid being taken advantage of so there we are and I'm going to turn the microphone over to Nancy Stewart and she's going to tell you a couple things including a very very unusual special offer if you're a female listening and you haven't called the show before please stay tuned just for five or ten minutes until Nancy tells you exactly why you should call the show thank you good morning everyone and welcome as I say every week you make the show you're a very important part of this show that we as a real mention have been doing for 21 years and it goes without saying all of you out there you do make

the show you're a very important part of the show so give us a call toll free at 877 960 9960 you can also text us at 772-49770 6530 and for you out there that are shy you can take advantage of your anonymous feedback your anonymous feedback.com so take advantage of all of that and I'm so excited about our partnership with Jeff Bezos and if you haven't read Earl's open letter to Jeff Bezos you'll You'll be able to do that very soon. Well, that was in last Sunday's Washington Post. Yeah, so I'll probably be bringing in a Washington Post next week,

or you can probably view it on Earl's Facebook page or mine. But the open letter to Jeff Bezos, it is phenomenal, and who better to partner with? the way we do business and the way we put the honest information out there always with you in mind certainly pairs with Amazon's way of doing business is called transparency and it is just so telling it is going to be so exciting so you can stay tuned for that and also as a far as the ladies are concerned, you know, there's Earl mentioned about our silence and how we pick a car and what we do. But most of all, I have to tell you, for a car dealer to ignore us

is a financial disaster because we have the power. We have the power now. And it is so telling the direction that the auto industry is going. As I said earlier, women in leadership, there are more women stepping into leadership roles within the automotive companies influencing design, marketing strategy across the board. We make an impact, and again, I'll say it for the car dealers that are listening. listening, it's a financial disaster for you not to recognize us, our power, and our financial power. So keep that in mind. We have a mystery shopping report that we'll be getting to, and that is with Palm Beach, Misabishi. And it's quite interesting. We want you to vote

on that mystery shop. You can do so at 772-497-6-5. Also, you know, I love the Gallup poll, and the Gallup poll is all about honesty, ethics, and it really is telling. Nothing has changed as far as selling a car, salespeople, but one thing for sure has changed, and that is the auto mechanics, and it really reflects, the Gallup Pole really reflects the honesty and how far the mechanics have come, and there are more, much more, honest mechanics out there, and you can find them. And it reflects an improvement of 24% during the 2000s, indicating, a growing trust. Yes, a growing trust in this profession over time. So we have a whole lot to get to. Linda, if you're listening, give us a call. Thank you so much for your texts

and pictures, additional pictures, this week. Again, that number is 877-960-99-60, and you can text us at 772-497-6530. Our lines are lit up, according to my X-screen, and I am going to go to Phil, who's calling in Jupiter. Good morning, Phil. Hello. Hello, Phil. Listen, I got a question for Rick, and I've got a new Prius, 2024, Prius, and I've got a new Prius, and I just wondered, does it still need the hybrid battery fan filter? Does it have one, and does it still need to be replaced like my 2017 had to do? It's going to have a small screen in there, and every so often you should get that cleaned out,

just to try to prevent any issues with the airflow through that hybrid battery, because they can build some heat. If you have animals that ride in the car with you often, like a dog that rides in the car often, you're definitely going to want to have that cleaned out more often. And other than that, just try to keep the car clean and avoid putting anything where you might see like a grill opening in the plastic in the back of the car, the back seat, don't put anything that might block that. Can he do that himself or is that something else to be done by the dealer? I'm sure there are videos online showing how to clean it.

But some of them trying to get to it, you're disassembling quite a bit of plastic trim. Yeah. So it might be a little more difficult for a lot of people. What would be a fair charge for that? We normally get about a half-hour labor, which would be about $100 at our shop. $100, yeah. And maybe an independent might be a little bit less. Yes, yes.

An independent would definitely be less than that, probably. Yeah, I remember on the 2017 Prius I had. I mean, you could actually, you guys had a park for it. and you could actually order a new, the filter. Right. You can, but it's actually just like a mesh screen. So you can actually just take it out and take like a toothbrush or even an old hairbrush or something and just brush it clean to get the dust and dirt off of it.

Maybe rinse it with some water and air dry it for a few minutes and you're back in business. Yeah, and what I've noticed is the back, the rear seat on the 2024. It's got a grill on both sides. So which one, I mean, it's got, it looks like it's got two grills on it. Yeah, they're both going to be air intake and air exhaust air out. As I recall, the passenger side, I think, is the main one for the air intake. Oh, the passenger side. Yeah.

Okay. Oh, okay. So it's still critical to do that because I did not 2017. I remember you all told, and I didn't even know what a hybrid battery fan felt. or what it was, I mean to know what it was. So, okay. Well, listen, that answers my question. I appreciate it.

Thanks for the call. My pleasure. Thank you, Phil. Give us a call again. We are going to go to Carolyn. Carolyn is a caller from Fort Lauderdale, and she's a first-time caller. Good morning, Carolyn. Welcome.

Hi, good morning. Carolyn, as a first-time caller, you. You just won yourself $50. If you stay on the phone until after we're finished speaking, you can talk to Jeremy in the control room. Give him your contact information. Okay. He'll pass that along to me, and I'll get that check out to you. Okay, thank you very much.

You're welcome, Carolyn. What can we do for you this morning? A while ago, probably a year or so ago, you had a call and talking about the Toyota door handles the brake. Yes. And I had an 84, I think, Hamry, all four broke. I'm now driving at 2013 Route 4, and all the handles have broken. Oh, boy. And I just have a sarcastic remark that here you have a, what, a billion-dollar company, Toyota,

and they can't find some college geek, material science, and engineering to come up with a polymer door handle that never breaks. Yeah, it's amazing me. We've been dealers for almost 50 years, and you're right, Toyota is the biggest, most profitable volume, and every other way, automotive manufacture in the world, and they're human, and we see some of the stupidest things that somehow slip through the cracks. If you look at overall quality, Toyota has a very high ranking, but those door handles, I can think of some other things, We had, our dashboards were cracking in the hot Florida sun, and they would actually melt. The sun was melting the dashboards,

and it would cause a reflection. It would actually be a danger. And I can write a book on some of the dumb things that Toyota has done over the years, but when I wrote the book, I could probably write two or three books on most of the other cars, because as bad as Toyota is, It's amazing how some of the, think of the recalls that we have right now,

25% of the cars on the road right now have an unfixed recall. And you'd think that the model manufacturers could build a car that they didn't have to bring back in and fix after they sold it. Yeah. That Camry was, oh, I had over 100,000 some miles. Yeah, I had it forever. but then when my dad died in 2013 he left us with a bunch of money

so that's when we got to wrap four but yeah what does Toyota say about the handles do they give an excuse or a reason you know that's funny they don't ever seem to apologize the manufacturers I think they try to keep it

subtle they do one of the first thing they do The quietest is a notice to the dealer, and they don't tell the customer about it. They just, it's something a dealer is supposed to check when the customer complains about it when they come in. If it's serious or a safety issue, then, of course, they have a recall, and they hate recalls because everybody hears about it, and it impugns the quality of the manufacturer. and impugues the quality of the product. So recalls, they just don't want to have, so they don't probably recall cars they should.

But they do want to fix it, so they quietly tell the dealer, if a customer comes in and says something about this, we know how to fix it, and we'll do it for free, instead of just making it open that the customer, maybe already knows about it, or forgot to mention it. You got to remember with capitalism,

which is, in my opinion, the greatest system in the world. Profit is very important. So whether it's Toyota or Mitsubishi or Ford, the number one thing on the minds of the people that run those companies is making a profit. And after that, quality comes second, unfortunately. And you just have to be careful when you choose. Yeah.

Well, we have a really good trend. It's an auto mechanic. We just order, and he puts it in for free, but it's not cheap to buy that and have a mechanic put it in. You're a lucky woman. Carolyn, I'll interrupt here for a second. I have to commend you as far as you having your own mechanic and being able to have that done. You asked an important question as to what Toyota says about this, and, you know, I feel they really fly under the radar and don't give it much attention. And when they do, you know, they talk about things like lubrication and check your owner's manual, talk with your Toyota dealership.

And here you are calling wrong cars, and I believe I was just putting on my headphones. So I think you said this is the second vehicle that you've experienced this problem with. And we had the first was it was 84-86 Camry. And it was used when we bought it. I don't know how many miles. It went over $100,000 or more. And all four broke. And I have a RAP 4, a 2013 model, and all four have broken.

Carolyn, at what point with your Rav 4 did you notice, I'm going to call it, defects on your handles? At what point after you bought your vehicle? Oh, yeah. it probably was probably four years ago and between in those four years probably one a year yeah about four years ago we noticed and it seemed like it was one right after the other within a year or two years well you know i i have to commend you because what you have done uh this is i have been called about this problem myself, you know, by other ladies. And none of them have said what you just said, and you said that you had a reliable mechanic and that the replacement or repair

was a lot easier and quicker. So I commend you on being, you know, very knowledgeable. And Well, that was my husband. I mean, he's friends of both, but we were both teachers, and my husband taught this mechanic's kids in school, so he's like five minutes away. So it's a close relationship, and he does a lot of stuff for us. Yes, and did you hear when I opened the show about mechanics and that there is so much more honesty and transparency with mechanics today than ever before? So that mechanic is, you know, certainly worth its weight in gold, and you're doing the right thing. It doesn't erase buying such a beautiful vehicle. You know, everybody's driving, well, almost everyone is driving a Toyota.

And you just expect more quality than when you're receiving. Yeah. My husband bought a 2020 rep for the seller, the LE with all the stuff on it, you know. They have, they've definitely gained in popularity, and they have, I believe, taken the place of the Camry that was at the top of the, you talk about popularity. Camry, you know, was in that rule for, I'm going to say 15 years, and RAV four came along. and took the place of the, not literally, but they are at the top of the list as far as everything that you could even expect from a Toyota.

And does it have all that stuff on it that you can't figure out what it's used for? There you go. Absolutely. Carolyn, it's been a pleasure. And I thank you. I thank you. And I have to ask you before you go to please.

spread the word, tell all the ladies that you know that, you know, we play a huge part in this auto industry. And without us, the auto industry is certainly, well, not going to do as well, because we spend a lot of money in that direction. Where is your dealership located? Because we buy rats while we're coming to you guys. We're in North Palm Beach. Okay. okay yes so uh i thank you for that you have a have a great weekend and again thank you for calling and stay on the line and speak with jeremy okay thanks you're welcome okay we are going to go to

gina and uh gina is calling us from plantation and earl guess what she's a first time caller wow good morning jena good morning this is my favorite car show since click and clack the tapper brothers went off the air oh what a compliment thank you were they amazing were they amazing i just love those guys and uh the passing of one of the brothers he is definitely missed uh Gina before we go on I'm going to send you a gift of $50 for being the second female caller and if you stay on the line when we're finished speaking, Jeremy will take your contact information and he'll pass it alone to me and I'll get that check out to you. Well, thank you very much. I appreciate that.

You're welcome. What can we do for you today? Well, I had a quick comment about a car shopping experience at a Toyota dealership many, many years ago, which thankfully this has changed somewhat what do in part to your advocacy. I walked into a dealership with the hope of buying a Toyota Seleca GT, and the salesman said, that's a lot of car for a little lady. Oh, boy. Gina, let me interrupt you for a second. My second car was a Seleka, and wow, an amazing vehicle.

and I'm quite tiny and there was no problem I can handle it that's the most chauvinistic comment I can think anybody could make it what a way to start a sales negotiation to call the buyer a little lady you know I have to add this to it it certainly isn't I don't know which is more damaging Do you want a makeup mirror, or this vehicle could be too much for you? Actually, I thought that I made it pretty clear that what I wanted was a GT with a stick shift. Oh, boy, you really knocked him back on his heels. He took me over and showed me a base selica that wasn't a GT and was MOVE. And he wanted to know what I thought of the color.

Yeah. Yeah, that's the male shelving. It's big right there. Gina, were you honest? Did you tell him what you thought? I'm just kidding. I actually did, and I did walk out of that dealership. Good for you.

And then I had a question because now I have a Subaru Outback. It's from 2008. Great vehicle. And it is. I love it. The cat, well, I'm not sure what's going on with it because the engine light keeps coming on every time I drive it. And I took it to my mechanic from my trust. And he said that it could be the catalytic converter.

Oh, those catalytic converters, they make trouble all the time. Anyway, I'm going to interrupt you and turn the call over to Rick. No worries. But he said it could be a catalytic converter, or it could be one of the oxygen sensors. And I wanted to know if there's any way to more narrowly target what the issue might be. Right. So I don't want to spend money on an oxygen sensor if I don't need to. Well, you probably... Well, you'd be a lot better off replacing the oxygen sensor. than the catalytic converter because the part is way more expensive and the labor is much more.

But yes, by using a scan tool, he should be able to look at the readings from the oxygen sensors and determine if they are responding properly or not. And that will actually narrow down to tell them whether it's the catalytic converter or a bad sensor. He's just got to look at the readings from it and determine if it's responding properly. okay what's the approximate different and price between the two uh well the labor to replace an oxygen sensor on most cars is going to be about 350 to 400 and the part is around 100 to 150 dollars depending on you know the brand or what type it is uh catalytic converter you're looking at more like around $2,000 for the part or more and the labor oh gosh on average car I'm going to say probably

four to $500 maybe more well I'm not I'm not going to suggest that our caller is a person who doesn't care about the environment but if if someone wanted to just ignore the problem it wouldn't affect the performance for the car, would it? There is a possibility of it because if it's the catalytic converter and it becomes plugged up, then it would basically, you'd be stopping up the exhaust and it could affect the way the engine

runs. Well, what if I didn't have a catalytic converter anymore? Well, you'd still have to find a way to basically replace the piece of pipe because it's, you know, it's a piece that's in the exhaust itself. I mean, it's, it's, you really can't just take it out because now you've got just a wide open exhaust. Yeah, well, I'm, I'm not trying to advise anybody on committing a crime, but there are a lot of people out there that are driving cars that are older and the value depreciates.

And they get an environmental issue like the catalytic converter that is extremely expensive to fix. So they love their car. and that red light just keeps blinking in their face all the time, but they don't want to spend $2,000 to fix a car that might be worth $3,000. So, and yet, in most of the states now, including Florida, no longer have inspections for environmental contamination. So practically speaking, there are people out there that would like to come up with a solution. And I can't aid in a better crime on the air by telling people how they can do that.

If you were a criminal and you wanted to not spend $1,000 on your car and stop that pesking light from going off, what would you do? The problem is if the catalytic converter has gone bad, you can't really remove it. If the car's running okay, you can ignore the light, but there's going to be no way to turn the light off because the computer is still going to be looking for that thing. about a piece of black tape over the light.

I mean, you could do that if you want, but the big issue that you have to remember. I'm not suggesting this. I'm not suggesting this. I'm just saying if you put a black piece of tape over the... And that can certainly be done. I've seen plenty of people do that. But the biggest drawback there is,

then if some other system on the car has a problem, you'd have no way of knowing about it because the check engine lights can be on all the time. My $1,000 car, would have to be replaced. And I could put a $1,000 catalytic converter on it and drive it. Well, I mean, if you just... I'm only playing with you, Rick.

Okay. The, uh, I think, uh, we're going to refer to you again, you know, as the recovering car dealer with the black electric tape. Rick, um, I want to another note here. Uh, the oxygen sensor, uh, typically wears out at, what, 60,000, 100,000 miles would you say no it does not okay they they just if if the sensor just finally has a problem they just stop working but like my own personal vehicle i've got 187000 on it and i've never replaced one of those sensors yeah well we know your driving technique and not everyone has that

has has nothing to do with it it's just luck of the draw sometimes parts break and it can have to do also with because the sensor is exposed to the atmosphere exposed to the air in that oil oil and contaminants splashing on it from the road dirt and debris sometimes get on there and it just causes damage to it we have a caller on the line here so we do so with maybe fuel economy you know that's an indicator that the sensor you know maybe have you know it might need replaced rough idling things like that no okay they only they're only there for emissions purposes the back one after the cat we heard it from Rick so he always has the answer Gina thank you so much for calling please stay on the line talk to Jeremy in

the control room and I look forward to speaking to you again and please help me build the platform here for the ladies we play a huge part in this industry We do indeed. Thank you so much for taking my call. You're welcome, Gina. Our number here is 877-960-960, and you can text us at 772-497-6530. Don't forget your anonymous feedback.com. We're going to go to Barry, who's been holding, and Barry calls us from Tampa. Good morning, Barry. morning everybody and it's really great did you make yourselves available like this most saturday mornings i appreciate it thank you um i hope you'll entertain a philosophical question today i've been wondering about the situation where a person is establishing a relationship with a car dealer or service

center he doesn't know anybody there yet he has no referrals online reviews may or may not be trustworthy it really feels like a role of a dight yeah Probably the sales or service person that he happens to get by chance trumps everything else. But putting that aside, is he generally better off dealing with a mega empire like AutoNation or Hendrit for sales or on the service side some national tire chain, for example? Or does doing business with a smaller independent outfit improve the odds of good experience? What are the pros and cons of each? You know, before the guys answer this, I'm just going to say one thing. knowledge is power

and it doesn't matter who you deal with knowledge is power and there are so many avenues that you can open in this industry and you can go to consumer report. There's just so much

at your fingertips, so much information and we're very lucky to have that. Rick, what do you say? I've got the answer. Okay. Yeah. Barry, I say this regularly on the show, the advantage of a large group like Auto Nation or Pinsky Auto Group, the Morgan Auto Group,

when you have a publicly owned company that is traded on the New York Stock Exchange, you have transparency because the Security Exchange Commission and the press and the public are eyeballs on large companies, especially when they're individual investors. So they're much more sensitive to criticism. A letter from an attorney or a letter from a complaining customer to an individual entrepreneur, a small dealership somewhere, doesn't mean much.

It could be thrown in the trash basket. Most businesses realize that consumers with problems are reluctant to hire attorneys. It's very difficult to take. to hire a good attorney to represent you against a small company. And the attorneys are in business to make money just like everybody else. So if you have a case against AutoNation, now they're looking at a big paycheck. Contingency, 40%, they're looking at big bucks.

For Joe's auto sales on the corner, it's not going to be a good payday. And we struggle a lot to find attorneys to represent college to this show. with that said if you if you have a small independent repair and you have from word of mouth and maybe personal experience knowledge and even better you know the owner that personal relationship is invaluable you I'd much rather have that relationship with a small good mechanic or a small store and be able to pick up the phone say hey Joe I got another problem here and need to help with that's what that's the way to go but if you don't know the store

and you just have to pick, do I go to this little place or this big place, you're better off to go to the larger place. Okay. Sort of on a related note, if there's a celebrity owner, like a retired sports star or something that gets involved in the car business, is that a red flag or does that really matter at all? Say that again? What was question?

Well, you have a celebrity that gets involved and buys a dealership. or something. Oh, yeah, yeah. Is that a red ride or does that really matter? If it's a single dealership, one of the things that's almost impossible today is finding a car dealership where you can contact the owner.

And whether it's, no matter what kind of business it is, if you can get through to the owner or to a top executive, usually they'll do the right thing but today for an independent dealer you're never going to find him he's going to be at his ski lodge and vale or he's going to be in Montana at his ranch or he'll be touring Asia I mean the car dealers make a ton of money and they enjoy life and they're they're very rarely accessible the large conglomerates have bought up most of the car dealers and a small, relatively small family-owned dealership is very difficult.

They're an extinct, vanishing species today. That's what we have at our dealership in North Palm Beach. It's a family, a single-point dealership. But I can't think of another dealership like that. I really can't. There are other dealers out there that say they're family dealerships, but maybe they are but they've got 25 dealerships so I don't see how one or two or three people

are going to be intimately involved with being fair with the customers with 25 dealerships so yeah it's I I hate to say it because you lose the warmth you lose the personal touch but I would say go to an auto nation dealership before I would say go to an individually owned dealership even by a celebrity

that you know spent a lot of money and bought it okay thank you your insights are appreciated thank you very much for the goal thank you barry give us a call again we're going to go to uh linda and linda has called us before and uh she's shared a lot of information with all of us and she has sent me a number of pictures with some pretty impressive cars good morning linda good morning thank you nancy i received your check Well, I know that you can use that, and you'll spread the word to the other ladies. Thank you. Oh, I will.

You have beautiful handwriting. Pardon me? Beautiful handwriting. Lovely, yes. I use her all the time because I can't write very well. That's my Catholic upbringing. It was very important that we utilized that script ability to write. And if we didn't.

We had our knuckles just plummeted with a roller. You don't want to feel that ruler on your knuckle. I love the Tappert brothers, and the remaining brother did do some radio work, and he did some form of advertising, too, after he lost his brother. Yes, definitely. I followed them. We all followed them. Fun.

Oh, what a fun show. It definitely was. My family never threw anything away. and I have my father's 1949 88 four-door sedan Oldsmobile

Delco Battery Service policy and it recommends having the battery tested at least once a month by the dealer. Doesn't that sound

a little bit obsessive once a month back in 1949 having the battery check? Well, I mean things have changed a whole lot since then the quality has gone way up oh for sure yeah this is everything for uh you know quick service and all that good stuff yeah that's quite a statement

linda that's quite a statement uh you said 1949 wow interesting uh thank you for your last picture that you sent on your son-in-law uh who is employed With Blue Origin. Yes, works for Jeff Bezos. I told he had breakfast with Jeff Bezos in a diner in Melbourne a few months ago when Bezos was here for a launch. And so I have friends in Jupiter, and every year their Christmas picture has multiplied with their grandkids. And I'm sure they have bought more than just a few cars from you. and I'll be anxious to talk with them and see how many they have bought.

But they are growing exponentially with their grandkids, and I'm sure they have given you business. Beautiful story. We finally found our Washington Post, and they should be delivered shortly. It was certainly a journey in obtaining them, and that open letter to Jeff Bezos, from Earl is going to appear.

I tried to view it. I tried to Google it, and I couldn't find it. The letter. Impossible. Oh, the letter? Yeah. Uh-huh. Earl, where can Linda go to view the letter?

The Back Bay or the Washington Post on the edition last Sunday. Okay, last Sunday, okay. Yeah. I will do it. Okay, Linda. It was great hearing. from you. Stay in touch. We'll do. Bye-bye. Have a great

weekend. We are going to go to John in West Palm Beach. Good morning, John. Hey, good morning. Welcome. Thanks. Okay, about the service, the 49 Oldsmobile, the one thing that's

different now than back then is she almost touched on it. The reason why you had the battery check once a month is because where were you pulling into, but a full service gas station. So not only were you checking the battery, but the oil, the wipers, and any other fluids. So you can afford the time. That's why it may seem excessive.

Right. But back then it wasn't, because how much slower was the time back then, and you had a chance to check all that. I meant tire pressure, too. But the real reason why he called was I'd love to hear a segment on Saturday on people who called in said they had this problem. and how did it generate to other people from the show, regular listeners of that, happened to them.

And the reason why I bring this up is, remember the person that called where they put their car up on a lift, and then all of a sudden the car came down off the lift, they had the work done, but now there was a rattling noise happening. Or the rattling noise went away. That's what it was. The rattling noise went away. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, well, took my car, and I had a rear tire, changed.

It came down off the lift. I didn't even touch the front end. When I left that day, I was checking the handling of the car. Went from chill mode to power mode. And all of a sudden, in power mode, there was a rattling sound. It sounded like, you know, like wrenches hitting each. other but it happened whether I was turning or going straight so it wasn't suspension and it only were it only you only heard it in power mode not chill

mode and it didn't matter what speed the next day the sound went away so I got on the Tesla sites and put it in there and you know if and I'm suspecting that it might be the motor but I've never heard again it was only that one day after I got entire change We get complaints like that, as long as I've been a car dealer. And as the dealer, you know, I have, I'm fairly broad by that about it. First of all, it certainly could be one of my technicians that messed up. I can put my consumer hat on and see me driving into a car dealership,

and I want to have my radio fixed. And they fix the radio, and I pick my car up, and the air conditioning doesn't work. Now, you know, the customer is absolutely sure something happened. We did something to the air conditioner. Maybe not premeditated. That wasn't sabotaged, but we did something. And then we go through an explanation of, sir, we came nowhere near your air conditioner. No one even looked at your air conditioner.

All we did was fix your radio. But that doesn't always sit well with people because, you know, coincidence. You know, the old saying, I don't believe in coincidence. but you're right you hit on one of the most sensitive subjects they bring a car in for service and A is working fine and they get B fixed and they come back and now it's broken so we have to defend ourselves but we have to do it with courtesy and with fairness so I'm sure 90% of the people who listen to you right now have had that same experience yeah the well the the noise went away I haven't experienced it, but like I said, it's a, it's a 2020. It's only got 22,000 miles on it. So it's all covered under warranty if it's the motor. It's not suspension because, like I said, you would hear it. If it was suspension, you would hear it both in chill mode and power mode or sport mode. But it was only that one time and it hasn't occurred again. And then I'm thinking,

is it something I was dragging underneath? But this was a metal sound, a metal clinking. like in the motor and so I'm still concerned about it but I haven't heard it oh I only heard it once and that was it I don't know why this came to my mind I have a strange mind but listening to your your comment

I think of the old joke going way back when Volkswagen first came out and I had you know great mileage compared to any other car and the bug and it was very controversial car you either loved it or hated it

kind of like a cyber truck today. And this one guy, he had a Volkswagen, and he was bragging and bragging, and he's getting 40 miles to gallon, and back in those days, that was a lot of money, he's bragging, he's driving everybody crazy. So his next door neighbor would sneak over at night and he would add a gallon of gas to the guy's gas tank,

and now the guy's telling everybody, he's getting 100 of bottles a gallon. And he did that for a while, until everybody in his neighborhood says, this crazy guy says he's getting 300 miles a per gallon, and then he started going over and siphoning gas off. And now the guy's terrified, so he goes to the dealer says, I'm only getting 10 miles a gallon,

and I was getting 300 miles per gallon. So anyway, those are the kind of funny stories I remember from back in the day, but cars are inscrutable. They can really get you emotionally involved. Well, the early Volkswagen, you know, the very, very early Volkswagen were, you know, something else. As a matter of fact, you had to keep a little book with you. And because you had to calculate your own mileage and gas because it was a good.

You know, you had to learn me. You better hope you know math then. So you don't run out. But also they had that because of the engine configuration. You'll be in the rear net, but the car was underneath with sore-lake detestal where it's got all blocked off. If it ended up in the water, it would float for about two hours before sinking because of the configuration underneath where it had that flat metal panel. Hilarious. One of my favorite stories is I think it was Lyndon Johnson that he would get people in his car and just drive straight along, then all of a sudden start screaming, no break,

snow brakes and he would drive into a lake and he had actually an amphibious car and he would terrify these people because they had no clue they just it was a weird looking little car they had no idea that this car literally could float and drive

in the water like a boat well you know the thing is I don't understand this with today's technology and lubricants and everything why don't we have company I mean there are some but they're very expensive But why don't we have more amphibious cars out there available?

I agree. I agree. That's a good question to cost, I guess. And how silly looking they are. I got to come up a bit better looking one. I love those amphibious cars. But the technologies there, you make them look good. And if you look it up, there are companies that are doing amphibious cars, but they're like $150,000, $200,000.

Yep. But they don't have to be prop driven. because now you got the, you know, the jets. Sure, sure. Jets and that. But anyways, more people want flying cars than amphibious cars. That's what I want. Thank you, John.

John, thanks so much. It was a great conversation. Give us a call again. Well, I will be because I'm driving up to Michigan, leaving on Monday, and let you know how much it cost. Last time in my Model 3, One weight was only $70, so. Nice.

Now I have a Y that's performance. I'm going to see how different that is. Very good. Look forward to hearing from you. Have a great weekend, John. You too. We're going to go to Chris, and Chris is calling us from Lake Worth. Welcome to the show, Chris.

Welcome back. Hi, good morning, everybody. Good morning. On the previous caller with that random clink noise after service, It was probably the 10-millimeter socket that the mechanic lost. And, yeah, what do you say, Rick? You're a hoot, Chris. Thank you for calling.

Rick's got to catch his breath first. You have a great day. I love it. I've had people ask me, what's a good gift to give them auto mechanic? And I would say give them a whole bunch of 10-millimeter socket. in 3-A's and quarter-inch drive because it's a fact of life that that is the most common socket needed

and for some reason they're always the one you lose and they're just, it's every mechanic in the world will tell you, yeah, I got a whole bunch of 10 millimeter so I'd lose it and then have to go buy another one so I'd buy it in bulk. They left it in the car. Yeah, they get dropped into the car someplace you can't find it down in the engine in the body

Okay, confessions of a recovering mechanic. Yep. Thank you very much, Chris. Our number here is 877-960-9960, and you can text us at 772-49-2-4976530. We're going to go to Frank, who's been holding. Frank calls us from Jupiter Farms. He's a regular caller. Oh, good morning.

Good morning, Frank. Perfect time. I just got back in my truck. I've been driving. It's leachy season, so I'm putting out my signs. I sell leachies and mangoes. That's right. By the way, I have gas money for the rest of a year.

There's my commercial. But here's a quick question. I'm also been cleaning out in the garage. My wife, Amory, has been, on my case, to clean our garage. With 35 years of accumulation. Oh, my goodness. Three weeks. and 12 trash cans, and we're starting to make a dent.

But I came across a little notebook with a new car I had purchased in 1977 with eight miles on. And every time I got gas, I put down the mileage and the gallons, and gas was still 60 cents a gallon for a high test back then. And it dawned on me, eight miles, I bought the car, but at 24 miles, I had to fill the tank. I go, when did you guys actually start filling tanks? The car I bought, by the way, was a brand new 9-11S Porsche, Pensacola when I was in the Air Force at Eglin. And so here I sent $21,000 in a car,

and they only had like two or three gallons of gas from the tank. As long as I've been in the business. So that's 1997. I can say Toyota has been doing a full tank of gas for that long. For that very reason, because it was really stupid when people would come in. We used to just have a. enough gas where they could get happily home. I think

it depends on the dealership too. So the manufacturer will reimburse you for gas and it comes in not with a full tank of gas because that would be too heavy for the carriers. So they come in with just a minimal amount of gas and the dealership is supposed

to fill it up for the customer and they're reimbursed and maybe dealerships don't do that. They get the reimbursement and they don't fill up the gas. I wonder if there's any dealerships we know that might Oh, sure. Yeah, yeah. So that could have happened with your Porsche, Frank.

Yeah, well, it was, I end up tossing the book. I mean, I'm trying to get rid of a lot of old memories. But here's another thing that this is more for Rick. I've come across many manuals because from my truck, my Jeep, those like climber manuals, you know, telling you what to do. Is there any of where to donate them, maybe like those trade school or anything like that? Or just go ahead in the trash? Repair manuals?

um i mean ebay i if you wanted to donate them to a school unfortunately north tech is gone and they're all digital too yeah and pretty much most of are are all digital now everything is online um eBay yeah maybe if you put them up on eBay or uh took them to the local library or something you know see if anybody you know if they have any idea where to donate them uh or keep them You keep them around for the apocalypse when we don't have computers and no one knows how to fix cars. Now, that could be it, yeah. Or even when the computers, when all the AI takes over and they won't let us use their computers anymore, you know, then you'd need them then. We need them to build tanks to fight back against the robots.

Uh-huh. Yeah. Well, as always, I'm today. Hang on to them, Frank. Yeah, now I got so much stuff. Show them to your great-grandchildren and they won't know what they are. Right. Yeah, it'll be like, what is this thing?

It's made of, what is this paper? Yeah, well, they'll need it to rebuild society. Yeah. Well, they're talking that if you just want to confuse your kids, you're just writing scripture now and show them a phone that you have to do a rode or dog with. I mean, no one knows how to read anymore. I know.

And if you're writing cursive, you can just communicate with your spouse and your kids. Yeah, it's a secret code. Yeah, it's a secret code. And that's not a joke. I used to have to read Earl and Nancy's, birthday cards to the kids because they write and by the way, beautiful cursive my kids can't read it.

Now you tell me. Well, I've stopped someplace to put up more signs but then you went out in Jupiter Farms, the leachies are wonderful, the mangoes are huge, I just seen the picture, I had some mangoes that went up to five pounds a year. Oh my goodness. That sounds good. So what what road are you at Jupiter Farms Road?

On Whippoor Wheel Trail. Okay. Yeah, Whippoor Will Trail just near near the Reynolds Ranch. Bert Reynolds was my neighbor when we moved up here. Oh, okay. And, of course, he's gone. But it was an interesting chapter. But the reason the mangos are so large at this one tree

is it had a very unique source of nutrients. It was by the chicken coop. Oh. It had natural fertilizer for 30-plus years. Anyway. It's amazing what nutrients can do. I think you're going to have a big mango weekend with that plug. Thank you, guys.

Thank you. we're going to go to bob in lake worth good morning bob welcome thank you very much bob the governor of florida is just signed into law that gold and silver is now legal tender in the state so if i walk into your dealership and i see a beautiful blue supra with the chestnut interior and it's an automatic transmission and i go to the salesman give me your out of out the door price. And he says, well, it'll be 72 grand. I says, fine, you got a deal. I go out to my car. I come back in with my 20 ounces of gold. Gold is trading at $3,600 an ounce. Right. That's $72,000. Deal or no deal? That's the law, Bob. I guess we've got to take the

gold. I really don't know. I mean, I tell you, that, I used to use that as a gimmick when I was a Pontiac dealer, and we would take anything. We'd take gold, jewelry. We've taken a thing on trade, like boats and jets. We would turn it into payment to confuse the customer. Any arrangement could be made. Generally speaking, we don't accept gold, but if it left you on us. We were one of the first to accept the Bitcoin. Bitcoin, yeah. We sold a car with, I think we sold a forerunner with, and the customer used Bitcoin. And it was mainly for a promotional event because Bitcoin had come out and it was

kind of fun. The main reason we wouldn't typically, I'm just answering your question seriously. We wouldn't accept a goal just because we don't have a process for that. It's not because we wouldn't recognize the value of city. Right. Yeah, that was my question. What would be the process? There wouldn't be. Like I said,

there could be a one-off thing. If we wanted to do it for the show, we could do it. You convert it into cash. Bitcoin has their apps. In fact, When we started this, it was my idea to get the wallet, just PR. We weren't, you know, we thought, hey, what's the Bitcoin, start a conversation, maybe sell a car. So we had Bitcoin up there. So I had an app on my phone that if we took a Bitcoin in, I could immediately convert it to cash. So I immediately converted my $500 Bitcoin into cash, which is, and now Bitcoin is worth over $100,000.

So that's how smart I was. it is because we would just have to wouldn't you be legally obligated to do it because it's a state law I don't know I don't know if that's if that state law would stand I think we're really talking about infringement on federal authority here only the United States government can issue currency states can't do it they tried it back in the Civil War it's just you know so I don't think this law is serious

I was having fun with your question I don't even know about it I didn't know about it either, but I do know that there's something called federal supremacy and only the United States government can issue currency in this country. That's true. Yep. So whatever DeSantis is doing, it's goofy. It's not going to stand.

It's just a piece of, goats, cattle. He's appealing to that. There's a group of people like sovereign, you know, whatever, that self-sit is the whole idea. It's kind of based on goofy Internet theories and stuff. Essentially, cardioliers do this. anyway when we take a used car because nobody knows exactly what used cars worth it and a lot

of cars go out of business because they don't know what used cars they're worth either so yeah but you never have trouble having a car dealer take anything let me ask a question Bob do you have $72,000 worth gold lying around not lying around no

you have to go buy the gold right it's good no I don't keep it lying around I don't keep anything lying or I don't mean that I'm saying you happen do you are you in possession of 72,000 in gold. Yeah, for the last 20 years. Oh, okay, okay. So then you can bring it over.

I was saying because it would be also kind of awkward to go buy a bunch of gold and go use that to buy a car to... Well, the problem is that price of gold fluctuates on a daily basis. Exactly. That's why we use the good old greenback. Yeah, but I was just a thought. I thought it was interesting. It is interesting.

I think it's nuts, but it's interesting. You know, the governor signed it into law, so I don't know. I didn't know that. I didn't know that. I don't know what the power of the state is. They try things, and then the courts will say, you're not allowed to do that. Well, I wanted to talk.

You were talking about the Washington Post last week, and there used to be a place on Royal Pointe, and it was called Main Street News. Oh, we love that place. We love it. We loved that place. I used to go there in the 80s to buy barons on Saturday. We had every paper in the country there.

St. Lucis' That, That's L.A. Times, the Washington Post, the Philadelphia paper. You probably saw Earl and I right there, Bob. 1928, they opened up. And, of course, they didn't make it. They closed up nine years ago. And now Sprinkles, which is right down the few doors down, the ice cream place, they've closed.

Oh, really? I remember you could get, like, candy sticks at that news store. That's where I used to buy my hustler magazines. I remember I always asked, Mommy, what is Daddy doing? They had every magazine, every magazine you could. could imagine in there too it was quite the store i think the only thing that's still left is greens uh the pharmacy they're greens yeah bob did you say that sprinkles is also closed yeah wow yeah that was uh every weekend sprinkles you know that we went into the uh the store to also

buy every magazine every newspaper what a fun time it was main street news Okay, Main Street News open 1928. Okay, and, you know, Royal Pointean, it used to be called Main Street. I didn't know, man. Yeah, it was originally it was Main Street. I never knew that. Okay, everyone, have a great weekend. Thank you, Bob.

Real quick, before the, about the Washington Post, it's running tomorrow. Oh, okay. Yeah, you know, the library. No comment. Huh? No comment. I can explain it. Washington Post is to be in the library, Palm Beach Gardens, but they don't get it.

it anymore terrible they had delivery problems that would come a week late so they they don't they have some other stuff I asked the guy last week I said oh yeah where can you find a Washington post you know you probably could go over to the breakers and find it I would think some of these hotels tried the brickers they didn't have it well I was able to buy 10 copies for $10 a piece for a paper the round last Sunday that they had was not in so yeah Earl solved that problem yeah You did. Very good. Okay. Well, I'll be looking forward to hearing if you get a response from Mr. Bezos. That'll be very interesting. It would, yeah. Keep my fingers crossed.

Thank you, Bob. Have a great weekend. Bye, bye, bye. Bye-bye. 877-960-9960, or you can text us at 772-49-6530. Don't forget your anonymous feedback.com. Now back to the recovering car dealer. Well, we didn't talk about something that I think is worthy of talking about. In my introduction in the show, I talked about the controversy between Elon Musk and, you know, our president, the President of the United States and the richest man in the world, it's fascinating to watch. And it's having huge impact on the automobile business.

but my point at the beginning of the show was it's not going to affect you or me when we go out and sell a car or buy a car right now but it's going to have huge impact five years from now 10 years from now and I didn't mean to disallow any calls or comments about that controversy but we've got we've got Elon Musk the richest man in the world which is over, what is it, over $200 billion, I believe.

261 at one point. Yeah. So it's huge. He could literally, and he's threatened, to get somebody else elected president, and he could do that. I mean, you put $250 billion behind somebody. You could get him elected to anything. And, of course, now we've got Donald Trump.

who's got, I think there are something like 19 federal agencies that directly or indirectly control the automobile business. And so he can basically turn those federal agencies against Tesla. Now, maybe not literally Tesla, but electric vehicles that are very much like Tesla. So you've got two extremely powerful people affecting what you pay for a car. and what kind of car you can buy and maybe some cars even if you can buy one at all and we don't know what to do and Nancy and I were talking about that on the way to the studio and she says what is what is this going to mean I says what it what it means is nobody knows what's going to happen tomorrow and if you're a stock market guy or gal investor or

whatever you know that the worst thing for markets are is indecision is a lack of knowledge so right now the entire world is watching these two clowns and I say that with they're acting like clowns Trump and Musk that are creating havoc in the world economically so as I say it's not going to affect you when you buy your next Buick or your next Honda or had your car service but it might affect it might affect the car after that that you buy and it sure is going to affect your children's and grandchildren's lives when it comes to buying your car so if anyone wants to talk about these two things they're they're kind of

volatile and half the country hates Trump and half the country loves Trump half the country hates Musk and half the country hates Musk and half the country He loves Musk. And so there's a lot of motion out there. But if anybody would like to call on that, I mean, I'm not going to say you can't talk about it. It's probably something we should talk about, yeah. You know, I think that what we're looking at is two universes that are just clashing.

Two personalities that are so strong. Ego. And it is, they're powerful. They have egos. And it is. Oh, I'm sorry. I have a question I want to put out to any of those. Did anybody not see this coming?

I mean, because the dynamic was like, that's what made me think of it. The dynamic was, it was doomed from the start. You have two people who, in their mind, and in some form of reality, run the world. And, you know, it's like the two toughest guys on the block. Sooner or later, they go and fight. And both of them are definitely known as risk takers. Yeah, and one of them is completely, completely. addled by ketamine it's pinky and the brain we just don't know which one's which it is it is

it is too that's a good point yeah i mean come on a serious man of his age should not be consuming the amount of drugs he's taking it's just you can't function with all the things he's responsible for he hates what i'm saying all right we'll move on well i i think we should defer from you know from expressing an opinion i'm sorry you're right i was a question it was of a question. If anybody, there's a great, if you want to know about Elon Musk, Isaacson's biography on Elon Musk and Isaac says a very, very respected, objective. When was that published?

That was 2017, I think. Yeah, 2017. And he talked about the ketamine and talked about a lot of things. In fact, there's a lot of things. Anybody really wants to bash Musk, all they have to do is. read the biography, there's enough in there to say a lot of bad things. But the point, you can bash Trump and you can bash Musk, but you can't bash what they've done. No, no, no. Absolutely. Musk is a visionary, an entrepreneur, an amazing man. Musk will put people

on Mars, and Trump was elected president of the United States. Unless Trump puts them out of business. And so they're both, they're both powerful people. Anyway, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I guess it's good that we didn't get into this with the calls because there's too much emotion and passion. And they'd be very long calls, too. And they could be long calls, and we don't want to do that. But beware of those issues when you buy vehicles today because they are going to be important.

Absolutely. And, you know, I do have to say something about the vehicle that I'm driving. Did I ever think that it would bring me so much comfort amongst other things? but for a woman my age at 82 years old and who has had her both of her knees replaced and so many other medical issues the autonomy is just it's amazing there was a time when I wouldn't even consider it and autonomous is just it's amazing there's the plaid that I drive the comfort the yoke everything about it and It's frightening what's going on with the two of them right now, and that's my personal opinion.

I'm going to go to – we have time for another call. I'm going to interrupt, and we're going to go to Vivian, who's calling us from Jupiter. Good morning, Vivian. Hi. Good morning. How are you, Nancy? Very well. Thank you for asking. Nice to speak with you. I enjoy listening to the show. I've been listening for many years, not a first-time caller. But I did have a question regarding a Honda 2022 Ford H.R.V.

I purchased it last October, and it was, we're getting into kind of like our cooler season then, so I didn't notice it as much then. Now that we're getting into the hot season in the summer, my air conditioner, when I put it on, it doesn't really cool off. at nighttime it works beautifully so if it's nighttime or dusk oh there's cold air coming out but during the day it's rather warm not not really cold kind of coolish but it seems like that is it just continues that way and i kind of googled it and it did mention that hrvs um that have an issue with that or have had issues with that i just can't i don't know what what it could possibly be. Because like I said, when it gets night time or, you know, six or six o'clock in the evening or dusk, it cools off beautifully. Early mornings, it's cool. But later on during the day,

if you were to get in your car and you put the AC on, it's rather warm, not hot or not just regular air, but it's not as cold. Is it under warranty, Vivian? How many miles? It's not 33,000 miles on it, but it's a 2022. Well, you've got a three-year warning. on that so you probably covered under warranty well when I called before I believe it's the sticker on the door it was manufactured in 2021 I think September and they go by that date no they go by the date of first use so it was the day that you purchased it unless it was a demo she purchased it used but I purchased it used in October yeah what you want to do just call up your local Honda dealership for the

service department and ask them that you want to find out what the data first use of your car was and give them the VIN, your vehicle identification number. It'll be on your insurance card, so you won't even have to find it on the car. Okay. But when you give them that number, they'll run it through the computer and they can tell you what date was the warranty started. And even so, if there is a problem with the AC, which most likely you've got a small leak and it's lost just enough of the refrigerant that it's starting to affect the efficiency of it or possibly it's something to do with the compressor, because you've got a car that's, you know, obviously not very old at all, if you go to the dealership, even if you're out of warranty, just buy a little ways, ask them for, assistance, goodwill assistance, and there's a very good likelihood that they will get Toyota, Honda factory to actually help cover a portion of the repairs. One of the most common things that I see with us at Toyota is we'll get Toyota to cover the parts, and then the

customer only has to cover the labor. And there are also times when I've seen the Toyota actually just cover the entire repair just as a way of trying to keep you as a good customer and basically get goodwill. That's where they got the name from. But yeah, it's a very good chance that you could get that fixed either for free or for a very low cost by going through the dealer with that. Oh, I'm glad you mentioned that. I kind of figured there might be some type of maybe a solution to this other than going in and them saying, no, you're going to need a whole new compressor. But again, like you said, it's only got 33,000. miles purchased it in 2022 uh it's only had one other thing when i picked up the car it was the

battery went out on it so they had to replace the battery and they replaced that for free um but other than that i haven't had any issues with it so um i appreciate that uh tip and that information i will definitely follow up on that rick yeah there's a very good chance that you'll get that taken care of for maybe for free completely yeah yeah good good to know thank you so much and as always i enjoy listening to the show, regards to Earl as well. Thank you. Oh, thank you so much, Vivian. Look forward to hearing from you again.

Hey, I got a little update on the Florida law with the gold. Oh. So, yeah, it was signed into law. It is optional for businesses if they want to accept it. So if you go to McDonald's and you have some gold, they probably won't take it. But some businesses will, I don't know how this will fly legally. I think they're requiring all, like you can pay your taxes, your property taxes in it now, floor will accept that.

And it's requiring any place that like check-cashing places and think, and I don't know how that, you know, I'm not a lawyer. I'm just saying it seems a little fraught. I share your opinion. That's the stupidest thing I ever heard. Yeah. I never, I didn't know it. I didn't know about it.

It's joining. I think some other states are doing this and it's to supposedly on the face. It's to protect Floridians against the falling dollar, which we know why is getting softer. The dollar falls, the value of gold goes up and up and up. Right. So anyway, I would rather use Apple Pay. It's my phone only weighs a few ounces. I'm not lugging around a wheelbarrow with me, and anybody who does.

Which you have to know what Apple Pay is before you... Sure. Okay, I'll use my credit card. That's even lighter than Apple Pay. And to what you just said, you know, about the gold, I checked into that. and it depends on the state it depends on the brand the dealership there's a whole lot to take into consideration but there's a whole lot of there's a list of dues and don'ts yeah i just don't see the practicality of it unless they come up with some sort of technology that verifies your i'll donate a thousand dollars to big dog ranch rescue if someone can show me and prove that a business refused to accept gold when someone wanted to buy something from that business and pay you with gold. So that tells you how much I think that law is worth.

You're absolutely right. So anyway, I think it's performative. It is playing up this sovereign citizen notion. I don't know. I'm not thinking of gold. I don't know. I don't want that gold. Okay, we're going to keep things on hold

as far as your opinion and your calls for this controversy that we were speaking about with Musk and Trump. And we are going to move to Anne-Marie's text. Absolutely. Oh, by the way,

Tom Steckle on YouTube says, Rick, it's getting bad. I bought some ice yesterday, and the cashier tried to sell me an extended warranty. Great one, Tom. Thank you, sir. You made my day with that one.

Anne-Marie, good morning. Good morning, Henry. Many, many moons ago, when people hailed a taxi, a checker, cab would pick them up for those that don't know

General Motors actually used to make this model of car called a checker and that was that iconic looking taxi cab you saw everywhere Did you know I was a checker dealer? He was a checker dealer. Nice. Yeah. I did not know that one.

But yeah they these were the iconic taxi cabs and you could actually buy them for personal use as well. They got five miles to the gallon. Wow. And that actually fits as she continues here. She says, nowadays when I call a cab, it's usually a Prius that arrives. Although my sister encountered a deluxe hybrid Camry in Sydney, Australia.

Hybrids strike me as being well-suited for the rigors that taxis go through. And they are because especially city driving, this is where a hybrid gets its best fuel economy. Absolutely. Back when there was still a lot of cabs in New York City, because now people, People don't take cabs. They used right share. But when I went to New York 10 years ago, every taxi in the city was either a Prius, a hybrid Camry, or a hybrid Sienna. Yep.

And then that all disappear. Now almost every Uber I see is a Tesla Model 3. Again. At least up north. Yeah. Great car for it. Do you remember when we first saw our Prius cab? I remember going to New York with you before they had the Prius.

before they had the, you know, the Lyft and, you know, Uber. And Nancy is the world's greatest cab aller. And I just, I can't get into it, you know. Because it feels silly to me. We would come out of the theater. And if you've ever gone to the theater in New York City on Saturday night, you might as well be, I can't describe the density of the population. The evacuation of Kabul.

Yeah. But so, and Nancy would just run out in the middle of a, all this terrible cars, and she would go, hey, she wave, I'm waving for you on the radio. And she would get a cab. I don't know how she did it. Anywhere we were, I said, can you get us a cab? Yes.

Sure. Because she's cuter than you, Earl. Probably, yeah. I think it had a whole lot to do with being aggressive, and you either got a cab or you didn't get a cab. And also, you have a man who is, well, sort of in the background, going through. crazy because when you come out of the theater, if you've ever come out of the theater in New York,

you knew, you know, sink or swim. You might not be getting back to the hotel. That's right. You might be walking. I'd give anything to relive those days, for sure. So Anne-Marie goes on to say, have you had any taxis come into the shop for service? And if so, how well do they hold up? Like any other Toyota?

They hold up beautifully, and yes, we have seen a lot of taxis come in. They just, you know... I didn't know that. Some of them are actual, you know, taxi company. They'll come in for warranty work. They don't get tires for life. Yeah, and a lot of those are actually personally owned by the driver, and they, you know, they just run it as a taxi. However, now Uber has taken over, and we don't see the taxis near as much as we used to.

I've seen personally owned taxi cabs that will be a taxi with the livery markings on it, but they also respond to Uber rides. So they do everything. Lyft, Uber, taxi costs. I was an Uber driver. I know that. Well, you were ordained an Uber driver. Yeah, well, I don't think you ever took a licensed.

Right, right. Did you take it on any rides, I don't think? Just you and your brothers. I gave you a five-star review. Yeah. But did you tip him? Of course. Of course.

And folks, I will say, I actually had one occasion when a customer brought a Camry hybrid to our shop because it wouldn't run. It was a problem with the hybrid battery. And it showed the mileage on the car as being, I think, somewhere around like 30,000 miles. But it was like a 7 or 8 year old car. I beg your pardon, about a 5 or 6 year old car because the hybrid system was still under warranty, according to that. until I looked at the car and saw all the signs

that the plexiglass shield had been removed the carpet was all gone and it was all vinyl the seats were all vinyl and it was very obvious that it was an old taxi cab and when we checked

on we ran a Carfax Carfax on it and it had over 200,000 miles on that car and they had just purchased it almost sight unseen on the internet from

somebody and then suddenly they find out that their car is pretty well worthless so yeah you got to watch out for taxi sometimes when stew first came to work for me you were didn't you appraise a police car for a real car or something no that was i did you did i know you did no i know you did every new every new car guy yeah it's got to do that that's my story my story is not a police car mine it was a Hyundai sonata it was painted with a mop it was too rainy to go out to look at it, and so I did it without touching the car, and I got screwed. Yeah. Now, you're talking about

a car that you appraised for $7,000 that's worth $1,000. Yeah, it feels bad. Huge mistake. And you feel really stupid when that happens. All right. Okay, Stu, do you have anything from your anonymous feedback? We do. And

this morning, so I'm going to go in the newest ones. Dear Earl, can you clear something up? What is the difference between MSRP and TSRP. I read that TSRP includes taxes. Does that mean state sales taxes included on the TSRP? Well, I can answer that no.

TSRP is manufacturers are shifting to that term to be called total sales, wait, total recommended sales price as opposed to manufacturers suggested retail price. Does Toyota ever use T SRP? They use that now too. So does the Hyundai, the one that we did last week. and so they're just changing the name but the maybe so you don't get mad at the manufacturer it's like but it does not include sales tax or anything else it's just the the retail price of the car according to the manufacturer very good the next one says

Bram and BMW oh this is a critique of our mystery shop this is good Bram and B&W offered to sell a 2025 vehicle for 5,8707 under MSRP, which is offset by the fake dealer fee of $9.89 and the fake title fee of $414. So the net price is about 9% under MSRP. That seems far better than a C rating, particularly in comparison to the many other dealers visited by undercover agent. Here's a typo. I would rate this car dealer at least in A-minus, and that's a fair opinion. Yeah, except for the fact we don't...

Just do price. based on the price. You know, if a car dealer tries to take advantage of you, lies and cheats and steals, and you still buy the car there, and you get a good price, we still give them a bad grade. Our contention isn't that people at shady car dealerships

always pay too much money. Many do, but it's really just the tactics that they get. But you're right, it was a great price, but I think that's more reflective of the market and not how nice they are. A shrewd buyer can go into any dealership, I don't care who it is, and negotiate a good price. We have callers to the show that brag about it. They like to do it, and they feed on the adrenaline of a negotiation. And so we're not protecting those people.

We're appreciative to the choir. The same person that the shrewd negotiator went in and bought it for a great price is going to take. a little old lady that has never bought a car before, a widow, and going to charge her $10,000 or $20,000 over a sticker price. And we've seen that happen. So it's what you'll do to somebody that can't defend themselves that we grate you on, not how shrewd you are able to negotiate the price down. And the next one I got anonymous feedback. What's driving down the resale value of electric cars in particular? Is it anti-Musk sentiment, range, anxiety, poor quality issues,

high cost of new cars, or market saturation? All of the above are three. I think it's, well, you got it. It's supply and demand, and so it's affecting the demand. I think it's probably more, it was an over-exuberance on electric vehicles and maybe

an over-production. So the resale value is there's just a lot of them out there coming off on resale and they're not being sold fast enough and those other factors are part of that range, anxiety. all that sort of stuff. I don't think quality issues are a problem.

I think most of the electric cars out there aren't, there's nothing that's jumped out as being a blemint out there. I think they're all doing pretty well. And the Muck's sentiment, I mean, that's affecting it. I think it's a short-term thing. It's really, there's too many used electric vehicles out there and various reasons why people don't want to get them. On that note, I've got a text message here that kind of fits into that a little.

Myself, I'm confessing my ignorance. here because I'm not sure where Toyota's going. Customer Liz says, we were going to buy a RAV4 for our daughters, but we found out that Toyota is changing it to just electric. We want to

buy new. What Toyota is equal to a RAV4 that is gasoline? Thinking of a Corolla hatchback or a Highlander, you've talked to the CRV Hondas, but our girls don't like that one, and they're looking at a Subaru outback, but they really had their heart

set on the RAV-4, but we don't want a full-electric vehicle. What is your suggestion? RAV-4 isn't full-electric, and it will be some time before it will be. So right now all... Yeah, that's what I thought. Right now, there are gas-powered RAVs and hybrid. And the plug-in hybrid. Which is basically you can't get here. Yeah. You've got to move to California or some. Toyota has announced that they're going to have six EVs, BEVs, which is a battery EVV, around the world. So they're sticking their toe in the water. Right.

Yeah. But you don't have to worry, but they want to get a Rav4. You can get either a gas powered one or a hybrid one. I think next year all of them will be hybrid. But they are not, they're not electric. There was an electric Ravore a long time ago. Right. Yep.

They were only in California and were technically not for sale to the public. I remember seeing one in your bay. It came into our dealership. And the old dealership. Yeah. was actually for a while it was in body shop it had a small accident and it amazed me because we were all trying to figure out it had park reverse neutral drive and b right and this was well before preas had come out and none of us had any clue what b mode was and it was actually

for electric braking yeah i remember coming everybody came out it was in your your bay we had sorry to digress but it's it's sentimental uh rick had an outdoor we had an outdoor service department and rick was exposed to the elements and i just remember that that's an electric vehicle and this was like 1999 or something like that it was wild so yeah I don't even remember what we were talking about before that

we're sort of on the edge here with time with the mystery shopping report do you have one more anything exciting they're all exciting oh here's a complaint I think we're caught up oh great

you've made Jonathan very, very happy. We really have a time problem. We're going to go to the mystery shopping report, and as I said earlier, excuse me, the mystery shopping report comes to us from Palm Beach, Misabushi. And you can vote on that mystery shopping report at 772-497-60. Now back to the recovering car dealer. Okay, this, like Sue says, we keep thinking Mitsubishi is going to disappear, but somehow they survive. Did you catch the address? I think this is the one at Belvedere and Congress. Okay, it's the same franchise that was.

It's on the east side of the road from the top golf thing. Okay. All right. I know exactly what you're talking about. Yeah, they're kind of, they went to Nissan to save them, and Nissan's going down. I mean, Mississippi is getting desperate. So before I even read the Mr. Shopping Report, be very careful before you put a lot of money in a Mississippi. Even if it's a great car, you don't want a car that are no manufacturers.

I don't think it's a great car. I mean, it's got to be a reason why nobody wants one. Okay, speaking in the first person, I am Agent Lightning. I arrived early in the morning and was greeted by a sales lady. As soon as I walked in the door, she was very friendly and welcomed me warmly. She asked, what brings you in today? I replied, I'm here to possibly buy a new car. She introduced herself as a ninja, N-I-N-N-F-A, N-F-A-N-F-A-N-SY-A-N-F-A-N-SY-A-RESH-A-N-F-A-N-F-A, because it's such an interesting name.

Ninfa is either Spanish or Greek, and it's kind of means like a sea goddess. Kind of a cold name. Not like a nymph. Nymph. Yeah, but like a nymph, like an ancient Greek mythology. Exactly, exactly. Anyway, Ninfa invited me to have a seat at her desk. Before we got started, she asked if I had spoken with anyone else with the dealership,

explaining that she didn't want to step on anyone's toes. She was very considerate. And that's something about the culture of a car dealership. Thou shall not take a customer from another salesperson. The vernacular for that is called skating. And if you skate another salesman and you take a customer, and you take his customer, the penalty could be death.

It could be your knees could get broken. Or your knees broken, so you don't want to step on anyone's toes. That's how Nancy's knees got messed up. She was a skater at the car dealer's. I explained I'm helping my son look for a car. He was recently in an accident and totaled his. We want something safe but reasonably priced. Nympha suggested we look at the Mitsubesri Marage.

That's been around for a while. I think it's the only model number I remember for a Mitsubishi Mirage saying they currently had a really great deals on them I said I'm open to look again so we walked out outside door to check I ended up deciding on one of the mirages a new two thousand twenty four and course it's 2025 but if the car hasn't been titled it's still new technically two thousand twenty four a Mitsubishi Mirage, B.E, with an MSRP of $20,070. That's awfully low. Right. You don't see that. You don't see that. And that really struck my attention there.

I'll tell you a little bit about Mitsubishi. I don't think there's any car that's got a new car at that. I think Tesla got a lot of attention because there was rumor they were going to come out with a car under $20,000 and everybody got hysterical. be the most, the cheapest car in the world. Mitsubishi is almost there already. There was no issues with the Monroney label. The Monroney label was on the window, and there was no addendum. Hey man, so far, so good. Look at great, great price.

No Moroni pulled off and hidden, and no addendum at all. On Infa, excuse herself to grab the keys. When she returned, she unlocked the car and went over all the safety features, highlighting the excellent gas mileage. She also showed me how spacious the hatchback areas and demonstrated how you can fold down just one seat or both to create more room. She added that every new car purchase

comes with complimentary benefits. Well, that's good. I mentioned I'm not sure about the small tires. And she replied, and there is room to put on bigger tires, so it sounds like she'd heard complaint before and she emphasized it is a great vehicle for the price and they're currently marking them down well below MSRP she explained that the window sticker price was higher than what they could sell the car for today boy

I mean that sounds you don't hear that too often we turn the car off I headed back inside so she could work out some pricing for me nympha asked for my driver's license did it or their computer system she also pulled up the vehicle online to show me the listing listed pricing which as she had said was significantly lower she pointed out that the only difference would be about a thousand dollars if we didn't have a trade in but otherwise the online price was accurate that's that's a little rough that's you know you know what if you had a trillion worth five

hundred dollars I mean it just raises all such a stupid questions but it's okay I I mean, that's car dealer stuff, you know. We understand, so that you understand, the reason they say something like that is that it takes away the opportunity for the dealer to what we dealers call steal your trade. So you can advertise a very attractive new car price if the customer comes in, prospect comes in, and they have a trade in, and you undervalue the car, $3,000. over the real value, then you can imply that you're selling the new car at a very low price and you can steal the trade. So that, hence, they will give you that Mitsubishi a thousand dollars less if you have a trade-in. She displayed the full pricing breakdown on her screen. I took photos of it. I asked that she could print it out for me to better clarify, and she happily did. The top line was labeled sale price, and it was 15,159.

I feel like I'm on a value used car lot. Exactly, yeah. A $4,900 and $11 discount from MSRP. And, of course, they added back a $1,99 dock fee. There's a junk fee. And then they overpriced the true government fees. They said that the license and fees were $1,250. couldn't be so they hit about 800 bucks of junk there so that's about $2,000 in

junk fees that they added on after the incredibly low sale price of 15159 and just with a discount off of a very little MSRP so I'm still dizzy as I proceed here because this is awful good but the total off the door price was 18,697 but not bad for a newer, untitled car, even though it was a 2024. So that is a super good price. And out the door too. I thanked her for a time, I thanked her for a time,

told her I'd be in touch, before I left. She asked if I could give her a moment for someone from upper management to come over and say hello, standard operating procedure, explaining that it's part of their dealership policy, as it is in every dealership. In fact, we do it in our dealership. But we'd like to think we do it for the right reason, just in case the salesperson didn't do his job, and we can find out of that.

Or find out if there's a problem with the salesperson. They didn't like what's going on. Yeah. She stepped away and returned with Paul, the sales manager. Paul said, I just wanted to quickly introduce myself and let you know about our free roadside assistance. Bumper-to-bumper warranty, power train warranty. What do you think? You get a chase car whenever you buy Mr. Bishi, it follows you around.

They probably run their Toyota. Those are two worthless products. Trust me. They're worthless. These roadside assistance programs are just terrible. And the bumper-to-bumper warranty, power trade warranty, that's worthless. But at least they're free. So if something's worthless, it's nice to get it free, right?

I mean, it's when they charge you for the worthless. Right. Like Toy Guard, they change their roadside to AAA. So you get free AAA if you buy Toy Guard. Right, yeah. Anyway, I said ultimately it's my son's decision, but I'll definitely talk to him about it and get back to him. He replied, I understand we're a very easy-going dealership. We don't do the back-and-forth.

Well, they just did one back-and-forth, right? I mean, well, maybe, I don't know. What you see is what you get, no hidden surprises like some dealerships. So they're interesting, not just an interesting name of the salesperson, a woman, but also an interesting product, Mitsubishi, which I wasn't even sure were still around. Right. And the interesting price, the lowest new car price.

They made really good kamikaze fighter planes back in the day. So my opinion is this is a little bit better than average. And it was probably because it was like going to a restaurant like in the non-busy hours. just seemed like a very peaceful place. I'm going to give them a C plus. They got, they're still down in that C range because the fees and also what I really don't like, and I'm going to be fair, I think it could be the worksheet thing that we see, like where they're combining things because when you get a worksheet at a car dealership,

you're not getting something printed out from their big DMS. Like it's not F&I paperwork. It comes from a web-based program that gets information from that. And it's got to be programmed, right? And we've seen weird things like math errors on worksheets before. So that's what I think the computer might be combining them, but the effect is it's deceptive and it's not true. It has no legal basis.

None. And so it's bad. You don't get an excuse for being sloppy either. But at least it's better than being intentional. But I have, so mine is a C-plus. Chat-G-T has something to say. We dropped in on Palm Beach, Mississippi, and we're greeted right away by NINFA, a friendly professional salesperson who asked all the right questions,

gave respectful, low-pressure presentation. She showed us a mirage, explained features, clearly, provided the online price matched in-store, rare, but then came the fine print, an 1199 dock fee, 800 padded license and fees, oof, the manager popped in to say, no hidden surprises here, well, except for the hidden surprises. Still, the overall behavior was solid, ethical, courteous, and new games. It just needs a little cleanup on the fee front. Final grade B-plus from ChatGPT.

Interesting. Well, we've got Bob and Maryland says, it was an F for me on your last review for Palmish Mitsubishi, but they get a B-plus this time around. Without the junk fees, it would have been an A. And okay, still looking for text. Let's see. We got T-Cash says, C, it was going good with until the, oh, that price is with your $1,000 trade in.

It's all a mirage. Joseph Kelleher says, C-plus, grade would be higher without the junk fees. Nagan won. I give it a C for fees. Over here, we've got Tom Steckle. My father shot down Mitsuby. She's in World War II. They haven't learned their lesson with $2,000.

in junk fees, 15% of the price, otherwise straightforward C-minus. That's true. Those fees get proportionally bigger when you're spending $2,000 in fees on a $15,000 car. Tim Gilliland, junk fees are junk fees regardless of the price, C-minus. Brian said Latko, you get what you pay for, C. Mark Ryan, C. Johnny Z. Fradley, new car for under $19,000 out the door. Just for that, I'm giving an A.

Mitsubishi used to make high-quality TVs. Mark Smith, I'll give him a C-plus. Mark H, I was going to give a C-minus, but upgraded to a C for the opportunity of having a main ad, sell me a car. Rocky Blockatiel says Solid B for me. And for myself, I'm actually going to go a little higher. I'm going to give them a B, because I think I'm. The junk fees bugged me a little bit, but they were, they just kind of put them there.

They didn't try to hide it or anything. And still, even though technically it's a one-year-old car, it's still brand new, and your warranty starts the day you buy it, and you're basically getting a brand new car for about $4 or $500 under the sticker, oh, beg your pardon, $1,400 under sticker price. I wanted to, and I didn't check consumer reports to see how. decent in that car is, because I don't feel comfortable yet recommending Palm Beach Mitsubishi and getting a mirage, but I'm tempted to just because... Yeah, but we can't judge the quality of the car or the shopping report. We can't.

I'm saying I'd like to check out the consumer reports, and then maybe next week we can say because a lot of people are looking for a cheap car. Everybody's looking for a cheap car, so if it's a good car, then I feel okay. if it's not a good car. And with both cars having a three-year warranty, you know you've got at least three years of good use out of the car. Ken Asher says, in college, C's get degrees. I'll give a C.

And we also have Roadrunner, Steve, says, started good, then the wheels fell off. Roadrunner, Steve, gives it a C. Beep, beep. I'm going to go with a C-plus like Stu did. And I wonder, we, I wish Agent Lightning had gone back and said, wait, I'm going to trade a car in after she gets the answer door budget. Yeah. You only, by the way, listen, I'm just feeling nice today.

So I could see a dealership desperate for used cars saying we need to incentivize, we need trades, I don't care what it is. And like, I'm going to spit the salespeople some extra money if they can get a trade in, work a little bit harder to get that trade. And we'll, we're going to offer $1,000 off more if you can get us trades. I don't know. That's what I'm thinking. That's where dealers thrive is in the gray area. Yeah, I know. I'm thinking, I'm trying to see a non-evil reason that they would do that. Like it was more of an incentive to get trades in. Absolutely.

Let's tell, does Chad GBT know when they grade a shopping report? Does chat know that... Price. There are no good dealers in South Florida. And so does he... I didn't give it the background. and I can and say, just keep this in my...

I think that's why he's giving higher grades now. Well, I did say that I go that we care more about ethics and behavior than price, so it knows that. Hey, consumer reports has a little blurb here

where it says, the Mitsubishi Mirage lives up to its name. With its low sticker price and good fuel economy of 37 MPG overall, may conjure up an inviting image of a good economical

runabout, that illusion quickly dissipates into the haze when you drive this tiny regrettable car. And it is tiny. It's definitely. That's like one of the worst things you can say about a product. That puts some chills up the spine, doesn't it?

Yeah, I know. All right. Very good. I'm glad you found out how we know. But where's that from? Consumer report. Thank you, Rick. You took the words right out of my mouth.

So you want to spend very little money in a pile of garbage. just go to Palm Beach that is funny oh wow oh boy so so if you want to donate a car to charity you think you think okay guys I'm gonna vote I know I'm waiting for the harsh okay here's a car that is in many ways affordable for you know all of the consumers that are struggling, but then you compound it with fees, and that doesn't make me happy, not at all. And it, like I said, a low sticker price. So my vote would probably be much higher, but the fees, they turn me off all the time. And there's so many, many, there's so many excuses for these fees,

and it just isn't right. I'm going to give them, and this is really fair coming from Nancy, and that's a C. Oh, hey, I thought it was going to be lower. You know what you can do so much with the tone of your voice. I thought something bad it was coming. Earl will agree on that. We have three minutes left.

Earl, would you like to make a comment about your question earlier, or would you like to, in that musk? and Trump, or would you like to speak about something else? I think, you know, it's hard to believe that we did this whole show without anybody calling in. Well, we didn't have enough time, and the lines were closed. But people were calling in, and that we had no attacks on Musk or attacks on Trump, and yet they're affecting our lives every day. I think right now I think people are just eating popcorn going on.

Yeah, what's happening next. I guess. I mean, you can't get, you can't choose sides because they're both being so stupid. Yeah. I thought that Elon was being conciliatory with one comment that he made to Bill Ackerman when he said, you guys need to cool this because you're not wrong. So that was possible. You know, I think that if they could remember who they are, where they are, and how many people they affect.

These are men, Nancy. These are men, men, boys. So to what Stu said, what my comment was, are we 16 again? Let's do our job. Trump was elected president by so many, expected so much from him. Musk is unbelievable, but like I said, let's grow up. Thank you so much, ladies and gentlemen, for joining us this morning. We'll be right back here next week, same time on the oldies channel.

Have a wonderful weekend.