Earl Stewart on Cars - 08.06.2022 - Your Calls, Texts, and Mystery Shop at Audi of Stuart

Episode Date: August 6, 2022

Earl and his team answer various caller questions and responds to incoming text messages. Earl’s female mystery shopper, Agent Lightning visits a local Audi dealer to see how much over sticker price they will charge her for a new 2022 Audi A3 on the 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, his tweets at www.twitter.com/earloncars, and reading his blog posts at www.earloncars.com. Sign up to become one of Earl's Vigilantes and help others in your community to avoid getting ripped off by a car dealer. Go to www.earlsvigilantes.com for more information. “Disclosure: Earl Stewart is a Toyota dealer and directly and indirectly competes with the subjects of the Mystery Shopping Reports. He honestly and accurately reports the experiences of the shoppers and does not influence their findings. As a matter of fact, based on the results of the many Mystery Shopping Reports he has conducted, there are more dealers on the Recommended Dealer List than on the Not Recommended List he maintains on www.GoodDealerBadDealerList.com”

Well, good morning, everybody. We're back. And here we are in the new normal, crazy business car automatic manufacturing and retailing, and the world's upside down when it comes to buying or leasing, maintaining, repairing your car. Upside down, a lot of other ways, too. So these are going to be some special shows we do during this, hopefully the tail end of the COVID thing we're going through. but we're still there I've been in the business since 1968 as a car dealer

and that's a long long time never seen anything like the way cars are being bought and sold today manufactured everything's topsy-turvy and when the dust settles I was just talking to my son Josh by the way Josh Stewart's fulfilling

in for Stu Stewart Josh who's my youngest son we were talking about what are we going to be doing in 10 years or actually what he's going to be doing 10 years, I'll be retired, but hopefully. And it's going to be a different world out there. Are we going to have car dealerships? Are we going to have a need for repair? There's an interesting article in the current automotive news, September, that Nancy's going

to talk about a little bit about the cars that have the highest cost and lowest cost of maintenance and repair. And the first thing it struck me when I read the article was, boy, I tell you, if there's anything good about cars today, it's the low cost of maintenance and repair. So there are some good things going on in the business, along with the super high prices, buying and leasing. And repairing and maintaining to some extent right now, because everybody, we have a low supply, high demand, added a record number of jobs last month. just when we're talking about recession, and we say, are we? Prices are just sky high. That's the way it's going to be. So what we'll try to do on the show today is help you make some calculated, intelligent decisions

about when to buy a car, how to buy a car. We've got Rick Kearney, sitting on my right here in the studio. You heard him mention in the recorded introduction. And he can give you some great tips on how to avoid being, taken advantage of by repairs. If you do have an issue that's worrying you about your car, give us a call at 877-960-99-60. That's the phone number.

We prioritize that call, by the way. We get text, we get Facebook post, we get YouTube posts, but we prioritize the old-fashioned telephone. [phone]. Now, Rick, he monitors the YouTube channel. channel. Earl and Cars, or is YouTube.com for slash Rowland Cars. YouTube.com for slash Rollin Cars.

Rick will see the posting and he will wave his hand and we will recognize Rick and he will read your post on the air. So if you have something that you're afraid to bring into a repair shop or to the dealership because you might be taking advantage of, ask Rick. He might save you a lot of money. I have to mention for our new listeners, everybody that is a regular listener knows about this, the highlight of our show is the mystery shopping report.

And Josh Stewart, he's running that department now where we send an undercover agent in to some dealership somewhere. I started to say in Florida, but actually we're in other states as well, and mainly in Florida. So we have a new mystery shopping report every week. Agent Lightning That's her nickname

She goes undercover Pretends to buy a car Goes through the whole Brighamoreau And then reports exactly what happened Names the dealer Names the managers and the salespeople Gives her thoughts on

How she was treated And we read it on the air And then you vote on it So that comes toward the end of the show The last half hour We're on from now until 10 a.m. Eastern Standard Time. So we know you'll be tuning in, tuning out. If you have to tune out, try to tune back in the last 20 minutes anyway, and we'll have another exciting mystery

shopping report. Let me do this. I want to introduce Nancy Stewart. She's sitting to my left here, co-founder of the show many years ago, and a strong female advocate. She has a very special offer for you ladies that have not called into the show. a lot of you listen. And most people are a little timid about calling in, being live on radio or YouTube or Facebook for that matter. So if you haven't called in before, I'm going to ask Nancy to tell you about what she has in store for you. A really nice surprise. Definitely. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to an exciting show. Ladies, for the first two new callers, we offer you $50 this morning the first two female callers. And if it's the

first time that you call, you have a surprise. $50. So give us a call at 877-960. You can also text us at 772-497-6530. And also, I want to mention Earl's vigilantes before we go on. We don't, well, mention them often, and they really do deserve recognition. And to the volunteers that we have had, thank you so much. And if you're listening this morning, we'd love to hear from you and hear how the progress is going as far as people, consumers, reaching out to you. Yeah, let me jump in there. We were talking about this.

Nancy and I were talking about it earlier. and the conversation went something like this, is Earl on Cars, is this radio show preaching to the choir? And we said, you know, we've got a pretty sophisticated audience. People that call in, we've been doing this for a lot of years. We're actually talking to a lot of people that maybe don't need our advice that much. But you make an interesting show because you ask such good questions and you send in such interesting text.

So the purpose of the vigilantes, by the way, free hat, if you join the vigilantes. We're trying to get a list of the name of our vigilantes, and Stu Stewart is the one that has the access to that list. For some reason, we weren't able to get that list, but we will read it next week. It's classified information. Yes.

Highly classified. Classified, yeah. But the vigilantes take the information, and they make it available to their community. So the plan is to have Earl's vigilante. all over the country. You'll be in Pennsylvania and Missouri and you'll be in California and we'll recognize your location where you are and then local people can call you up and you can be a local source of advice on how to buy or lease a car or maintain and repair your

car. So if you go to earluncars.com, that's the website. There'll be a little link there called Earl's Vigilantes. You sign up, you get a free hat and we give your contact information. Of course, this is all with your permission to everybody, and local people could go to the website and they could call you. Hopefully, we'll have enough vigilantes at some point in time, but you'll be able to even talk about the local dealers in that area with the vigilantes. So as Nancy said earlier, and I'm going to turn the mic back over to her, thank you very much all you vigilantes out there that have really been helping the people within your own communities. We really appreciate you doing that, and you do it for free. Yeah, we definitely appreciate them. And, you know, the other part of this good, well, response that we get from you on Earl's vigilantes is the Internet.

There are some of us who really can't, you know, make their way around to obtain information that they need. And we also have volunteers on that aspect of it. So of any of you who are listening this morning, give us a call. Let us know how things are going and what the response has been out there. 877-960-99-60. I have a question for our audience, and this may inspire you to give us a call. Recently, the Consumer Report had some interesting information on new car costs that is maintaining and repairing them and what it cost a year. What do you think, which brand do you think, costs more than, you know, any other brand a year to maintain and repair?

Equally interesting, maybe more interesting, is which car costs the least. That, too. If you know the answer to that question, give us a call, 877-960-99-60. We're going to go straight to the phones where we have Bob, who's been. holding and Jane will be right with you. Good morning, Bob. Good morning. Good morning. How is everybody today? Great. Thank you for calling in. Thank you very much. I have a question for your ace mechanic. I have a friend that has a 2002 Lexus SC 430 with 70,000 miles. He was driving down the road, lost power, pulled over, put the hood up. There was smoke coming out.

the car towed to the Lexus dealer on Okotobie Boulevard, and they told him he had a cracked radiator, and that the timing belt had come off and would need to be, you know, fixed. So he said he called your dealership and, you know, to get a price. And he spoke to someone over there by the name of a Josh. Do you have someone there that works by that name? Yep. Josh Scott, service writer. Okay, service writer.

Okay, so Josh told him that it was going to be $2,800 just for the timing bill. And according to him, the Lexus people's price was going to be a lot less. And I was surprised because normally I would think that their labor rates per hour are got to be higher than yours. And everything's done off a book so many hours for whichever type of job. it is. So I'm not quite sure why you are price a lot higher than the Lexus deal. I would think the Lexus deal would have been, I would have thought it would have been the opposite. Well, you're exactly right, Bob. That's what should be the case. And I'm not sure why the difference. Rick can speak to the timing belt. What would you, in your experience, say it would be the cost of

replacing a timing belt? Earl, they told him that the timing belt would be a five-hour job. Okay. Yeah, that labor time sounds about right. However, it may be that Lexus was going with simply the idea of replacing just the timing belt, whereas we have found in our experience, we generally recommend the timing belt as part of the package. In other words, the timing belt, the drive belts. And the water pump, and the water pump, too.

Right, the water pump, thermostat. and any oil seals that are behind the timing belt. Because on a 20-year-old car, those seals are going to be 20 years old. It's time to replace those. And if you don't replace them, and they go bad a year later, they're going to dump oil all over that brand-new timing belt and can break that belt. So we generally recommend to take care of all of that at once because it's much cheaper in the long run to do it at once than to do it separate components.

I yeah absolutely because everything's a part anyway and I also I also noticed that most most of the YouTube videos on it when they when they when they when they have to change the belt they usually automatically will change the water pump out yes I get to I get to the belt they have to take the water pump apart anyway so I kind of thought that's what it was but they told they didn't tell them that at the Lexus seal I mean they did they were very kind to him they gave Malone a car and all beautiful car and but he has He has brought some of his vehicles to your service department before to be fixed. But I just thought it was odd that, I thought it was odd that the Lexus would be cheaper than your labor rates.

Your labor rates over there are what per hour? About 150 an hour. 150, and at the Lexus dealership, they've got to be what, two something, I would think, huh? I have no idea. Bob, you're absolutely right. You know, your call is important to a lot of people listening for a lot of reasons. We recommend regularly that if you have a vehicle that has a luxury version, you know, if you have a Chevrolet, you know, it's a General Mother's product.

So if you have a Cadillac, you can take that Cadillac to a Chevrolet dealer in most cases, unless it's warranty work, they're qualified to repair. And the same thing with Lexus and Toyota. In this case here, you have a telephone call to a dealership, two telephone calls to two dealerships, and two verbal quotes. And a lot of things can happen, and a lot of things can be lost in the translation. So there are some dealers, and I'm not accusing Alexis or any dealer necessarily, but all dealers probably are guilty of this, either accidentally or on purpose. when someone calls up and says, how much does this cost, you're reluctant to give a very, very high price, perhaps, because it would dissuade them from coming in. Right. Well, I think they told them the radiator would be somewhere around $1,200 to $1,200 for the radiance.

But when he called your dealership and Josh told him $2,800 just for the belt, he was really taken aback. And I said, well, to me, I said, it doesn't sound right. I said, it's got to to be less at oral steward's dealership than I've got a funny story for you though let me just say one more thing Bob before your funny story because it's a great call the other thing to remember is that with a 20 year old vehicle here we have a 2002 you got to be very careful spending a lot of money on a 20 year old car because you might be throwing good money after bad and also the resale value so okay now i got my message out and now here i want to hear the funny story Listen, listen, he was pulled over.

He was going down south, and this was on Hyperluxo Road, so he pulled off the ramp, off $9.95. And some guy pulls over in the Mercedes, it's a Mercedes dealer, wanted to buy his car from him. I'm not kidding. That's crazy out there, you know. Yeah, well, this car, these cars, these SC 430s, his car's in really tip-top condition. He's taken very good care of it. and they're like a specialty car. And he got, the guy gave him his car,

run to buy the car right, you know, right there. And then I thought it was kind of funny. You know, but he does want to get another, he does want to get another car. But, you know, the situation right now is, you know what it is. And, you know, and, you know, I want to, I have a little bit of a, uh, something to say, uh, last year you were telling people to wait until last year this time of the year, you were telling people to wait for the end of 2021 before they go by a car.

Now, now we're in, now we're a year later and you're telling them to wait to the end of this year to go buy a car. But from what I see, from what I've been hearing, that the supply and the demand equilibrium will not be in place for another year and a half. Well, true. So we're going to be, we're going to be in a situation. So if you need to buy a car, if someone wants to go buy a car, they're going to just have to go shop around and deal with it. Because I don't know, somebody's going to wait a year and a half. I know I wouldn't do it at my age. you know I know you

don't wait Earl you didn't wait you went aboard a Tesla didn't you yeah I got a Tesla back on your point about when things are going to be better things aren't going to suddenly become better they're gradually in fact the prices are stabilizing

they are coming down a little bit and the question remains a year from now will they be there I don't think we're ever going to be back to pre-2020 back then car dealers were losing money in their new car

apartments on average. And there was a huge oversupply and it was crazy that a new car dealer can't make money selling new cars. Now they suddenly realize not only they're making an obscene amount of money and I don't think... I know. I've seen the numbers.

So what would you suggest what would you suggest my friend to do? He's got his car down there with the Lexus dealer. What, you know, what's your thought? Well I think it should the market value of his car he can shop it around and go to carvana we buy any car.com the lexasheeler himself will buy the car the Mercedes guy I'm talking about the repair all the repair yeah I would I would definitely get another quote I would have

why when you got a serious quote because a telephone quote is just that you know it's not you just don't know how serious when they look at the car and they get a written estimate that will be something he can make a decision on. Then I would take it to another mechanic or another independent or another Lexus dealer and get another quote. It's not drivable right now. Okay. Well, then he can still get a quote

by knowing what the auto nation, that's, by the way, Lexus and Okorubia Boulevard is owned by Auto Nation. And then after you get a couple of bids on that, then you give the market value of your car and then you make a judgment you know if you can if your car's worth a few thousand dollars more than the repair then you might go ahead and have the repair if the repairers have missed much i i went on i went on auto trade when i looked at his car is probably worth anywhere around 25 grand so you know even if you know if this drop could be any way yeah that's a huge amount of money i looked at josh when you said that because that's hard to believe a 20-year-old car is worth 25,000 but car prices are sky high. You should have held on to your SC-400. You had one back in the 90s.

Well, that's the retail number, not the wholesale. Yeah, right. That's the retail number on auto trade, not the wholesale. I imagine the wholesale would be a little bit less. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, so, okay, I just wanted to know. So, in other words, the repair is a little bit more. So that $2,800 involved more than just changing out.

Absolutely, Bob. You're a great friend. It looks like as if you dotted your eyes and crossed your and we wish your friend luck give us a call again follow-up much have a great day everybody thank you you too uh we're going to go to jane thank you for your patience jane and amy we'll be right with you good morning jane jane's calling from coral gables good morning good morning have we heard from you uh before no you have it okay uh jane you just won yourself

as a new female caller, $50. And if you give your information to the gentleman in the control room, I can get that check out to you. ASAP. How do you like that? Okay, thank you. Thank you so much. What a nice way to start a Saturday morning.

Definitely. That will be a big help. What can we do for you this morning? Well, nothing really, and I'm not calling about a repair or not a vigilante. My husband, we purchased a RAV-4 hybrid Toyota in May, and we just drove to North Carolina and back, and we were getting 40 to 50 miles a gallon. The car drives great, smooth, quiet, amazing, great car. My husband was, when he went to go buy it, there was, I think there were two cars,

and they told him there were three cars. When he got there, there were only two cars. This was a place in Tampa. that he bought the car and um and he got i when he called me he said there's this one car i kind of like it i said get it because i knew what the guy just said we have another friend who has a car on order because she likes our car so much uh they said it's going to be eight months to a 12th 12 months before she's going to get this car great story you don't have to wait they just ordered it through you that's why we know about you she just might these friends of mine just

were up up there thank you yeah and eight to 12 months is it more along yeah so i just wanted to really uh just say this is such a great car and i'm so glad my husband got this car and just want to promote it that i think this is the way the country and the world should be going for hybrid this all electric uh it's great but we couldn't have gone in north car like this with a electric car so um you know this was wonderful when the the gas mileage was so great. And also, I'm supposed to ask, do you have metal skid plates for the underbelly? No, we do not have those in stock. However, there's a lot of aftermarket companies making those. I'm assuming you're looking for protection for the catalytic

converters? Yes. Yes. It's my husband. It's an all-wheel drive vehicle, and I'm a hunter, and I do go off-road, not over, you know. Okay, gotcha. Yeah. I want to be able to be. Yeah, I would, let's see, I would start by looking for local 4-by-4 groups around in your area and see if there's any local mechanic shops around there. We have places here in West Palm, like Truck and Trailer, USA.

They handle a place called DV8. they do a lot of our modification trucks they'll put all the splash shields the extra lighting and things like that so anyone that would have underguard shielding like that add-on stuff

it'd be one like that I would look for truck modification places I've seen on the internet there are places that sell them for the gas model raft but I don't see that there are anything specifically for

the hybrid. Yeah, it's something you'd want to check with the manufacturer of those items to make sure that they're going to match up for the hybrid system because the underside of the car is a bit different in the design. A great source would be rock auto.com, R-O-C-A-O-C-A-O-D-com. They're the largest independent online supplier of auto bars. I have bought things from them before. Yeah, they'd probably have exactly what you're looking for.

All right. Thank you. Thank you. Well, thank you. I just mostly wanted to call in and tell you, and this friend of mine really, really likes your place. They drove from Coral Gables up to you. And they've ordered the same Rav4 Prime. Oh, yeah. It takes several months for them to get it. So I'm just so glad we have what we have,

and I really think that this is the way the country, you know, that we should be going right now because it's 40 to 50 miles of that gallon is great. Can't go wrong. And good for the environment. Absolutely. Well, call it good, Jane. Thank you very much. Thank you to you and your husband for calling in.

And Jane, don't forget the control room. Jeremy is waiting for your information. We're going to go to Amy, who's calling from Tuscaloosa. Good morning, Amy. From Hypolyxo. Oh, hypolucca. Yeah, and I really want to say. You're calling from Hypolexa?

Yes. I want to speak to the mechanic because this is something I don't understand. I have a 1998 Chevy Blazer, it's an LT, hatchback, and the rear driver's side door. It doesn't open or won't open. Okay. So I've ordered from Carparts.com. I got a handle. Inside and out, went to have it put on, but the mechanic said because the door won't open,

he would have to remove the seat. Yeah? And because there's no way of getting at it. And I'm just perplexed as to why the door all of a sudden out of the blue on a 20-year-old car decides it won't open. 20 years of dirt, grit, grime, salt, and other things getting into the latch and suddenly the door latch just basically something must have corroded or broke in there and the latch jammed up so unfortunately it's it does happen I mean you know with 20 years it won't open from the inside either which is weird

right but it's we're talking to the latch assembly maybe jammed up Yeah, that's the part of the, you know, when you open the door and you look, there's a little like a U-shaped bar, a little square bar that comes from the body, the latch assembly is in the door, and when you close the door, that latch assembly is meant to grab hold of on that bar system, and it is designed to not open in the event of a crash or heavy collision. So, I mean, they're made very, very durable, but unfortunately over the years, like I say, salt. dirt, things that get in there, you know, eventually, even the best parts can break over 24 years. So then I should be worried about my other doors? Well, you might want to have, when the mechanics got your car in there, might want to have clean them up and add some lubrication. I would think that the doors that you use regularly, like the front doors, would be less inclined

to stick, but the rear doors probably don't get that much use. And as Rick says, when something sits still for 24 years, in South Florida. Oh, he's got a lot of use. I get my seat down, and that's where my groceries went every day. Okay. And I used that door. And my question to him, even if we pulled the seat out and did everything, my big concern was,

would that door ever lock again with my remote? Well, if... And or would the power window go up and down? and he said he couldn't guarantee you that. I can only give you the mechanics one last final rule, and that is I can fix any car if it takes every last time the customer has as long as there's parts available. I mean, if you're determined that you want to fix that car,

then yes, somewhere out there somebody makes the parts, and we can generally find enough parts that we can repair any car. car. Amy, here's my advice. At a cost, it would be able to be fixed. Yeah, right. It just could get expensive. Amy,

here's the advice. Get the estimate from the person you're talking to, the mechanic, and for every possibility. In other words, you ask some very good questions. You know, what about the window? What about the, you're not

just a lock, but the window operation. Anything that's going to effect your use of that door, you should ask to get an estimate on. I did. I got an estimate just to put in the latches and do that was going to be about $310 with the labor. Then they got to pulling out the seat, and that's a labor-intensive job. So we're looking at $600. Now, it's $600 plus for a 20-year-old car doesn't seem a good thing in my well it's

yeah the repair cost doesn't know how old your cars they just know what they have to do and they have so many hours and they have parts so 600 or 800 is not a lot of money to repair a car you have a 24 year old car and if you could get by with six or 800 it would be a lot less expensive than they have to buy another car so

you might want to get another estimate from another mechanic but four to six hundred eight hundred dollars is not a huge amount of money to repair what you're talking about well his suggestion was taking it to a body shop well you could get a bid there I mean the body shop would be glad to give you a bid on that and once you have two or three bits okay listen thank you very much I want to ask a question before you go are you a first time caller yes congratulations Amy you want to yourself $50 this morning. And if you stay on the line, you can give Jeremy in the control room your information, and I personally will get that check out to you.

Thank you very much. And also, here, I have something to share with you. Three estimates, always. And right now, in today's climate, it may be worth your while to hang on to your car. It just depends on your circumstances. Thank you. Yeah. Financially speaking, I'm not in the financial bracket to be getting another car. Exactly. So you can also go to Earl on Cars and you can read a column that he wrote and that's all

about hanging on to your old car. And then all my friends say, well, why don't you lease? Well, I'm in a rental market and you know the rental rates in Florida. My tenant has raised my rent by 25%. 25% that's a big hike so you know I if you least that's just like another renter that's add no it's something I don't want to have every month on top of me my shoulders absolutely I can sympathize with you Amy Amy thank you so much for calling Earl Stewart on cars and give us a call again let us know the outcome I've all driven Toyotas and I made a boo-boo by buying a Chevy Blazer

and that's my fault thank you so much have a wonderful day Good luck. Thank you. Okay, we are going to stick with the phones, and we are going to talk to John. John, I missed you last week. Welcome back. Yeah, I had a tooth that extracted, so it wasn't bad-shaped to talk. But I just want it today, I want to, Nancy, be very proud.

But I mention this. I want to acknowledge a female in the auto industry. Earl probably knew her dad. She grew up with DNA in her blood. She owns 20 dealerships in Florida and in Georgia, and she's a president and controller of these dealerships. Her father was the first Honda dealer in the United States, I think it was in 1970.

I'm sure a girl probably knew who her dad was, and her husband passed away two years ago, September of 20, and his name was Rick. And she's all won many awards, including a Horatio Award, which 63 females qualified for, and she was the only one that was awarded that. And what I want to say is also it goes beyond the dealerships that she has. Her husband and her were the first Accura and Hyundai deal in the United States. So I just want to acknowledge her the job that she does.

She lives here in, I think, Broward County, and I just, I know Earl would know probably her, not only her father, but her husband, have passed away. And by the way, she also collects cars. They have the first Honda, convertible it was ever delivered to the United States, the first regular Honda, and the second body number two, delivered here. but I just want to give a shout out to this female, and I'm sure Nancy Stewart, oh, by the way, the most important thing about Hark, they formed a, uh, philanthropic, they, they dedicate the money to the boys and girls club. It's an exclusive show that's held in Becker and Boca Raton every year, and it draws a lot of money, but all the money has contributed to charity of the Boys and Girls Club. It's a tremendous show.

that's held in poker every year. That's Rick Case is the husband, and I do know of her, and she was a very important part of that partnership. She was very active in the business. There's a book out by Rick Case, and she probably co-authored it. I can't think of the title.

But, yeah, you're right, that's a great story, and she's an amazing woman. Thank you so much, John. What a great story to share with us. I was reading about Rick. She met her husband at one of the Honda stand's meetings. So I think that's an interesting thing.

Yes. Another interesting thing. And I was reading about Rick Case in the automotive news, and that is a great story. There is room for, well, the female. And in many departments, it could be in service. It could be in accounting. It could be in sales, anything at all.

we're growing. Absolutely. Trained by her father, by the way. Oh, that's an amazing story right there. She was right by his side, and it's an interesting story. Well, John, thank you so much. Good luck with your recovery on your extracted two. Okay.

And stay tuned for the mystery shopper report from Audie of Stewart. Yes, I look forward to it. Thank you. So that was Rita. Rita case is the Rita case. Great call. John. Thank you so much. Yes. I'll give you that telephone number again. You can give us a call or you can text us and that's 877-960-99-60 or you can text us at 772-497-6-5-30. Well, I see our lines are wide open, so we'll go to Josh or to Rick. Actually, I've got an

interesting one. Neakin I just brought this one up to me and he wanted to get Earl's opinion on it. Jalopnik and several other sites are reporting a letter has come out from General Motors apparently three models of their super hot cars the Corvette ZO6 the Escalade V model and the EV Hummer they are so popular with people for flipping these cars

buying them then reselling for a huge markup that General Motors has sent out a letter stating that if a person buys and sells one of these three models within 12 months of the original purchase, the warranty on the vehicle is null and void. No bumper to bumper, no power train, no sheet metal, tires, batteries, anything except the electric battery warranty on the EV Hummer. And they said apparently they're trying to curb the flipping of these vehicles

Apparently, they're in angry, they're not getting a piece of that market money. My comment is I don't believe that because I think General Motors would not legally be able to penalize a third party who happened to buy a car from a dealer that flipped it. You can penalize a dealer. That's what they should do. In fact, most of the manufacturers do penalize dealers if they buy a car and then report sold. and sell it again. But you cannot penalize an innocent third party. They need to penalize a dealer or whoever's slipping the car.

I can read you a letter if you like. You can read all you're up, and I just don't believe that legally it can apply. That's what I wondered. I think somebody is misinterpreting facts. This reminds me of the Hyundai with their really long warranty that used to advertise. That was always just to the. original owner and then these you know the the every owner thereafter would have a shorter warranty so there's some sort of precedent to you know conditional warranties based on you know right ownership

they're talking about the whole warranty i believe so yeah that's far more extreme i'd be surprised that you know yeah very extreme the letter that they copied here on jelotnick is from steve carlyle and this letter apparently went out to the gm dealership team and as i look at to hear the one section says let's see certain warranties will not be transferable if the original owner resells the vehicle within one year of delivery

well that again that would go to Josh's comment about the extended power train warranty but the basic new car warranty when you buy a new car without the other sub warranties that go on there is no precedent there I've never heard of any

manufacturer of anything saying If you buy this product, you have a 12-month warranty or a 36-month warranty, but if you sell it again within a certain amount of time, the warranty disappears. And to your point, you're punishing some poor person who's buying this car, and they're not getting that letter or... Especially on the idea that if you purchase a car, a used vehicle that's less than a year old, and you have not heard this story, you would assume that it's still going to have a full factory warranty. and if you're unaware of that wow caveat emptor on that one yeah it's a bad situation when you

assume thank you for that information Rick we're going to go back to the phones and we have Alan who's calling us from Lake City good morning Alan good morning Earl on cars you guys all look well I was watching you on YouTube

well thank you how you doing there boss feeling well how you doing Alan? I am doing perfect. I'm sitting on my front porch. I watch the sunset. I'm smoking cigars, drinking coffee, just enjoying watching my house. Oh, go ahead. Rub it in.

Sounds tough, man. Speaking of the farm, I was mowing the other day. This is a question about lithium batteries. I knocked a hybrid, I had the hybrid light batteries or flashlights. I knocked

one off a horse stall railing, and I hit it with a mower. It shattered, of course, and it threw pieces out in the middle of my yard, and it was like somebody threw a smoke bomb out there. Oh, yeah. I went out to pick it up. It burned like, it was burning like crazy. So I tried to let it burn out.

I was afraid to pour water on it, because I don't know the science of the lithium and stuff. So I just thought I'd leave it be and go to my mulling. An hour later, I went to pick it up, and went to pick it up, and went to. I touched it, it was still, it burned my fingers. Yep. And it started smoking all over again. Wow. So, I then, I went on to YouTube and I looked up lithium battery fires, and there's a bunch

of people puncturing like RC remote control model batteries, and just the fires are just violent, and it's like a chemical reaction fire. They're terrible. My question is, I've always kind of glossed over when I saw. all those old articles about random fires on electric cars, you know, Tesla's and this and that. My question is, is it too soon for us to be putting these batteries and passenger cars? Should we be waiting for a new technology? Because lithium seems to me to be extremely dangerous.

And now I'm starting to pay attention to these articles I see about spontaneous fires or fires after accidents. I'm just wondering what Earl thinks. I kind of think I know because I know he has a Tesla. But is it just two stones should we wait for a better technology? That's my question. I'll just listen. Just before the show started, Rick Kearney was talking about Tesla batteries and how far advanced they are.

They're about two generations ahead of all the other manufacturers. And even Tesla is advancing the technology. So you're right. Lithium is yesterday's news. and they have a technology now that we can't even dream about. I mean, we're going to have, you know, I'll just, I'll go out on a limb and say that by the time we have mostly electric cars, the batteries will probably, instead of lasting three or 400 miles, I mean, a range of three or 400 miles will be like 1,000 or 2,000 miles. I mean, it's just amazing what can happen when science and engineering focuses on one thing.

And right now, there's no more focusing on batteries, and lithium is going to be just like a horse and buggy in 20 years. Yeah, and the lithium, it's such an ugly process to mine for it, and that's why we're importing it. We don't want to do the mining for it here. My last question, hydrogen, 10 years ago it seemed like that was going to kind of be the direction that Toyota went. Did that just go away? Is there some reason they're not following up with the hydrogen, or are they following up, and we just don't hear about it? Toyota is a huge company.

They're a smart company. I would, I'll have to, in full, you know, transparency, I am a Toyota dealer, but I think Toyota is the best manufacturer in the world. But they got off on a wrong tangent. They got off on the hydrogen tangent. Sometimes you hate to change your mind about something, and I think they stuck with hydrogen too long. They got behind and the all-electric and, but there'll always be a place for hydrogen.

You know, the thing that I'm a, I have a physics background, so I'm kind of a scientific-minded person. And the thing that amazes me about the whole hydrogen thing is there's just a whole lot of hydrogen around. I mean, H-2-O. I mean, you've got hydrogen. I mean, the ocean has got a whole lot of hydrogen. So I think somehow or other we will tap that hydrogen source. hydrogen is what makes the sun go. So, I mean, the sun's doing real well with hydrogen,

and I think that one way or another we'll use hydrogen in the future. I think more of the... I'd be my hope. You're a show-off. Smarty-pants. That's what I call them, smarty-pants. I think hydrogen might be more in the commercial industry. I know they've used it for some trucking applications.

Like Toyota has some big rig. that are fueled by hydrogen. I think one of the biggest issues that hit hydrogen was the fact that California and Southern California, to be specific, is one of the few places that actually has a small infrastructure in place for hydrogen refueling stations. Nowhere else in the U.S. do you really have any amount of hydrogen refueling stations? Electric cars, however, even Tesla's, can basically be plugged in on a 110 circuit, and it may take hours to charge it, but everywhere in the U.S. has electricity available. So the infrastructure

is there that an electric car can be effectively used anywhere you live in the U.S. A hydrogen car. We're not talking about do we use hydrogen or electric. We're saying at some point in the future there will be a place for hydrogen. Right. It's just you've got to build that infrastructure. Yeah, exactly. It doesn't mean that hydrogen isn't necessarily a better technology. It doesn't have a foothold in practical applications right now. So it may be far superior to electric vehicles, but if the infrastructure, like you said, it's not in place, then electric and hybrids will have the advantage. Good call, Alan. Last, last. Oh, it ain't over yet. Thanks so much, Alan. He's still going. The Toyota, I forget the name of it. There was a Toyota model.

I think it started with an L, and that they were starting to introduce. I even took classes on it. Did they ever retail any of those? I thought they were going to retail some in California. It's the Mariah you're referring to. Yeah, that's it. Yeah, it's, it still exists. But as, like Rick said, it's localized in California. We actually, we actually had one on our showroom floor, and for some reason it just didn't move. Maybe the fact that the nearest hydrogen refueling station was 1,800 miles away. And we paid way too much for the car and lost enforcement when we sold it. Even car dealers

make big mistakes. Thanks so much, Alan. It was great hearing from you. The show is great. It's good to hear from you guys, and I'll stop by and see you one day when I'm down that way. Okay, enjoy your mowing, Alan.

Missy, buddy. Yeah. Enjoy your coffee. We're going to go to Carl, who's been holding in Boynton. Actually, Carl is calling from Royal Palm Beach, I believe. Good morning, Carl.

Good morning. It's nice to talk to you. guys been listening for a long time. A couple weeks ago, my daughter, Sarah, called in with some problems that she's having with her 2009 RAV-4, a four-cylinder.

Yes. And I wasn't able to contact her while the show directly while the show was airing. But she forgot to say that one of the problems that she was having, she forgot to say that it was happening

when she was was it really happened i've been in the car when it happens it's on an uphill okay when she's climbing pittsburgh has lots of hills and when she's climbing and it's i guess it's trying to down shift perhaps uh there's sort of a sound i she said it wasn't a rattling sound but i can't think of a better description uh than a rattling sound going uphill about 35 to 40 miles an hour it happens for anywhere from a couple of seconds to maybe ten seconds. And then it eventually goes away. And I'm wondering whether you've had any issues.

I mean, what have been the problems with 2009 RAV-4s? Other than that, I mean, she had an issue with a noise when it starts up. But other than that, you know, it's been a great car for her. And I sort of hate to see her. she's getting a new car soon but I hate to see her just sort of trade that in when it may have a whole lot of life left in it Rick good point

the way you're describing it sounds like when it's going into a high torque situation it's downshifting in order to get increased torque to get up the hill I would suspect either something in the differential or in the one of the axles maybe is making that noise but if it's only happening just uphill

and just for a few seconds of times like that I wouldn't get too awfully concerned on it without actually hearing it myself I mean it could be as simple as a heat shield one of the aluminum heat shields that just picks that moment to get the right harmonic vibration

is something could be covered in the power train warranty not on 09 I mean you're talking to cars 13 years old already so yeah yeah now what what what about the torque converter i mean sort of seen a couple people complaining on the internet about torque converter issues it could that be it and if so i mean you know like what's the most expensive repair for something like that the torque converter probably be one of the most expensive repairs except for the differential which is part of the transactal itself uh however the torque converter usually if there was a problem

with it is you'd be getting a shutter that you would actually feel in the car. It'd be a vibration that you literally would feel throughout the car that's like, but it would literally vibrate the car. If it's more of a noise than a... I think it does. I'll ask her again, but I think it does. I mean, I seem to remember, you know, you notice it. I mean, it's not just a slight noise.

It's not super loud either, but it's, uh, there's definitely a vice. vibration definitely okay and torque converter is possibility that's certainly one of the possibilities but it definitely sounds like something in the drive line there yeah and Carl to wrap this up I do remember Sarah and I think at that time I suggested to her to if she possibly could take her phone and record that noise that is very very helpful and hanging on to her her older car like you said, she may have a whole lot of miles left on that car. Also, Carl, here's the good news. Sarah failed to give me her information when she called.

She needed to give it to Jeremy in the control room because she won herself $50. You know, she mentioned, she mentioned that nobody ever asked her, so how was she ever going to get the $50? She didn't call in for the $50. Absolutely not. Nobody does. We're just building a platform here.

And I just want to recognize Sarah. She's helping to build that platform here for the lady callers. That's fine. Thank you so much, Carl. She doesn't need the $50. Thank you. And Carl, if you give us your address to Jeremy and the Control Center, we can get that check out to you and you can pass it along to her.

Or tell her how much you enjoy taking your wife out to dinner on it. If you really want to, put me on hold and I'll get you the information. Thank you so much, Carl. Have a great weekend. Give us a call again. Our phone number here is 877-960-99-60. You can text us at 772-497-6530. The lines are open, and we'll give it to Josh.

Yeah, I have Anne-Marie's... Her kick-off text is coming in late because we just had too many callers. And, yeah, and Anne-Marie always puts so much thought and care into these texts. It would be a shame. Doesn't she? It's a shame that it took so long to get to. So she says, good morning, and we have another Jalapnik scoop here. Jalapnik reports that the IHS, the Insurance Institute of Highway Safety, has changed their

side impact testing program to more accurately reflect real-life forces inside impact crashes. The striking barrier is in the test, now weighs more, hits faster, and is designed to more accurately simulate an impact from an SUV. makes sense because there's far more SUVs on the road now than ever before. These factors, along with the barrier's SUV height, means that a lot of mid-sized cars are now failing this test. The Subaru Outback, with its wagon silhouette and lifted ride height, received the only good rating. Those two factors seem to be why the vehicle is safer with side impacts. The Hyundai Sonata, the Jetta, got acceptable.

The Honda Accord rated marginal, and wait for it, the Camry, Ultima, Malibu ranked poor due to their size. The vehicle's sitting low to the ground don't test as well because the striking barrier hits higher up. The test was like she said was designed to reflect the cars on the road and yeah she says I drive a Camry often I'll be at a stoplight and the truck rest of you will pull up beside me and they'll be so tall I feel like I'm driving a low slung European sports car as I stare at their hubcaps. Do you think Toyota will ever raise the height of the Camry? Thanks and what a great thoughtful question. I remember a long time ago

So it's great that the safety organizations continually raised the bar for their testings. I remember a long time ago there was a front offset to represent like a corner front impact and all of a sudden all these cars that had great ratings before, including the Camry, all had failing grades. And that's what made Toyota redesign the Camry in the middle of 2014. Remember we had a 2014 and a half Camry. Wow. So, yeah, I mean, what do you think about them raising the height of the Camry?

Boy, either of that or lower the height of everything else. Exactly. Good point. Yeah. That is, again, Anne Murray is amazing because we all feel that way. There's nothing more dangerous than being on the road with a vehicle in front of you that blocks out the sky. In other words, you can't see over them. You can't see the right of them or the left of them.

And it's like having a partial blindfold on. And so there are no regulations as far as I know about that. If you buy a short car and you're behind a tall car, you're in trouble. And it's dangerous. So there's legislation. There needs to be some control on that. I think, though, we're also limited by like, because a lot of people like the Camry and cars like it, because it's easy to step into, you know, if they have mobility issues and things like that.

So, I mean, I'm sure they could improve the safety of it without raising it too much. I don't know if they'll be an engineering. I think it's a great idea. Yeah. I truly do. And I got to bring to the audience attention that Consumer Report is constantly giving the attention to vehicles that are being tested. And one in point is the seatbelt and the female. And these dummies that they were using are male. So they're addressing that issue too. So there's several safety factors and there's several changes that should be made in the future. Yeah, who's driving cars and the kind of cars on the road has changed so much, so the way we gauge their safety needs to change with it.

Absolutely, with more vehicles on the road, it is definitely an important topic. Do you have... Yeah, I can keep going. I have another one right here. Our lines are open. This texter asks, is there any significant mechanical and functional difference between the new Corolla hybrid and a regular Prius hybrid? I can answer from my layman's perspective, Rick might jump in with a little more technical, you know, differential, but there's really, in my, from my view, there's really no difference between the hybrid technology. The hybrid drive train is very similar. Obviously, the coroll is a little bit of a different body style, so I don't know if that's a mechanical difference. I do know that it has a little bit of a bigger gas tank, and so it has a little bit of a better range. But other than that, I would say they're basically the same type of hybrid technology.

Is that correct? Exactly. As a matter of fact, I think one of the things that Toyota did when they first brought the Prius out, they made such a odd body design to it to make it stand out. So that's the first one. Because in 2004, the second genera of Prius, because the first generation just looked like a little four-door sedan. So they did this wild design.

Everybody either loved it or hated it. And now we've reached the point that hybrids are a quite. across the board, every manufacturer has hybrids out of everywhere. So making a distinctive looking vehicle that's a hybrid doesn't really benefit. However, taking a vehicle like the Corolla that has a design inside, easier to sit in, nicer car, a little more trunk space, a little more space inside. Make it a hybrid, best of all the worlds. Yeah, and you're not, they get basically the exact mileage.

So, you know, it all depends on what kind of body style you like better. Mm-hmm. There you go. Great. A lot of choices. Before Josh gets to the next text, I want to remind everyone that you can give us a call at 877-960. And, of course, the text number is 772-497-6530. Don't forget your anonymous feedback.com. Now back to Josh. Speaking of anonymous feedback, this is one that we did have time to get to last week. And it speaks to a point that was brought up earlier on the show. He says, I work in the computer industry, and I can assure you that the chip shortage is over and done. The chip plants that were closed in 2020 were mostly reopened in quarter three of 2021. It took about six months to get them fully running again. The automakers and the dealers have found a new norm for making profit by limiting production and inventory.

I know this has been something that's brought up before. do you think is there going to be in some sort of unspoken agreement moving forward that they're not going to flood the dealers with cars and they're going to limit production? I think if they want to go to jail, they can do that. I disagree with the opinion. I think that, first of all, the cars that are being built today require more microchips than ever before. I mean, the microchip capacity was playing catch up before the COVID pandemic. And so now with the highly sophisticated technical cars we have, the more computerization you have in a car, the more microchips.

And you also have the same phenomenon occurring all products. Your toaster, your television set, your smartphone, everything takes microchips. So the demand for microchips is huge, and the automotive is only a piece of that. So we're all getting, you know, all automotive are having a shortage. The shortage is diminishing, and there's also situations where you have the manufacturers over-ordered, and they created a shortage themselves. It's chaotic right now, but there's no conspiracy. I mean, I honestly don't think there, certainly between the car dealers and the manufacturers.

There's an adversarial relationship between the manufacturers and the car dealer. Take it from a car dealer and the manufacturer. So I think that there's some truth to what you're saying in the fact that when the smoke does clear and things calm down and supply does get. I think you're going to find the manufacturers will realize that they were stupid before by overproducing. And the dealers know they were stupid because when the manufacturers overproduced, they jam the cars down the throats of the dealers. And they said, look, you're my dealer for Cadillac. You're going to take an extra 100 Cadillac's next month or else. And so there was that mentality.

I think that's going to be gone. And I think you'll see a smoother supply and demand situation. But remember, you have supply, you have demand, and you have price. So one way to equalize supply's demand is to manipulate the price. You can raise the price, you can lower the price, and that affects supply and demand. So it's a complicated thing, but the car dealers, almost all car dealers, were losing money in their new car departments. That's ridiculous.

That can continue, shouldn't continue. And again, I'm a car dealer. We didn't like that. So now car dealers are making too much money in the new car department. So the answer will be somewhere between losing money and making too much money. It'll be the new norm. Great, great answer there. I wonder, is there a benefit to the consumer in that their car doesn't depreciate as fast anymore?

I guess it depends on how they bought the car. If they paid way over sticker, it will depreciate traditionally. But if you get a good price on the new car nowadays, it's not depreciating. used to. In the old days, you drive off the lot, it'd lose $4,000. Nowadays, it just kind of covers there. You think about it. You're going back 50 years when I was in the business, when I started the business, and you had a one-year warranty. The cars were a bunch of crap. I mean, they just, you know, by today's standards, they were really junky, and they'd break. And once you drove a car for two or three years, you better get rid of it because it's going to fall

apart and the lenders the lenders didn't want to finance a car with over 60,000 miles on it and today the cars are extremely good by comparison to 25 30 years ago and they're getting better and better so yeah you buy a car and it lasts longer as higher quality you keep it longer and therefore you don't sell as many cars yeah yeah and that you wrote the column on that just hang on to that old car and I opened the show this morning or we opened to show this morning speaking of how long a vehicle will last

and maintenance and all the above things certainly have changed as far as that is concerned and I asked the question and this was from Consumer Report which car has lowest maintenance and repair a year you'll never guess here's a hint you'll never guess

all the cars that you think would not be cheap to maintain repair over five or ten years. This car happens to be according to consumer reports, I believe them, the lowest cost. It's a great question, ladies and gentlemen. We'd love to hear from you. And also you can answer a question if it stirs your interest, which one costs the most? I think that's pretty important. Okay, excuse me, Josh, we're going to go back to the phones where we have our

regular caller, roadrunner Steve. Meep. Good morning, everybody. Good morning. Okay, I just heard they're going to have a Tesla in the Daytona 500 next year.

Look at. They're allowed to come in for the fire changes. Look at. But they're only allowed to come in once for a charge. And that's it. Is it a quick charge?

Yes. Will it be autonomous? That's a good question. I love that. That is hysterical. Okay. Here's the other thing. We all heard this song, 409, my little deuce, Coat, little GTO.

They even made a song about the Nash Rambler called beep beep beep. Yeah, beep beat, beep. Yeah. Beep, beep, beep. Okay. Where's the Tesla hot rod song? That's a good question. You got to write it.

Yeah. We're working on us, Steve. I forgot my extension cord, and I had to tow it back. Oh, you're a rise. You need to take your show on the road. I got one. Lightning is striking again. Yeah, Luke Christie.

Tumbleweeds, Rick. Tumbleweeds. Something again. You got to put a lot. right on top of the car. Look at it. But we need like a rim shot sound effect here. It's alive.

It's alive. It's alive. It's like Hennie Youngman just called the show. Yeah. All right, everybody have a good and safe day. Thank you. Thanks for the call. You always lining things up.

I'll tell you, we love your energy. We love it. You're quite entertaining. We are going to go. Bye-bye. We're going to go back to Josh. Now the show is going to seem very boring as I read this scintillating anonymous feedback. Now, this is a good question.

Are dash cameras provided a standard equipment on any new cars? It seems like with a few drivers obeying traffic laws and road rage, it might be a good idea to have one installed. I think they're great. I don't have one, but I think they're standard on your Tesla, right? Yeah, it's really cool. On the Tesla, you have not only a dash cam, you have a 360. degree view and it's really incredible. I'm pretty sure several manufacturers have models with dash cams.

I don't think Toyota has one yet, but I won't be surprised if that's a standard or at least an available option within the year ago. I actually haven't seen one. I didn't know Tesla had one as standard, but I have not seen them as standard options, but I can tell you that my vehicle and my wife's vehicle both have dual dash cams recording out front and out through the back of the car. Well, think about this, where autonomous cars are moving along. Right.

And it isn't going to be, tomorrow afternoon, we'll have autonomous cars. They're becoming more and more autonomous every day. So what's more important than having the cameras that you would see? And you add that to laser and sonar and visual. And all you got to do is add it. Put a video right to a recording source. In terms of determining fault in accidents and things. things like that. There's so many applications.

The Tesla is amazing that Josh, to your sharing with us about the dash cam. Josh, does your dad and I really need that dash cam in our Tesla? I mean, here we are two crazies that are on the road and we are going to achieve autonomy sooner or later. You're the safest drivers in Palm Beach County right now. They're in a contest. And part of it, by the way, the cameras are also inside the cockpit. It's just amazing. The cameras also see your eyeballs and they know where your eyes are looking.

So if you're a privacy freak, you might not want to be driving one of these cars. But part of the autonomy is going to be if you take your eye right now to drive a car that is fully autonomous, you have to be there because it's illegal. You have to be in the front seat with your hands poised on the wheel. And it knows if you're looking away. It's not going to be easy. That's so creepy. They have something called a phantom breaking.

They have all this terminology, and they are on you. It's just an amazing phenomenon when you reach autonomy. Without the autonomy, it's recording everything that I say. Yikes. Big Brother is watching. There you go. You mentioned that last week, and I read about that very subject. We are going to go back to the phones where we have Marty holding from West Palm Beach,

and John, I will get right to you after we speak to Marty. Good morning, Marty. Good. I have to disagree with Earl on something. I'm not supposed to disagree with Earl because he obviously is a car dealer knows more than me,

but maybe Earl can answer this question. If it takes eight months to a year to order a car, what year does he think there's going to be enough cars in a lot that you can buy a car the old way where you come in, make your deal, and drive the car out the same day? I don't think that's ever going to happen again. I think that I hope it doesn't happen.

The way cars should be sold, in my opinion, you should have an inventory of enough vehicles so that you could try out the vehicle you want to drive, obviously. But for a dealer to have a thousand cars on the lot, or in my case, with our dealership, It wasn't unusual for it to have, what, 500 cars? It's just crazy to have that many cars. And then even if you have 500 cars, you don't have the exact car that people want. You have to go to other dealerships, and typically a dealer will get 60% or 40% or 30%, some big percentage of cars from other dealers.

So it's cumbersome, it's expensive to do. the car dealership of the future, as I say, will have representative vehicles to test drive, and then you'll be able to order a car that will be in in a matter of days or weeks. I mean, once they automate the manufacturers to build to design or request, you have the best possible of all worlds. But you're never going to see. having a zillion cars in stock and walk into a dealership and having them give you that car and take it home or spot deliver it and push you into the car, those days are going to be gone because consumers won't stand for it. Yeah, well, I feel that it's gone and I went over to Southern 441 and I asked him, I said, do you have any hybrid that I could just drive?

because I ordered a hybrid for you. And they said, no, we don't have any. But they said, oh, we could order it. I said, well, yeah, I know you could order it. The guy said, we only charge $3,500 over sticker. I said, oh, that's pretty good. But I ordered it from Earl Stewart. So this guy, who's the salesman, I forgot his name,

and I don't want to get him into trouble. He said, no, Earl Stewart, he charges over sticker. I said, look, I said, he doesn't. and even ordering stickers too much more than I want to pay. I said, that's all his markup is up the sticker. And I said on his radio show, he says how much car dealers are making. And it's obscene to me. And that's why I personally feel they're never going to go back.

And like I said, they're never going to go back to the old way. Well, if they had their way, they might. but the car dealers don't make the rules. And the consumer is getting more and more powerful every day. And this is an enlightened era we're going in in 2022. And I think people are going to be shocked at what consumerism does in the next few years. It's just consumer will be king and the consumer will make the rules and the companies will follow or they go broke. But the way cars have been sold for the past 100 years, that's a dying trade or whatever you want to call it.

But consumers are too smart today to put up with it. Yeah. Now, Jason called me and said my car that I ordered in March might be in September. So I'm waiting to see. Yeah. Yeah, that's a shame. I know that it takes so long for these cars. And we never know for sure.

We feel bad as dealers when people ask us, okay, if I order this particular model, when will be here? The truthful answer is we don't know. Yeah. And a lot of people don't understand. If you order a car, the manufacturer does not build the car you order. The manufacturers build cars, do they think you may order? and they build cars they think that the majority

people will order and if you order something that is too oddball if you order a purple car with a stick shift and no air conditioning you're never going to get the car because nobody else wants to buy one so you have to kind of think about that

if you're in a hurry for a car order something that is fairly commonplace not too oddball if you want it in a short period of time Now, I ordered the Camry X-L-E with everything on it, and I ordered it as a hybrid. Yeah, that makes it sort of an oddball, unfortunately. It's the, you know, but it's one of those things. You want to get the car you want to get.

So if you have a good transportation in the meantime, then I say you wait for what you want. It all works out. Marty, I want to add that congratulations on coming out of that dealership on scaved after spreading the word about Earl Stewart on cars. Yeah, the guy didn't like it, but I said. Did they chase you out of there? Well, they didn't chase me up, but the guy said, do you want to order a car? I said, if I have to pay $3,500 over sticker, you're never going to see me.

There you go. So, I like you, Marty. Your voice must be heard. I bought enough cars. Absolutely. I mean, I know everybody's got to make a profit. Yeah. Within reason.

A little more. Yeah. Marty, it was great hearing from you. Give us a call again. All right. Okay. Have a great weekend. We're going to go to John, calling from West Palm Beach.

Thank you for your patience, John. And Kyle, please hold on. Good morning, John. Hello. Hey, good morning. My question happens to coincide with what we're talking about, at a little bit different angle we're in the market for a certain car we have a friend that has a used car dealership he goes to auction he tells us give us the parameters of what you want

because on Wednesday because Thursday he'll start searching for the car he says and I said well we're looking at 10,000 to spend he goes all right well you're going to be looking at car for about 8 to 8500 I said why is that just well we've got our dealers fee that has to be paid and all the taxes, plus the titling and all that. And I'm thinking, okay.

And so I didn't send them any parameters because I just didn't want to go that route. I don't think there's a dealer fee for him getting a car from auction. Then my question came to you.

Or my question to you is, do you fill up your used car lot from the auction? And if so, could I give, I hope your guys are piping this into your

showroom in that because I want to give a shout out to you which is we've dealt with before a great guy in the used car but could I order a used car from the auction from you guys sure told you what I'm looking for sure yeah the prices are high I mean we buy cars at auction and we pay a lot of money for them sometimes if you listen to the show or past months you know we've actually seen new cars selling at auction for more than MSRP. Car dealers are actually taking new cars they get from the manufacturer to the used car auction and selling them at the auction for thousands of dollars more than they pay the manufacturer even over MSRP. So the market is topsy-turvy now. But yeah, you want to buy a used car,

you can go to a dealer if you'll work with you. We would. A lot of dealers will. And they'll say, we'll find this car for you. We'll buy it. We'll mark it up and make a profit. sell it to you. And I think what your friend with a used car a lot, he wasn't, when you said dealer fee, he probably was referring to an auction fee because the auction does charge the buyers there

to make a purchase. So, you know, there's a two, three, or four hundred dollar auction fee that he might have been referring to. No, it was $400 for the auction fee. Okay. I forgot to mention it. His dealer fee is $9.95. Oh, your buddy's going to charge you a dealer fee.

he's not that good a friend does he oh boy my mistake that's why I'm going to give you his used car now I can't do a secret shopper on him because he knows me yeah

Hugh can talk to his manager and you give him what you're looking for and we'll do our best to find it for you he's the owner I thought you're talking about your never mind I got confused all right

oh that's it all right so it was great hearing from you do you have any other questions no that's it I give someone else a chance I don't like to run on well thank you for sharing all that with us we surely appreciate it

have a wonderful weekend we're going to go to Kyle who's been holding good morning Kyle hey good morning guys when you have friends like that who needs enemies I just wanted to say

that I really like to hear the Brayman Honda shop you did the other week. I thought there about a month ago, and I was actually going to suggest that you shop them, but then you guys did it just weeks after I visited it. Everything you found out was, you know, the stuff I saw. I just went to test drive the new Honda H.R.V. And they, you know, it was $6,000 over MSRP after all the fees and markup and, you know, crappy accessories.

and everything and it was just yeah unbelievable they the salesman was really nice but that was the only good thing thing about it they uh just what you saw too about the destination fee they tried to say in the email that it was an extra 995 for destination and i said to him i was like well destination on the hrv is $1,200 i'm like is this an additional fee and then he said oh well i think i made a mistake i'm not sure double dipping it was yeah yeah double and then now And I ended up talking to the sales manager on the phone for like 15, 20 minutes, and saying, he was telling me how they have the lowest markups at any Han dealer. And I said, well, do you know there's dealers that don't charge over MSRP?

And I brought up you guys, of course. And I asked them, I said, well, what do you guys say when people bring up Earl Stewart at your dealer? And he said that, oh, well, we just have a meeting about that this morning. And he said that what Earl Stewart does is they're taking customers. off the market by ordering them a car and they stop shopping around and then when the car comes in they charge a bunch of fees and I said no they don't do that I said I bought cars from them before they don't do that you know I know he probably feels bad because his manager his boss is telling him what to say and I would just never ever buy a car from Brayman yeah definitely lots of

information I'm we always like to know what they're saying about us so we love it we love it And, you know, Bremen just proves what a treacherous seller's market it is, and it's great hearing from you, and what we're doing is working. And do you mind if I ask another question for Rick? Certainly. Go ahead. It was about transmission fluid. I have a 2020 corolla, and I've asked you before on the YouTube about the lifetime fluid, and I know you suggest not. to do it because that's what Toyota suggests, but I've just heard so many other opinions on

YouTube and mechanics, and I'm just so torn about Toyota's lifetime transmission fluid because I drive for work, so I already have 150,000 miles on it, and I want to get at least three or 400,000 or 400,000. Can one fluid actually last, you know, 400,000 miles? Well, my personal opinion, my 2013 Tacoma has 154,000 miles on it. And I have changed that fluid. And now, bear in mind, I have used my truck for towing quite a few times. And towing puts a lot of stress on the transmission and on the fluid. And I have changed that fluid exactly zero times.

Toyota says in their books, WS fluid is good for the life of the vehicle. You don't need to change it. And I trust that. And I've seen Toyotas with hundreds of thousands of miles on WS fluid that has never been changed and it just keeps on going. Okay, is there anything with Toyota

that if they did have a transmission problem and they suggested that, that they would actually like back it up with covering some kind of repair? Other than their normal warranty for 5 years, 60,000, they really don't. But, you know, I mean, your case, yours is a bit of a special case,

150,000 miles on a 2-year-old, well, almost a 3-year-old car. that's that's a lot of miles but yeah bear in mind that that's generally going to be like highway miles probably which are some of the easiest on the transmission you're not putting a big strain on it you're not towing you're going at easy rates you're probably i'm going to guess an easygoing driver that doesn't do a lot of hard acceleration and hard stops which you know that's the way you take care of a car and general driving it doesn't it might last a half million miles or more for you yeah the um actually just got my brakes done for the first time uh the brake pad you guys did them and uh yeah even in the

maintenance is very nice yeah i think you're in good shape goldberg hit i love how rick and uh tell that you're a gentle driver just by the sound of your voice is that's quite a talent right well definitely the amount of miles that he drives the car are going to be highway miles And if he's driving that many miles, he's probably someone that takes good care of his car. You're like Sherlock Holmes over there. As a mechanic, I have to be. Dr. House. Yeah, definitely.

There's one other thing, guys. I was the one that said I'm from Hershey, Pennsylvania, and said that those dealers up there are really good. There's not actually any dealers in the town of Hershey. But, you know, they're 10 or 15 minutes down the road in Harrisburg and Mechanicsburg. So the Falkland Group of dealers and Bobby Rahal, they're all MSRP and MSRP and and nothing above you know great nice that's who I dealt with when I lived up there so yeah I recall you sharing that information with us before it's a great story yeah we're glad that they're doing some good work and Hershey okay well have a good day guys thank you

thank you for the cool uh the street lights with the Hershey kisses on them oh I love Hershey I got through there one time beautiful place we're going to go to uh that's true Rick we're going to go to Charles and uh from what I see here on the screen he's from North Palm Beach, well, residing in North Palm Beach, and he's from Connecticut. Good morning. Good morning, Charles. I have a general question. I have babied my 2009 XC-70 Volvo, and it's got about 68,000 miles on it, and I'd like to keep it and possibly pass it on to one of my sons. The question I've got is, I'm thinking about just as a preventive maintenance issue,

replacing the hoses and belts on that car. I mean, it's 13 years old. And I'm wondering, Rick, one approximate cost, is this a good idea? And you have any other ideas? Your point about that timing belt got me thinking about all of this. So that's my general question. As for the cost of it, I really couldn't speak to that because I don't even know how many hoses or belts the XC might have.

However, 13 years old, I think it wouldn't be a bad idea as a preventative maintenance to go ahead and get them done. What I would do is I would check around to find a good qualified outside mechanic and an aftermarket mechanic who is trained in Volvo. There is a place on Palm Beach Lakes Boulevard called Prestige Auto. I see them doing a lot of work with European cars. and one thing I've noticed is or a big apartment it's on US 1 just north of Palm 6th Boulevard

and anytime I drive past there their yard is full and I mean they are hundreds of cars it seems like of course anytime after hours they get them all packed away inside the shop Prestige Motors Prestige Auto Repair

Prestige Auto Repair Yeah I think pretty certain that's the name of it and there's got to be a reason why they have that many people bringing their cars there I just I would I would say it's a good place to check get a couple of estimates you'll stop at a couple places and maybe even go online to the Volvo forums and find you know local Volvo owners and ask them who they use for mechanics and check them out for estimates on what they would

charge you to replace those hoses and hoses and belts but generally I think it's a good idea that just as a preventive maintenance thing Do you have any other things that you'd also throw in the mix? Just a general inspection, check the tires, the age of the tires, look for any damage or wear conditions, checking the brakes, and other than that, just a good inspection by a qualified mechanic. Charles, you sound like a guy that takes care of his car. My guess is you've probably had all the factory recommended maintenance done.

So when you do that, you've got yourself a real diamond, and Duvalvo is a good car, and I think, you know, have one to check it over. But as long as you've done the owner, the factory recommended maintenance, the car is probably going to be fine. And the hoses, obviously, as we talked about, which should be replaced.

Okay. Thank you very, very much. Oh, you're welcome, Charles. Thanks for the phone call. Okay. We are going to go back to Josh. All right. Here's an anonymous feedback.

This sounds like a question that might tickle some of your ideas, Dad. Many years ago, a Chevy dealer offered car that had weird color combos like green paint and a red interior these were cars that were ordered and when customers saw them they refused to take delivery i know a guy who ordered a buick without air conditioning so of these ordered cars some must be made special at least at that time as opposed to taking the next allocation of that color combination am i right so i guess he's asking if there's a some oddball car sitting on a lot was that a ordered vehicle that a customer requested

specifically? Probably not as many as there used to be. I mean that does pique my memory from the years back when I was evil and snapped the thing I reminded myself of I used to order when I had a Pontiac dealership. I used to order stick shift Grand Prix with no air conditioning and no tint of glass. And it's a funny story because the idea was to have it in. I still remember the price 5555 was a price $5,555,55 and the idea is they would come in, they wouldn't want to buy the stick ship with no air and I would switch them to another car and make a lot more money on it. The problem is there were some people out there that just really wanted to buy those cars and every time I order when something came in and bought it and drove me crazy

because I'm selling a car and I was selling it for probably what it cost me because I tried to keep the price down. But yes, back in the day, it was really nasty, like when I was selling cars back in the 60s and 70s, some of the stuff really went on. Today, I don't think you see it that much. I don't think car dealers have got too many more sophisticated tricks. That was a basic trick, which is really kind of a stupid way to do it. Great story. Eventually, all cars will sell. There's a saying there's a butt for every seat. So even those weird cars, we'll find a home eventually. I have another question here, very general.

How long should my car loan be? I mean, there's no one answer to that question. No, it depends on how long you want to keep the car. It depends on how good a car you're buying. You know, I used to say anybody that finances a car for six years, 72 months, or even 84 months is crazy. But, you know, 25 or 30 years ago, that was true. Today, if you've got a really low interest rate, sometimes it's better to weigh the cost of the financing against the length of the financing. If somebody has zero financing for 60 months, grab it.

But you weigh it against a discount that would be the alternative. So it's not a simple answer. I don't think it's such a good idea to finance a car for seven years, but, I can't say positively. And with cars lasting longer, like we've said, it's not as treacherous to finance a car for six years. Yeah, great question. We're going to go back to the phones, Josh,

and we're going to talk to Becky from West Palm Beach. Good morning, Becky. Good morning. How are you, Nancy? Oh, we're great. How are you doing, Becky? I'm doing great. I love your show, listen every week.

Oh, thanks so much, Becky. I have a story to tell you about Brayman earlier. my good friend she turned in a Honda SUV and bought a new Honda SUV so recently she applied to renew her tag and they told her

that she owed $400 to a tow company up in Melbourne she said what are you talking about I gave that car to the car dealer apparently after they took possession of the car I don't know she doesn't know what happened either, but somebody must have took that car off the lot, or we don't know what happened.

But it ended up in Melbourne, and the towing company had to tow it, and they're charging her because that car was still in her name. Unbelievable. And, of course, she tried to talk to Brayman and say, you know, I gave that car to you, so you pay it, and they know, absolutely they won't. We love these stories. Have you ever heard of that before? Yeah.

Amazing. Earl? Josh. Any advice? No, I'm sorry. I wasn't paying attention to that question. Reading a text from a customer. Okay.

Becky, thanks for sharing the story with us. Yeah, that's crazy. I mean, she doesn't want to have to pay that money, but if she wants the tag renew, she has to drive to Melbourne. They won't even talk to her at with phone. She has to go to the towing company and pay the money. Yeah, I've never heard that.

Okay, so the vehicle was purchased in Melbourne? No, no. No, the vehicle is purchased here in Brayman. Yeah, right here. Oh, okay. Yeah. Okay. Because she turned over her old car, and somehow it ended up in Melbourne after she gave it to Brayman on the side of the road, you know, like broken down or something.

Yeah. So the vehicle she traded in ended up on the side of the road somewhere else. Yeah. And they never completed the registration of the vehicle, so it was still attached there. That's, I mean, that's on the dealership. That's unheard of. They never acknowledged anything at all? I think you need a lawyer.

Yeah, what I would recommend is taking the bill of sale, the buyer's order that she has, showing that vehicle being traded in, and then getting that to the DMV or the police or whoever's involved, and that should absolve you of any responsibility there. Yeah, that's great information, Josh. Yeah, with the date on it,

because it was like two weeks after the date that she gave them, exactly so that that'll be a time stamp letting them know that that vehicle was out of your possession before it was abandoned up in Melbourne I'm just sitting here shaking my head that's unbelievable I hope you can get that resolved all right thanks Nancy love your show thank you Becky give us a call again we have a video clip that I'm going to hold off on showing that if we don't get to it we'll get to it next week I'd like to get any text that we have are anonymous feedbacks and then get to the mystery shopping report.

Okay, very good. We'll go back to Josh. If Rick doesn't have anything for it, no? Okay, go ahead, Josh. I have one last anonymous feedback here and asked if we saw the New York Times article about California's Department of Motor Vehicles accusing Tesla of falsely advertising its driver assistance

technology and two complaints that could affect the company's ability to sell cars in the state. The agency said Tesla has misled customers by claiming in advertisements that vehicles equipped with autopilot and full self-driving capability were autonomous. If the agency's complaints to the state's office of administration of hearings that they succeed, Tesla's licenses to make and sell vehicles in California could be suspended or revoked. Yeah, I read that. I will say this. There was no intent to deceive or defraud anyone, but I will say this, as a Tesla owner,

I think they throw the word autonomous around a little lightly and it could make some people they play with the terminology, but to most people, fully autonomous means fully autonomous, and there are different degrees of autonomy. So Tesla should be more careful about the way they use the word autonomy. The way it is now with Tesla, and most people that own Teslas and are thinking about buying Teslas understand this, you have probably three different degrees of autonomy currently in a Tesla, and to reach what they call the closest thing to full autonomy, which is not really full autonomy, you have to pass a test with your car before they allow you to use it. And then once you use it, they can cancel you immediately. And we thought there's a, there are people that have had their full autonomy turned on. And then because they didn't abide

by the care and rules that you have to when you're fully autonomous, they turn the software off. And then it's no one, and they notified you, your full autonomy has been canceled because you're a bad boy. You know, where you're suspended for 30 days. So it's very tedious. I think, I think it would be crazy to cancel Tesla's license to sell cars in California. I don't think that'll ever happen, but on the other hand, I think Tesla should be more careful about making it clear what autonomy is. And the irony of Tesla being the first, like, the first, like, automotive company to be punished for false advertising when there's 800 million dealers, you know, doing worse things every single day.

Yeah, exactly. Well, that's it for the anonymous feedback if you want to get to your video. I think we might. Okay. Well, okay. Can we cue that up, John? I didn't think we would get to it, but here's a video that we've got that is remarkable, and it sums up the kind of the state of the world with automotive manufacturing and also retailing

of automotive. It's about two or three minutes, and I was quoted in this article, and that's not the reason I'm recommending it, but I really think it is very interesting. and we can go. Here we go. There are more than 16,000 auto dealerships in the U.S. And most are small businesses. But these companies face some challenges ahead.

Consumers are growing ever more accustomed to buying things online. New car makers, such as Tesla and Rivian, are selling cars directly to consumers using digital tools, bypassing dealers entirely. And record high vehicle prices have irons have irritated customers and earned rebukes from automakers. The boom in auto sales was fueled by a few factors. First, inventory was tight due to production shutdowns at the beginning of the pandemic.

But the ongoing challenge remains chips and other supply shortages. Basic economic principles. Supply is low and demand high. Prices go up. In normal times, dealers carry large inventories and have to discount much of it in order to move it. They aren't doing that now. Dealers buy cars from the manufacturer and fund those purchases with financing, so lower inventory means lower borrowing costs. They also had to get a lot more efficient during the pandemic.

A lot of what would have been done by hand in the office is now online, partially because of the need to cut staff. While the auto dealership business appears to be thriving, it does come with challenges, especially today. The franchise laws enacted in the earlier days of the auto industry were designed to protect dealers from competition from or unfair treatment at the hands of the automakers whose cars they sold. The laws more or less require new cars to be sold through dealers.

This was to prevent an automaker from, say, opening a store across the street from one of its own dealers. Companies such as Tesla have no dealers and want to sell cars directly to consumers. Earl Stewart runs a Toyota dealership in North Palm Beach, Florida. He used to own one other dealership that he sold. Manufacturers would much rather go direct today. They're looking at Tesla and Elon Musk and his success. I make good work.

Tesla has the number one selling electric car in America, and they have no dealers. So the only reason the dealers exist today is because of the state franchise laws that were lobbied in by car dealers in their associations. But analysts are not expecting the end of franchise laws in the U.S. anytime soon. Even absent such strict laws, manufacturers might still want to rely on a franchise dealer network. Dealers do suffer some reputational challenges, though. One especially controversial point lately has been the price of vehicles.

Even manufacturers have come out criticizing dealer markups. Dealers are charged $2,000, $10,000 over in this heartbeat. I think we're reaching a breaking point in the consumer. They're educated and they're just not going to take it anymore. and this has got to trickle down to the legislators and the people that need to get elected, the voters. If perception of the dealer suffers, it could have ramifications for anyone selling cars. Automakers can't dictate prices for cars, but they do have some levers they can pull. They have to approve the sale of every dealership in the U.S.

The other lever automakers can use is allocations, how many cars a dealer gets. It is based first and foremost on how much you sell, but it also can be based on customer service scores and how much you invest in your business. It may take a while, but the era of the family-owned car dealership may slowly be coming to an end. Okay. Great stuff. That sums up nicely the state of the affairs with dealers and auto manufacturers. It's going to be interesting to see what happens in the next few years. I think we need to get to the mystery shopping report. We are, but I have something to say to our callers that have called in,

and we can't thank you enough for calling in and mentioning what happened at Brayman. To get two calls in one morning is we know our mystery shopping reports are working. And today we go to Mystery Shop of Adi of Stewart. And like I tell you, weekend and we got, ladies and gentlemen, It's important that you, too, rate this mystery shopping report, and you can do so by texting us with your grade at 772-497-60. Now back to the recovering car dealer. Okay, Mr. Shopping Report, and this was composed by Josh Stewart, sitting across the table from me here. They did a great job, and I'm just reading it, but this is an interesting report.

For those of you who could not tune in last week, Agent Lightning, paid her first visit to Brayman Honda upon Beach. We've talked about that a lot today. It did not go well. Our listeners don't take kindly to paying $6,000 over MSRP, and Brahma Honda received a failing grades. Highly unusual. You normally don't fail people because they're dealers because we grade on the curve, but it was so bad we failed Brahma and Honda. We take no pleasure in sharing these bad mystery shops. We'd much rather report that Agent Lightning had a pleasant and transparent experience.

Of course, that'd be very boring every single week, but we truly want to see positive change in the auto retail industry. In fact, we long for a day when shows like our own cars will not be necessary. That's kind of sad, though. It's true. We have fun, though. This week, we sent Agent Lightning on our first visit ever to Aldi of Stewart. This dealership is owned by the Murgato Automotive Group.

And by the way, you know, Gus Morgato, isn't it? Mario. Yeah, Mario, nicknamed Gus. Yeah. Is a really good guy. I know him, and we sat on the board of directors of the Florida Automobile Dealers Association together. Now they have a total of 18 locations in Florida, New Jersey, in Illinois. It all started with founder Mario.

Gus Margato, a wonderful success story. At five years old, Mario immigrated from Cuba. He worked hard, found success in the car business, picking his way up the ranks of the Bremen organization. He branched out, funny, ironic. Everything's tying together. Yeah, he branched out on his own and brought his first dealership in Miami in 2001.

And 21 years and 18 dealerships later, the rest is history. Mr. Mogado is a good guy with all those locations, Does he really know what's happening? I can answer that. No. I mean, that's the problem with large volume, large size. You lose control. And maybe that's the reason we only have.

You can't be everywhere at the same time. Exactly. I gave up. I had multiple dealerships at one time, and I gave up. I saw it was impossible for me to control. And so now we're having a hard time just controlling the one. Is Audi Astor taking advantage of his customers during this historic? inventory shortage, Agent Lightning, paid them a visit to find out.

And here's the report speaking as if I were Agent Lightning. I roamed the showroom for several minutes before being greeted by a salesperson named Brian who offered his assistance. We began a discussion of my wants and needs. He went over the sedan options. They had in stock, the Audi A3, A4, A5, not very imaginative when it comes in a name. Yeah, why don't think I'm up with it? The Germans, like the BMWs and Audi's, they have very just plain.

German efficiency. That's exactly right. He described each trim level one by one in great detail to me and my daughter. Brian was a fountain of information and very, very thorough. Outside, despite the heat, he made sure we saw each and every vehicle that was available. Sweating, I picked a white 22, Audi A3. Sticker price is $40,520, and no surprise next to that was an addendum, the old addendum sticker, with three extras. Wheel locks, $199, nitro, nitrogen, $199, Prima plate, $399.

There was about $100 of junk fees. That brought the total to $41,317. Satisfied that this was the car from me, suggested we had inside. and he would ready the car for a test drive. Back inside, he offered us a beverage and M&M's. That's a nice touch. I had to include that detail because I was just tickled by that. And I love M&MNs.

Who doesn't like Eminemps? Took a copy of my license. He then suggested we sit in a car and get comfy while he put our information into the system. He joined us in the car a little bit later, gave us a detailed explanation of all the controls and features. We learned all about the car. and Brian, six years, I'm telling Audi.

Is that Audi or Audi? It depends on what part of the country you're from. Okay. Down here, it's Audi. Audi, okay. Howdy, howdy, out of the test drive, we headed back to the showroom. After making sure I didn't want to drive any other models, he asked how I plan to pay for the vehicle.

I told him I plan to finance. He entered some numbers onto an iPad, showed it to me. The screen had an outdoor breakdown, on one side and a grid with different monthly payments from the other side. The selling price was $41,317. Doc stamps, 143.15. I'll mention that later if we have time because that's disturbing, dock stamps. Dealer fee, $9.99, you see that all the time.

Licensed fee, sounds legitimate. $432, don't know for sure. Electronic filing fee, another junk fee. That's not legitimate. $2.39.95. Battery fee, that's standard, SLP, $6.50. You wonder why did they put that in there? They put that in there because it's official, it's legitimate, and they actually pay it, and there's no tax on that. And so you mix the legitimate end with the illegitimate, and you kind of get smoked over. Good tactics.

Yeah, good tactic, yeah. Tag agency fee, $89, junk fee, illegitimate, you know, not right. M-V-W-E-A. I had to Google this. That stands for Motor Vehicle Warranty Enforcement Act. It's actually a Florida statute or law, and somehow it allows them to charge a fee. I think we need to do some research and attack this on a future show. Sounds like part of the smoke, like the battery fee.

Exactly. It makes it a legit fee. I mean, for two bucks, I mean absorb it, right? Yeah. You're charging. Why itemize that? It's one millionth of a percent of the price and you put it there. Anyway, a tax, sales tax, $2,604 and $75.

That's legitimate. And the balance is $45,000, $832.35. All told with junk fees, all told with junk fees and dealer ads, we were about $2,100 over a sticker. Now, let me say this, there's a lot of junk, but the total is not shocking. I mean, 2,100. Not in this market. Not in this market.

That's pretty gentle, actually. It's at the low end of the over MSRP. On the payment side, there were several options. The lowest payment was highlighted in green, $561 for 72 months with $10,000. Just on that, if I may interject, that's actually a very, that was an interest rate somewhere into three to four percent range so that it was not a it was not an atrocious sounding interest rate so on the financing side of that proposal it sounded like they were being somewhat fair so I thanked him and let him know I'd be in touch he said that although he could not hold the

car for me he would park it way in the back so well but see it was a far more subtle gentlemanly sort of a pressure yeah I got the impression this was a very thorough and very a very talkative salesperson. That was the temperature of AJ Lightning's text there. And after the terrible shopping report a couple weeks ago with Bremen Honda, I have to say we grade on the curve and as we document all these individual fees like doc stamps, dealer fee, license fee, electronic volume fee, it sounds really, really bad, but it's kind of SOP. So we grade on the

curve and there we are. No real pressure, and let's see what the grades are. As the grades come in. Well, I have one from Mark right here. I can kick off. He says, too many crappy fees. He gives them a C-minus. I think that's a pretty fair assessment.

Rick, anything coming through on YouTube there? So far, just one. Tom Steckle says D-minus, an upscale dealer operating like Hollywood Kia. And Tim Gilliland, nitrophil, really? Not the worst, but still too many fees. And he gives him a C. No, I'm still, I'm still shaking from the Bremen Honda one. And it was so bad that that was an F.

And we gave them an F. And we don't usually give us. So, again, A's are rare, F are rare, but we do great on the curve. The one thing that bothered me most about, and I don't even think that Audi of Stewart realized this, dock stamps, it was a small amount, $143.15. There are no dock stamps unless you finance a car. Well, he did ask how you, and she said, that was part of the report, she said, I plan to finance. So there's a little bit of, like, legitimacy to them, including that there, I suppose. But that's charged by the lending company, and it's included in the monthly payment.

Yes, but I guess if it would reflect, well, it wouldn't reflect her total amount of finance because it included interest charges. So it's a little pretty shady that it's there for sure. Okay. What's your great, Nancy? Well, I'm going to give them a C. It's a pretty good mystery shopping report. Not great, but it's okay. but it's a passing grade, he'd almost go over a C, but I agree.

I think that's a C. I'm not crazy about the nitrophil. It's an old story. Everybody knows about it. I have a Frank here. He says, I'm very familiar with the Audi dealership. We love the M&Ms. And Brian is a true gentleman, so he gives them a B plus.

I think personally, I was out of C, but the M&Ms are putting me up to a C plus. I'm not sure if they're peanut or plain M&M. I was just going to ask you that. If it's peanut, I would be at a B minus, but I'm just assuming she didn't mention peanut. I'm going to keep it out of C. Bob says C for Audi of Stewart. And I'm sorry, there's a correction.

Jonathan Wellington. First, he said, I'm giving them a B, but I'm giving them a C. Go ahead, Rick. I've got Negan 1. C, can't wait until all these games are over. Kyle in Pennsylvania, although he didn't give me a grade, Kyle. He says, very cool. to see you on the CNBC clip, Earl.

And we've got, let's see. Brian Sidlako, D minus too many junk fees. Rico West, C for crappy fees. Guy Larrabee, the junk fees annoy me the most. Otherwise, not bad. A solid C. Steve Ward, C minus. Far from the worst, but still think I'll shop in New York, too.

Steve also says nitro-free is, or nitro-fill is free at Costco. And for me, I'm going to go, I'm going to go a little more lenient. I'm going to say a B minus. I think the fees are a little hefty there. But I'm going to give them the benefit of a doubt and go on the curve. I think the M&Ms were a good touch. And an educated salesman, that's an important feature. Breaking news, they have both a peanut and plain M&M's, Frank confirmed.

So I'm going to, I'm going to a B minus. There you go. I don't know. I think I just learned something new about Josh. He will work for M&M's. Peanut M&M specifically. They're my favorite. Okay, I changed mine, too, to a C-plus.

All right. Well, congratulations. But not because of the M-Ms, because of the call-in we had for the person that... Yes, Frank gives a special shout-out to Brian for you to a gentleman. C-plus, yeah. Anybody else have something for me? I know, I think we're good. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you so much for tuning in to Earl Stewart on cars.

we sure had a great time this morning with you and we enjoy your company you're a big part of the show and we do appreciate you have a great weekend we'll be right back here next Saturday morning 8 a.m.