Earl Stewart on Cars - 08.22.2020 - Your Calls, Texts, and Mystery Shop of Arrigo West Palm

Episode Date: August 22, 2020

Earl answers various caller questions and responds to incoming text messages. Earl's newest mystery shopper, Agent Lightning, visits Arrigo West Palm Beach to see if she can get the large discount on a 2019 Jeep Wrangler as seen on their website. 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. “Disclosure: Earl Stewart is a Toyota dealer and directly and indirectly competes with the subjects of the Mystery Shopping Reports. He honestly and accurately reports the experiences of the shoppers and does not influence their findings. As a matter of fact, based on the results of the many Mystery Shopping Reports he has conducted, there are more dealers on the Recommended Dealer List than on the Not Recommended List he maintains on www.GoodDealerBadDealerList.com”

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

Good morning, everybody. We're very happy to be here. This is Earl Stewart, the recovering car dealer, and I'm live now. You were listening to my recorded introduction there. We're in the studio again. We're all wearing masks. the new normal how do you feel about this

it's an interesting time in our lives isn't I? I was born in 1940 and I've been through a lot of crazy stuff. This is about the craziest I've been through so we're here to address a particular part of the craziness which is how to buy a car

during the pandemic and how to buy a car without being taken advantage of you might say well that's what you've been talking about for 17 years and this is true, but things have changed during this COVID-19 situation. It's changed everything. It's changed the way cars are sold, bought, everything, Amazon, Publix, Target, Costco. You're probably buying more online now than you are anywhere else.

Once the last time you went into a brick-and-mortar store, you're nervous about it, because you're having to wear the mask and wash the hands, social distancing. So these are crazy times. We want to make your life a little easier, and I think we can. We've adjusted in full disclosure and transparency. We are a car dealership. We have a car dealership. We've been doing it for quite a while. Rick Kearney, Sue Stewart, Nancy Stewart, all my team here in the studio, radio studio, we're in the retail business, and we sell cars every day. So we've adjusted. tremendously the way we just cars, the way we sell cars, and so have most other dealers.

Strangely enough, and this amazes a lot of people, the car business is fabulous today. Car dealers, not all of them, in certain pockets of the country, if this isn't so, but I would say generally speaking, the car business is as good or better today than it's been in a long, long time. People are buying more used cars, more new cars, and it baffles me. But I accept it. I'm glad because I am a car dealer. And we're having record month after record month. And not so with service so much, but new and used cars.

So it's happening everywhere. But we're going to tell you how to adjust your procedure in buying, things you should do a little bit differently. than you did before, because you're the reason the car dealers don't so while you're buying more cars. I'm going to go around the studio here, and we have a very, very special thing that is happening today, and I'm going to let Nancy Stewart, my co-host, talk about it. She has been with me since from the get-go. She's a founder of this show back 17 years ago with me when we were only half an hour, and she single-handedly gets the prize for building our female.

audience to parody 50-50. And why shouldn't it be? They buy half the cars. They, meaning you ladies out there. Thank you, thank you, thank you. You do the service, you do the parts buying and the car buying. So you should be an equal voice. Well, I'm going to turn the mic over to Nancy. She'll tell you something that we should have done a long time ago, but thanks to her prodding, this happens. Mrs. Sunrise and Nancy Stewart. Okay. Thank you. Good morning, everyone. I want to thank all of you for being with us this morning.

You're at an enormous, important part of the show, everyone. And I also want to reach out to ladies and let you know that I have $50 for the first two new lady callers this morning. If you have a question, an opinion, constructive criticism, a money. So the first two new lady callers, 877-967. So, 9960, where you can text us, at 772-4976530. How about Lightning? Well, that's a real and exciting part of our mystery shopping report. Absolutely.

I'm so excited about it, and we do have Agent Lightning, a female mystery shopper. And my hat is off to her. She did what I think, a great job. It took, well, some know-how. It took a little dramatics. And you just don't qualify with one attribute to be a mystery shopper. So she did very well for the first time. Historian part of the show, finally, after 17 years, we have equal shoppers going out.

We have a female shopper full-time, and we have a male shopper full-time. They went out together last week, and that was the training mission. Agent Lightning passed with flying colors, and she did her solo mission, and that will be discussed in the letter half of the show, and we'll leave it up to you. Please stay tuned, the second half of the show, Agent Lightning, who is now alternating with Agent Thunder for a mystery shop, and we learn a lot from those mystery shops. Let's go to Stu, who was our cyber expert and our mystery shopping expert. He's a spy master.

You know, excuse me for interrupting you. I'm going to thank him for coming. He was pretty clever. You know, he names these mystery shoppers. And we have Agent Thunder. Now we have Agent Lightning. What's next? He's pretty creative.

How about a child? I'll tell you what. That used to be true. I used to make up the names just to make. it sound clever. I like Agent X. It sounded mysterious and threatening in a way. No, actually Agent Thunder came up with his own name and I think he and Agent Lightning worked out the Agent Lightning name themselves. So they came up, they said, hey, that's what we want to be called, that's our call

sign. I said, it sounds good to me, and there you go. We got a lot of folks out there that aren't familiar with the report, so Stu, why don't you tell them a little bit about what's so exciting and different about the Mr. Shopping? Okay, so this actually started a with the show, I think it was always a feature, going back 17 years. And every single week, we send a undercover agent to a car dealership, large or small. It could be a big franchise, new car dealer. It could be a 10 car lot, you know, just a buy here, pay here, just an independent place. And they go in, and they pretend to be a real buyer, and they go in and see what happens.

So sometimes there'll be a theme for the mission. We'll find an advertisement that looks too good to be true or just something that looks just really uh really sketchy we'll send them in on that sometimes we'll send them in and say don't have a plan just see what happens or sometimes we'll go in there and go in there and be a pain in the butt to the salesperson really challenge them on everything see what happens another persona is to go in go in and just uh let themselves be taken advantage of believe everything they say so it's a lot of fun and there's a lot of variables that we can do so are you amazed at least i know i say this every week but i just i can't get out of my head. We have never been sued. You would think somebody would sue us because they

were angry, but they haven't sued us, and we named names of salespeople, sales managers, dealerships, and we actually use the word criminal and crime, and you broke the law. And lie. Now, if I, if I go up to Rick Kearney and I say, Rick, you stole that guy's spark plugs, and you didn't do it, and I did it maliciously, boy, you could own the dealership. I mean, if you say something malicious and it's a lie, you go to jail. I mean, you can, maybe not go to jail, but it'll cost you a ton of money. Yeah, the closest thing that happened, we were, somebody tried to intimidate us. That was Offleys Only, it was two years ago.

Yeah, and now we're friends. We're buddies with Offleas Only, and not because of that. That wasn't any agreement. But, yeah, they wanted us to stop saying that they were selling Takata cars without disclosure, and we prevailed in that. But it's a lot of fun, and I'm also really surprised that after all this time, you know, there's a limited number. I mean, there's a lot of car dealerships, but there's a limited amount. And we have managed to cycle our way through the big and the small, and it helps by having somebody like Agent Lightning. And this is addressed in the report with a fresh face.

we can kind of hit all the ground that we already tread. So it's exciting. I like having a lot new opportunities, and it makes my job a lot easier. Let me give these numbers out. If we go 10 minutes without numbers, it's not a good idea. Our call-in number is 877-9-60-99-60. Again, that call-in number 877-9-60-9-9-60,

texting is very popular. I prefer texting, but I don't say that. I like the call in because you have the humanity, the warmth, the personal touch. The texting is good because we can backlog them and get them to them at different times as the show gets busy. The text number, a lot of people just prefer it because, you know, they don't want to be live on radio. Text number, 772-4976530. Text 772-497-6-530, and arguably it has become, surprisingly, the most popular input to the show, Your Anonymous Feedback.com. They start coming in the day before the show, and people just love total anonymity.

When you use this, Your Anonymous Feedback.com, when you use that, no one can ever find out who sent it. You have total anonymity, you can say anything you want. Interestingly enough, we don't get a lot of attacks. We get a few, but most of it is just normal stuff. People want to find out, and your anonymousfeedback.com. So please, oh, I forgot to mention that the telephone calls we get priority to because we don't like people to hold for a long time. We've only got three or four lines coming into the radio station here.

That's right. And so we don't want to have one on hold to long. Do we have somebody holding? And we're going to take advantage of that. Jessica's holding, and she's calling us from Sebring. Jessica's a regular caller, and she's a regular listener, her and her husband, Nigel. Good morning, Jessica. What can we do for you this morning?

Hey, Jessica, you there? Oh, Jessica. Yeah, I turn your radio down. Me? Jessica. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Hey, hi, Jessica. Hi, good morning. How are you?

Great. Thank you for being part of the show. I was just telling everyone, I don't think you heard me, that you are a regular part of the show, you and your husband, and we thank you for tuning in. Oh, you're so welcome. Thank you for having the show. It's absolutely awesome. We learn something new every single week. Oh, thank you. What can we do for you this morning?

Okay, so here's my question. Do car dealers prefer that you finance versus paying cash? Yes. Finance through the dealership that you're purchasing the vehicle from? Yes. Or finance from your own bank? No. Do they rather have finance?

Would they rather you finance through the car dealership itself than to pay cash or come in with a check from another finance company? A thousand percent, yes. Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. The dealership is going to, you know, well, they're going to make a whole lot more money by financing that deal. And what happens is you've got the dealership, you have the middleman, you've got, there are a lot of people, there are a lot of players. it's not to your advantage. There's more ways of taking advantage of you

and you know there's a lot of consumers that think that they could pay cash and this is going to be a big advantage so with that said I'm going to turn this over to the star of the show, Earl Stewart. What do you have to say? Jessica, they make twice as much car dealers make twice as much financing the car as they

do selling the car profit. On the sale of the car day is very low, new cars especially, and they make up for it by financing, and they're allowed to mark the interest rate up from what they get the money from the bank for. So they go to a bank too. Car dealers do not finance the car themselves. A lot of people think that they actually work with a bank, and the bank finances the car, but the car dealer gets a kickback from the bank. So the bank will charge the car dealer, two and a half percent for the money. And then they give the price to the customer you, three and a half, four and a half, five and a half, eight percent, as much as they can get away with. They mark up the money and they make a huge amount of money on that margin. Then they

sell you things like maintenance, gap insurance, extended warranties, a lot of other things. So if a car dealer today is they'll have a net profit, if they're lucky they'll have a net profit of 800 or $1,000 if they're lucky on a new car, whereas in the finance department, they'll make up to $2,000 or more. It's not uncommon for a dealer to make $4,000 or $5,000 on the financing of the car, and they'll only make maybe $1,000 on the sale of the car. So always arrange your own financing through your bank or through your credit union. And if you deal with a dealer, sometimes the manufacturers have good rates.

So if you're buying a Honda and Honda finance will loan the money at a subsidizedly low interest rate, that can be a good deal too. And Jessica, another thing is when you're in the finance department, they have a lot of things to sell you. That's another step in the sales process. So they sell finance insurance products and other things to buy. And some of these costs thousands of dollars. When you're selling it to somebody who is looking at a payment, it's a much easier sell to say, hey, you buy this warranty. it's going to cost you $15 a month versus saying, hey, I got a warranty,

it's going to cost you $2,500. So once you get somebody converted to finance in the car, selling a lot of stuff makes it a lot easier for the dealer. And also, Jessica, let me ask you this. You said something about paying cash. I have to ask you with your thoughts on that, or

do you feel that you have an advantage by paying cash? I was thinking that there was an advantage. managed by paying cash or even getting outside financing. It seems like there's a difference in the attitude of the car dealers like, no, you know, don't pay cash. It doesn't make sense.

You know, we have financing. That's true. Absolutely. I hear this a lot at the dealership, you know, a customer will say, well, I'm paying cash with intending to say that it's a better deal for the dealer. You're getting your money all at front. But like Earl said earlier, when you finance a car through a third-party lender or a manufacturer's lender, the dealer's getting paid all at once anyway. So when you're making payments to the bank, but the dealer gets all his money, so there's no cash doesn't have the appeal it might have had in the past if a dealer was financing the car himself.

Got it. Got it. Wow. Yeah, there's a. Thank you so much. You're welcome. You know, as I always say, knowledge is power. and doing your homework prior, not only just shopping for your vehicle,

but to shop for, you know, financing, you can say yourself a great deal of money. These dealerships make an awful lot of money whenever you have them, you know, financing and selling you everything but the kitchen sink. I hope I answered your question and the panel answered. Is there any other questions? No, absolutely. Actually, my husband had a question, but he's run out to the garden. But I can tell you what his question was, if that's okay. Okay.

He wanted to know, because he's been seeing all these commercials about, he's new to this country. So he's been seeing all these commercials about Car Shield, the warranty. so he was wondering if it's worth it and I've listened to the show I've heard your thoughts so I just I just wanted to you know he wanted to know from you if the car shield if that's a good deal we have an older car is that does it make sense okay great Jessica we'll answer that question we'll hang up right now and we'll answer Nigel's question if you don't mind. Sounds good.

Thank you for having the show. It's absolutely awesome. We appreciate it, and we'll see you next week. Thank you so much. Spread the word. And have a wonderful weekend. Okay, what was Nigel's question? Okay, Nigel was, his topic was warranties,

and he was interested in information on, I believe it was Car Shield. Is that what he said? Yeah, the warranties, the warters that are being merchandise on television, by email, by phone solicitation, or garbage. I got one the other day on my car, and they shotgun out these warranty offers.

Typically, they're powertrain warranties, meaning that they're valueless, and they charge a lot of money for them. So if you're going to buy an extended warrant in a car, try to buy one through a manufacturer, and if you buy one through a dealer, make sure you find out carefully what it covers what is it not cover and how much they cost because rule of thumb don't buy an extended warranty buy a reliable car if you buy a car that's recommended by consumer reports reliability maintenance is low you don't need a warranty

if you feel better as you sleep better at night shop and compare warranties don't deal through the mail or the television deal with the manufacturer or the dealer but then be real careful when you're dealing with a dealer. Prices, in my opinion, are too high on the warranties. Yeah, and Nigel, thanks for the question, but I've got to tell you that these warranty companies, they're in business that make a whole lot of money. Thanks for tuning in. We'll talk to you next week.

We are, well, first of all, let me give you that phone number, 877-960, or you can text us at 772-497-60, and don't forget www. Your Anonymous Feedback.com. We're going to go to Frank, who's been holding. Thanks for your patience, Frank. Well, good morning, Nancy and Earl and the rest of the gang. Good morning. First off and foremost, I need to offer you an apology.

I did not listen to your advice a few months ago, and now I need your help how to untangle this mess I got into. Are you ready? I'm sorry to hear that. What can I do? Well, I co-signed for my son's truck a few months ago at your dealership, and it was a very nice, pleasant experience as far as your sales lady and, I believe his name's Franco in the back.

Anyway, it was a good experience. Unfortunately, my son only made the first payment, now he's not making payments. Oh, no. So, of course, they're calling me because the title is in my name with him. and obviously I'm making the payments because I don't want my credit score to get messed up and he's not answering my phone calls and things like that. Regrettfully, now in retrospect, he took both keys.

So I need to get the truck back. And I did speak to someone in your service department. They said you can't just give me a key because they're computer coded or something. So I guess I need to tow the truck to you. Is that the best way to get it? Yeah, that's the only way it's going to, Yeah, because we need it on site to program.

Oh, I only ask Rick, is it possible with a laptop or you have to be tied into the system to program? Could it be done off-site? Technically it can, but for me to actually do it with the laptop, I have to call back to the shop, and a manager, well, actually, you could even do it on TIS, has to go on to the Toyota site and authorize my request to release our...

remote to me so that I can re-program the computer yeah it would be yeah and we can get your deal on towing Frank I'm real sorry that happened I say I know it's a lot worse than just having your credit room when you have a family situation like that and I'm very very sorry to hear it usually one of the best things to do when you have an issue a credit issue is talk to the lender the lender is probably Toyota if you bought the vehicle from us and we can certainly talk to them on your behalf I see what alternatives and this is not an uncommon problem, unfortunately, and I know how you must feel about it. We give you some advice on the value of the truck and what you could get it for it, and see what the payoff is.

We can get all that kind of stuff out of the way, but the number one thing is alert the lender so they know what's going on. If they know that they have a person that they can deal with and answer questions, the thing they fear is car being left on the side of the curb, people don't make their payments and they disappear, that becomes a very expensive thing to a lender. But when there's a friendly conversation going on, things get a whole lot better. So we'll help you any way we can. We'll get that car towed in.

We probably get you a free tow. Yeah, absolutely. Frank, just give me a call, and I can help you arrange all that. Okay, yeah, it's a Tacoma truck, so I mean, as far as, is it hard to pull it up on the truck if it's locks and stuff? Rick could probably answer that, but we can, they drag it basically if they can't get into the vehicle, so. Worst comes, they would use a flatbed and they'd simply drag it right up on, or if they were going with a regular tow truck, they would jack up the back end and put dollies under their rear wheels. The good news, Frank, is the fact that Tacoma truck is a high-demand, low-supply vehicle. especially a used vehicle and the used car market is very strong now and that works on your in your favor

so we'll come up with a as painless of solutions we can for you and we're very sorry this happened you know frank it's a pretty sensitive topic most definitely you know and it wasn't it's really great that you called us and felt so comfortable with the panel with the show you are a regular listener to share this with us. And when you get into family, I spoke to you early on about this. You know, I too have children, and you get involved emotionally, and you wear your heart on your sleeve, and sometimes these things happen. But as Earl said about a buyer's market right now, you're in good shape.

Oh, yeah, I mean, the truck's three months old, and I haven't seen it. Unfortunately, it's down in Miami. Is that going to present any problem? No, I don't think so. Not at all. But you know where it's located, correct? I believe so. Well, I'll find that out, and I'll come by and see you guys. Okay. Sounds good. Thanks again for your show.

Bye-bye. All right. Thank you, Frank. Give us a call to all free at 877-9-6960, or you can text us at 77249-9-7-9-7-6-5-30. And don't forget, www.W your non-nosefeedback.com. fantastic mystery shopping report coming up so stay tuned for that i got a great text here that was relevant to your opening statements okay let me just uh mention rick a lot of people are new and tuning in and one of the most interesting things and beneficial things for the show especially during the pandemic is rick's ability to answer questions about problems with your car a lot of people

don't want to go into the service department uh they want to stay home they have maybe a little noise or a squeak or a odor or a driving issue with a vehicle and maybe they don't want to have to go in and wear the mask and sit in the waiting room and so on you know the drill so if you have a little something that you'd like to ask Rick about the drivability of your car a problem just give Rick a call been on the business for a quarter century plus he knows everything about cars and he might give you a shortcut or a suggestion that allow you to delay having to spend the money or come in and expose yourself. So Rick Kearney, he's here and won't fake calls. Sorry, I interrupted. Stu, go ahead.

We have a text from Andreas, and he says, good morning, Earl. I'd like to take a stab at answering your question. Why are so many consumers buying new and used cars? I believe it might be because it is one of the great freedoms to be mobile. I also believe that it might be out of necessity. A relative of mine has been given a tremendous opportunity to interview for an excellent job, but the interview is very far away. He needed to quickly purchase a more reliable car. Others need a vehicle for critical hospital visits. Lastly, it may just be for fun or because you're tired of your old clunker. If I had more money and less sense, I'd have a garage larger than my house because I like cars. And that's Andreas. Very good points. We love people like you,

Andrea, and being a car dealer. And all car dealers love people who love cars. Seriously, on the why people to buy more cars. Nancy's asked this question a couple times at the beginning of the show. We haven't had a lot of input. We'd like to have your input. I'll tell you what my theory is, and this is just from Nancy, as my personal experience, we're more or less quarantined at our home. And we get cabin fever. I mean, you sit around the house all day long and you just want to get out. Well, where are you going to go? I mean, you're not going to go to a store you're not going to be walking around Costco maybe you will we don't feel comfortable

we're seniors and we don't feel comfortable so what do we do we hop in our car and we drive around and we could go somewhere that's wide open parked a car walk around get back in the car but we feel perfectly safe in our car and I think a lot of people feel that way and that is a reason cars are important it's a bubble extension you're extending your bubble

exactly and a lot of people are taking staycations I talked to somebody the other day, a customer was actually a complaint. He lived in Boca Raton, and he was over at the Hilton, I think, in Singer Island, and he took his family from Boca, to Hilton, and he needed a nice car to take his family over there. So this is a kind of psychological impact that has caused the surge in car buying, in my opinion. Absolutely. We are going to go to New York. and buckle up guys

see y'all we'll be back we have we have Lisa holding good morning Lisa a little humor there welcome good morning good morning and thank you so much I agree 100% about the car and the bubble you know calling from New York City where we were at the epicenter of the pandemic we were locked down for you know months and even though we're back at work

you know the city is pretty definitely and a car is freedom, absolute freedom. So, you know, we went to Connecticut one weekend via train, which wasn't so safe, and we noticed that we were able to eat outdoors. This was at a time in New York where we didn't even have outdoor seating, so we made a decision to buy a car at that moment, and I actually had called Earl Stewart and asked about how to go about the process, and you guys were so helpful, and I wanted to give you an update about where I am and also just tell you where New Yorkers are in general about buying a car. It's so difficult to buy a car right now in New York. Dealerships are closed, but of course they're making

special appointments, and we're actually on a list for a brand new car. So we went through Carvana to get our first car just a few weeks ago, and unfortunately it was a lemon. So the experience with working with Carvana was really tumultuous. It was not an easy process. I think they were at a very low capacity for staff. But luckily, when we got the lemon, they took the car back within seven days at 100% refund. Oh, fantastic. So that was fabulous.

So going down the rabbit hole and doing all this research, we realized, and by the way, the car that we purchased was a Mini Cooper, 2013 countrymen. And we noticed that Minnie was working on a program. with students and with members of the active military where this particular model called the Mini Oxford was available to them at $20,000 brand new, and it included about $8,000 worth of additional options, you know, like a moon roof, heated seats, and it was only available to, like I said, college students and members of the active military. But it turns out, with all the research, thanks to Earl Stewart and family and going down the rabbit hole. I found online that they actually opened up the program

for everybody during COVID. So it's no longer, it's just this great option. So we decided, let's get on this list. Let's try to find it. And of course, it was almost near to impossible because everybody in New York City is looking for a small compact car for parking. You know, we live in Manhattan. It's very difficult for parking. So luckily, I have a friend that I went to high school with in a dealership that was nearby, and we were able to get on to acquire the car, but of course they had to order it. It's coming from England, and so we're going into the dealership this week, and I want to be very well prepared for this, because apparently with this particular model, there's no

negotiation. You know, the price is the price, and it has been confirmed on quite a number of different consumer sites online, so there's no negotiation involved. which I understand. And then I also went into financing versus leasing. With this particular car, you can't lease. And I did read that you're supposed to at least give 50% cash if you want to get on any type of financing program. So we're prepared to do that. And also prepared to ask questions like, is there a prepayment penalty on the financing? Is the interest front-loaded? And we are prepared to also use our own financing.

If they're not willing to negotiate those terms, we can definitely go in with our own financing. And like I said, a check for half the money. So these are the types of things that I feel like are so important to be well-equipped and ask these questions, especially that there is no negotiation involved on the sticker price. Is there anything else that you think we should be prepared with? I understand listening to your show, you know, only get the manufacturers. warranty, you know, try to avoid all the extra warranties. Is there any other advice that you have for me walking into this, you know, being a first-time employer owner, I just want to make sure

that we're well-equipped. Lisa, before early answers your question, I just want to, I just want to congratulate you for doing the homework that you did. I mean, what a great story that you shared with us. You did a fabulous job, and you're still looking for more information. My great granddaughter lives in Manhattan, and she spent three days trying to purchase a vehicle, and she finally did. She got on her bicycle, and I'm not sure what the final destination was, but she found herself a range rover. But congratulations again. You certainly did do your homework. I'll let Earl finish answering your few questions you have left. Lisa, the only thing I didn't hear that you might want to consider doing is check with the competition. on your Mini Cooper. You have a price, you should have the Althador price from this dealership.

And I would go online, you don't have to drive anywhere, and I would go to two or three other Mini Cooper dealers, even if you had to go to New Jersey or Connecticut, you know, even, the idea is to have someone give you a competitive idea of what. See, I've got a car bought in New York, many cooper this is the price this is my off the door price what can you do for me you should compare competitive prices the fact that they won't negotiate the price that's okay to say and

that's okay for i understand many cupers can be in short supply and that may be the exact case the fact that they won't negotiate the price is not so bad if it truly is a high demand low supply as long as they don't put in hidden fees so that's the reason you need to get the out-the-door price you need to say to the Mini Cooper dealer when you're before you come in I'll be bringing a check-in from my credit union or my bank or my personal checking account I need to know what to write the checkout for that precludes them that that that warns them that they cannot be adding any hidden fees or dealer installed accessories often the price that you

you get on the phone or email is not the price you get when you get inside the dealership. Yeah, you know, we actually did that. We went to White Plains. We went to the Ray Cotona Mini dealership and White Plains, and I do want to call them out because they said that we had, they had a car on hold for us. They showed us the papers. They said it was a black mini with black interior. And, of course, it was the same price that this particular dealership quoted, as well as a number of dealerships.

It's 20,600. is the cost. And like I said, it's about $8,000 worth of options that are included in that price. A regular mini will cost almost $30K at that price with the options that are included. Well, you've covered it at all. If you've got competitive prices, like Nancy said, you did a marvelous job of research and being careful. I really think you probably will end up financing it through your banker credit union. the interest rates are very low today and if you have good credit you should be looking at interest rate

at 3% or less on a new vehicle and if you can get that from your own bank I would let the dealer know that this is what you can get and if they can match it or beat it that's fine but chances are they won't okay great yeah that's very helpful and I might want to just include that Ray Cotona

tried to cash our $10,000 check because they set the car fall through and they tried to actually cash our check, but we took the money out of the account when the car fell through. So I just wanted to call them out because we felt that was really inappropriate for that dealership to do that.

All right, well, that's all very helpful. I'm glad that, you know, we feel really good about walking in there, and we have to just thank you because we love listening to your show. Thank you. And without you guys, we wouldn't have felt really comfortable

even buying this car, because, of course, it's all happening, you know, super remotely here in New York. So thank you so much for informing us all. Thank you, Lisa. Thank you, Lisa. Thank you for being a great example for the ladies that are in. They are out there listening right now. You did a fantastic job.

And ladies, let me remind you you can win yourself $50 this morning. First two, new lady call, or skip us a call at 877-960, or you can text us. at 772-497-6-5-30. Now back to the recovering car dealer. Rick has got YouTube over there. Let's hear from Rick. Hey, good morning. Andrew's asking, do car dealerships purchase advertising packages from ad agencies

such as the mailers when they send out a key or a lotto number to bring you into the dealership? Oh, yeah. It's a big industry. I get solicitations on email, Facebook, every other way. There's a huge industry out there for scams and bait-and-switch, terrible, often borderline and sometimes illegal, and they will come up with ways they'll try to let you believe if you're a car dealer, they'll guarantee you this number of people, and they will guarantee you'll sell this number of cars. and if it's direct mail and oftentimes online advertising as they manage,

oftentimes it is, I would say, almost without exception, deceptive and sometimes actually illegal. Stay away from all advertising. I know this sounds like an overstatement, but it's not. Ignore all car dealer advertising. It's all phoning. Believe that. Do your own research. go online. You go to Consumer Reports, Costco. You can go Kelly Blue Book, Edmonds. There's a wealth

of information. Go to Google, and you can get all the information you want on cars. Don't pay any attention to the advertisements. Once you respond to an advertisement, the dealer has got a leg up on you, and it becomes an argument and a negotiation. Do your own research, come up with a price. you'll pay, get three competitive prices, forget the advertising. Great advice. And Guy Larrabee's asking, can you enlighten us on the manufacturers' holdback on the MSRP and why this practice is used by most manufacturers?

You know, it's been there forever. It's to be it and a bit lying. Yeah. When they started in business in 1968, I can remember talking to my father. And I said, Dad, what is this 2% that Pontiac puts in the invoice? What is this for? And he told me it was, and he believed it, I think. He says the manufacturers are worried about the dealers.

And this way it's a forced savings for them. So Pontiac and General Motors are kind enough to hold hundreds of millions of dollars of the dealer's money. By the way, there's no interest paid on that money they hold. And back in that time, they used to keep it for a year. And so the dealer would struggle for a year. At the end of the year, he gets this big check hundreds of thousands of dollars or millions, depending on the size of the dealership, and then they would have the money.

That would save the dealer from being irresponsible and gambling the money away or using it on parties and who knows what. So that was the party line for the manufacturers years ago. It's a way for the manufacturer to keep the dealer's money. Now, they give it back to you every 30 days. When you sell it. Yeah, and when you sell the car. So you get it back. But the irony is the dealers like the whole back

because it allows them to say to the customer, this is the invoice, this is what the car costs me. Meanwhile, there's holdbacks, now it's wholebacks, plural. It used to be just 2% or 3%. But think about it. Average ticket price stays about $50,000, so 2%'s $1,000. Or 5%.

5% is $1,000. No, no, no. I'm saying we're about 5% right now. 5%. Yeah, about 5%. So you're looking at thousands of dollars in profit in the invoice with a car. And so the dealers like that

because they could trick the customer. So everybody's happy. The manufacturer gets to keep the dealer's money and the dealer keeps to keep your money. And so it's like a holdback has become a game. And why it's legal, I don't know. It's really weird. We overpay for the car by about 5%.

And then we get it back when we sell it. And like you said, the fact that they're each, it's all, it's silly. So one's called actually called holdback. One's called dealer delivery of participation. That dealer, acceptance, price. And there's floor plan assistance. And then some distributorships will have holdback on the accessories that you add to the car.

So the more accessories you add to the car, the more holdback there is, which inflates the price of the car more, which makes the dealer cost of the car. When you're looking, if the dealer shows you the invoice and says, I will sell it to you at this price, he's probably making $4,000. He's making more money selling you a car

at invoice than he did if he sold it to normally. Yeah. So holdback is, you know, you feds out there, someone out there, listen to this, The whole auto industry, it's a conspiracy against the consumer. I know people out there saying, the man's crazy. He's lost it.

You know, he's got, his mind has snapped. If you think about it, think about the billions of dollars that are being stolen from consumers and dealers. The price, you know, if I'm selling this bottle of Purell, I should go to the Purell company and pay him a dollar for it, and that should be the price. and then I'm going to mark it up to $1.75, and then I'll sell it to you. I don't get a 5% kickback from Sherell when I sell this bottle.

The only people that get that kickback are car dealers on cars. Sorry, I went on a rant there. That's okay. Good, Earl on Cars.com, and look for Earl's article called Holdback. I mean, sorry, hold back or hold up. Hold up, exactly. And it explains everything in detail. A lot of great columns, so that Earl has written.

through the years and there's a lot of information for you to gather right there. Ladies and gentlemen, give us a call tool free at 877-9-60-99-60, or you can text us at 772-497-6-5-30. We want to thank Keith for his patience. He's giving us a call from Stewart. Keith, are you still there? I'm here. Oh, thank you. Good morning.

Good morning. I just recently, well, a couple of years ago, I bought a Tacoma pickup. And what I'm seeing is out there is a lot of pickup trucks, especially Toyotas, Thunders and Tacomas, the roof and the hood is all faded out from the paint, and they're relatively new. My question is, what causes it, and what can you do to stop it? Well, Keith, there's a couple things. It can be defective paint.

And it can also be environmental issues. Florida is a real tough state. The sunbelt states are all tough on car paint. And you have a lot of sun coming down. And you have a lot of salt in the air. If you live on the coast, there's a lot of environmental situations. Your Toyota warranty covers your paint for three years or 36,000 miles. Once it gets out of the warranty, then it becomes a negotiation

with the manufacturer and the dealer. If you have clearly a problem with the paint, and Toyota right now is a big problem with white paint. White paint is peeling off a lot of Toyos, different models, and the manufacturer finally felt so guilty about it that they're taken care of it. And if you have one of those white cars and it's a Toyota, you bring it into a Toyota dealer,

the manufacturer will pay for a paint job. I'm talking four, five, $6,000. My dealership is making a lot of money painting Toyotas now. I hate to say it, but we love the idea. We can give you a brand new paint job. Toyota reimburses this, and you've got a brand new paint job on your white Toyota. Now, other colors, there is not a recall in other colors that I know, and there is no assistance from Toyota or the other manufacturers.

You have to ask for it. And that's where you have to find a dealer that considers you, important to them and they will go to bat for you with Honda or Chevrolet or Toyota and say this car is only 5,000 miles out of warranty. It's only six months out of warranty. The paint is clearly defective. If it's true, they could say this customer kept the car in his garage or he waxed it every three months or whatever it was. In other words, be your advocate and go to the manufacturer and say he needs some help. Now, maybe they don't give you a free paint job, Maybe they pay for half of it, but you have to, the squeaky wheel gets through oil, so make some noise about it, and you might get some help.

Okay, my question is, I don't have the problem. My question is, I want to know, how do I avoid this from happening? Well, sometimes you can. I mean, if you're buying a car with defective paint, you're going to have a problem. The white Toyota's, what are some of the models do, Camry's? Well, yeah, Camry's, Corolla,'s, Avalon's, their specific model, years, I think it goes up to like a 2012, I think, is 2016. A good rule of thumb.

If paint is peeling, it's flakes off. It's called delamination. If you see your paint delaminating, it's probably a defective paint issue. I think he mentioned the fading issue, and that precedes the peeling by years, and it was the white paint. What I was saying is you can't stop the delamination that's going to happen. What you can mitigate, you can control, would be to wax the car, and if you can keep it in a garage, if it's possible,

but the exposure to the sunlight and salt is just a fact of life in Florida. You need to wash your car frequently and wax it. Some people say every 30 days, I think that's too much, but I'd certainly say every three months you should wax your car, and you should wash it weekly. What color is your car? Blue Okay, so most of the problems that we've seen historically

With the fading issue It was white paint and the code is 040 And the other is the red paint There has been too much So taking care of your car like Earl said Waxing it You know, it will help the finish stay nice But most of the problems that were with the white-colored cars

So as long as you're taking care of it I think you might be in good shape Okay Do you recommend a certain kind of wax support on it with the clear coat? Yeah. What's the name of that substance? It's Carnuba wax, and it's just a natural wax. That's

what Allen, our body shop manager and collision expert recommends. Spill that. I think it's C-A-R-A-N-U-B-A. Caranuba, something like that. And when you buy wax, Carnuba is also the ingredient, and you can buy all good wax has carnuba in it, and if you

don't buy something called Carnuba, then you can find something with a high carnivouba content. Okay. I appreciate it. Thanks. You got it. You're welcome.

Thank you, Keith. Give us a call again. My favorite one is Mother's California Gold. It's got a good carnivob wax, and the nice part is if you're going to be out there really working and busting your butt with it, it's also got a nice cherry fragrance. Mm. That's got a great name, too, and you love your mama. Yep.

So you want to buy a mama's California? California goal. That's good. Rick, would you say that just because the car comes from the factory and it's been a poor paint job, that this is the reason that there are so? Because, you know, there's been quite a few people that have complained to me about their paint peeling. I almost wonder if it's more that, because it seems to be a thing almost across the board. I wonder if manufacturers across the board are trying to put a little less paint, a little lower quality and they're just trying to save a few pennies here and there and maybe not get the

thickness of paint that they should have or maybe they're speeding it up too much or something but uh something it just it just seems like it's there they're looking to save pennies cutting corners and i think we feel it more in florida as i said because we're a sunbilled state oh absolutely parts of the country you don't you don't hear this kind of complaint I think it's the elements. Okay, we're going to go to John in Palm City. Good morning, John. Good morning to everyone.

Talking about the South Florida Sun, I want to bring up a point that I was told about, and my first thought was a flood car. Has Rick ever ran across a car that had all new liner put in the trunk, lining material, everything brand new, and my suspicion was a flood car, which had nothing to do with that. Incidentally, we have to be warned about flood cars in the market now with all the rain we've been having and that hurricane that ran through the east on two weeks ago. But has Rick ever seen a whole brand new liner and floor mat and everything in a trunk on a used car? Oh, yeah, because it doesn't necessarily need to be a flood car per se, but say if it had a bad gasket and it was leaking into the car, a body gasket, anything that.

allows water leakage into the trunk. You know, obviously they're going to replace all that stuff in order to get it cleaned up and repaired. Well, how about a new one that I heard about? The in the trunk, the donut blew up, and it caused a lot of damage. So they had to put all new lining in. Have you ever heard that?

The donut that sits there from the heat and dries out after a while, but see a car that's not garaged or under a carport, sitting outside at a condominable, and whatever, and it actually blew up in the trunk, and it caused a lot of damage. One person told me even that it needed some paint touch-up in the trunk, but I guess you never heard of that, right? I've never heard of that happening, but I certainly could see where it's possible.

Donuts are generally rated to be inflated to 60 pounds of pressure, and, of course, most people will think, well, it's going to lose air, so I'm going to set mine at six. 75 or 80, and you get a little too high, too much pressure, too much heat, and maybe a defective tire, it could happen. Right. I thought it was very unusual, but it can happen. Oh, certainly unusual. Especially with 60 pounds of air in it, and that heat after a while and the donut drying

up would be a major problem. The second thing, I was in a motor vehicle and a tag agency, and we always talked about parts by the manufacturer that's supposed to be available. for what, roughly 25 years after the car was built? Ten years. Twenty, twenty-five. Ten. Well, this guy, we had time to talk waiting.

He has a Ford Thunderbird. He bought it in 2002 when he first come out that 11th generation car, just like the 55 when it came out. And he had about 22,000. He has it with 22,000 miles on it. And he said to me, I'm very sorry to have boarded. To begin with, he said, I paid $5,000. It was a gift for my wife for her birthday, he said,

and I paid $5,000 above the MSRP. He said, yes, I know I was an idiot. He said, but I wanted the car. I remember years ago, first car I drove him was a 55 T-bird, and nostalgia of I thought I'll buy this for her. Well, here's the problems that he'd been running across. As I say, it's got a Jaguar platform in it from a Jaguar S or a Jaguar HF, I'm not sure. And he said, first thing is he had to replace.

plays two of the coils. And there's eight coils in it. Liquid would probably know, a rip on the mechanics of it. It's one coil per cylinder. And he said, then I was told I made a mistake. When you replace one, you have to replace all. And I think they're $90 or $100 apiece. But then this is the worst part that he told me. There's a failure in his front electronic module. Okay, that's called an FEM, he said. And that went. And that was a problem because it was discontinued by Ford, but he was able to find a rebuilt one through some source. I forget what.

And then he said there's also on that same car a real electronic module, and he said if that goes, they're impossible to find. So here's a car from 2012 that could be a major problem to find parts for. I can imagine, you know, other vehicles might be involved. But he said the big mistake is that this DeBird, being owned by Ford, had a Jaguar S components in it. Has Rick ever ran across any automobile that this FEM front electronic module is a problem or the real electronic module?

No, but I... And by the way, he told me if you get a used one or something, and Rick would know that too. You just can't plug it in. and it has to program specially to fit the individual car. Is that true? Oh, yeah. Lots of computer modules have to have what's known as a handshake or be programmed to the car.

But right now, as it stands, when a car model is discontinued, when they stop producing that car model, the manufacturer is required to keep the parts available for 10 years. however at the end of that 10 years it's anything goes so yeah a lot of old parts just become very difficult to find and I've even run into that three times in the last week at our shop where older cars have come in and the parts that we need for them simply are no longer available probably easier to get than ever before over the databases we have and and there's a very sophisticated used to be junkyards and now they're artificated, computerized, it's almost impossible not to find a part

if you really look hard or not. If it's still available, yeah. Well, that's what he did say on the computer. They were able to locate this part, not from Ford, but through the computer, this front electronic module. But you wouldn't believe I'm in a car 22,000 miles, again, not to mark Ford because they do make good cars. but a lot of headache it could be,

especially the fact that this was Jaguar components in it. Yeah. Just thought I would bring it up. Thank you, John. Always interesting and informative. We love you. Thanks, John.

Be careful on that used car. I'll pay $100, $150, and let a mechanic check it out because there will be flooded cars out there, and it won't be on the Carfax. Exactly. You're exactly right. Great advice.

Single most important thing you've got to do when you buy used car. bring it to your mechanic or someone who is at least not employed by the guy you're buying it from go to a third-party mechanic who is trustworthy pay him a couple hundred bucks and you will be very very happy you did that it you almost don't have to do anything else if you do that you don't need auto check Carfax you don't need to call the previous owner I say you don't need to you probably should do all of that but if you go to a good technician and he goes over the

car carefully it's the best guarantee you get that you're not buying somebody else's troubles absolutely absolutely agree and don't overfill that smant tire with this experience that i heard yeah thanks for the warning thank you so much john okay john we'll talk to you next week thank you very much have a great weekend thanks for being part of the show uh you know when we open the show i usually remind everyone about the car dealers that we expose you know we have some great Mystery Shopping, of course, where there's some great dealers out there. And then there are some that aren't so great. And that leads me to this, reminding all of you that we need your help. We can't do this alone. And therefore, we implore you to, well, get in touch with Ashley Moody. She is

the Attorney General. She can do so much for us. And you can do it, getting in touch with her a lot of different ways. One is to give her a call at 850414, 3,300. And you can help us to eliminate these bad dealers out there. Well, I'd like to hear somebody call us and tell us that I tried to get a hold to Ashley Moody and she didn't get back to me or she did get back to me. Somebody really ought to try to call Ashley Moody. She is the ultimate answer to dealership unfair deceptive advertising. So take Nancy up on that. Give us that number again, Nancy. That number is 850-414-3300, and she is there to protect a consumer.

So help us, help you by getting in touch with Attorney General Ashley Moody. See if she's there. Maybe she's not, maybe she doesn't answer the phone. She might be out to lunch. Yeah, it could be. Let's get some text over there, Stu. You got some text over there? We've got 21. we're going to go we'll get them we'll get them we're going to go to Michael who's giving us a call from Lake Worth good morning Michael good morning

how are you I'm fine I sent you the text of the addendum sticker from my key of you know so almost $6,000 I was just flabbergasted on my return to Florida as to how these addendum stickers and dealer fees have gotten so out of control. I sold and worked for dealerships in New York for many years. And, of course, in New York, they're limited to a $75 dealer fee. Yeah.

Not thousands of dollars. Yeah, I'm looking at the picture right now. Yeah, I'm looking at the picture right now. Florida. Wow, $6,000 for nitrophil, wheel locks, mudguards, a pinstripe. And then what is the recommending oil change? You have to pay for the recommendation? And a car wash.

Neil, my. Yeah, we mystery shopped them. That was from Greenway Kia out there. Where's that in West Palm? It used to be West Palm Kia. And we mystery shot them a couple of weeks ago. Michael, the reason you have a $75 cap on dealer fees in New York is because you have an attorney general there that cares about the consumer.

And I just wonder why Florida is the wild, while less. Every state is better than Florida. There is no state, 50 states, there's no state that has no cap, no requirement on what you name the dealer fee, and no cap on the number of dealer fees. The amount is the worst part. Theoretically, a dealer could charge a million dollar dealer fee if they could find somebody stupid enough to pay it.

There is no, and you could call it a doc fee. He could call it a notary and closing fee, electronic filing fee. So you can name it anything you want, and you can charge as much as you want, and Ashley Moody, our Attorney General, just sits there and ignores it. Congratulations on having a good Attorney General in New York, Michael. $75, I don't like $75, but it's one heck of a lot better than $5,000, and at least everybody knows what to expect. In New York, you're going to a car dealer,

you're going to pay $75 for a dealer fee. You swallow it and you do it, and nobody gets tricked. When you go into a car dealer in Florida, you have no idea how much it is, how many there are, and usually you don't even see it. You just get to print it out and you go home and maybe you read your contract a week later and find out that you got screwed.

Right. Well, you can see it in whether it's an appearance package or a taxable fee, then you know that if there's fees in there, but obviously they're taxable because the state fees aren't taxable. Exactly. Exactly. Because I was recently trying to negotiate some Nissan dealerships, and, you know, they'll lay the appearance package, which is, you know, nothing, you know, baloney,

but they, you know, don't want to waive their deal-fee because they claim they have to charge everyone the dealer fee. But, of course, the guillope can be taken off the price of the car. Sure. If somebody negotiates it. Well, Michael, thanks for the call. It's always good to hear in comparison with other states. I didn't know New York.

I think New York actually has a lower cap than California. I think California went up to maybe $100. And if I say, as long as all dealers do it the same way, then the buyer is not at that disadvantage. He can factor that into his negotiation and competitive pricing. Right. And it's much less frustrating to try and figure out all these numbers and try and get a decent deal here, blow it up. Well, thanks for calling, Michael. It's always good to hear from a previous car.

salesperson and you're an insider and you will cooperate what we're talking about here and i thank you very much for the call i hope you can call again next week yeah thank you great call 877 960 or you can text us at 772 49760 don't forget ladies 50 first two new lady callers haven't we had a new female caller wasn't lisa from new york new Oh, okay. Okay, we got some text? Yep, from Ann Marie. Good morning. I noticed a Tesla recharging station and a parking lot. Can all electric vehicles use that equipment to recharge their batteries or do the different electric cars require different equipment in order to recharge? Have the electric car companies develop one standard system to charge electric vehicles, or is this going to be like electric cords where some countries have two prongs, other are three pins, et cetera, and there is no set standard worldwide?

signed curious about electrics but still keeping the gas zipper from now and that's of course from Anne Marie the answer on that is no Tesla's supercharges are proprietary so you have to have a Tesla to use that for the most part the other electric chargers are universal and most will be well you can use on them use those Tesla was providing the charging for free originally to Tesla owners and they ended that recently I think maybe one of the model still gets free one of the newer ones. So they were paying for the electricity.

And also, I did see out there online that people are developing adapters that would, you know, if you had, say, a leaf or another electric vehicle where you use that adapter and then you could use the Tesla supercharger. But I don't think that's in widespread use at this point. Anne-Marie always asks the best questions. She is one smart lady. That's right. Very.

Thank you, Ann-Marie. Okay, we have another text from John. California says, good morning, my question is about the extended warranty. If you do get one, and when the warranty ends, does your monthly payment get reduced by whatever the amount was at the time, or does it get reduced by the amount going forward with the monthly payments? No, it doesn't. So once you buy it, that's going to be part of your monthly payment until you're done paying off the car. And what's worse is, if they sneak it in on your contract and you find out about it a month later, even though you haven't used it, you're still going to be making

in the same payment, but the amount that you have to pay out, it will pay out a little sooner because they take it off at the end of the contract. Correct. If you cancel it, let's say you just didn't want it anymore, you cancel it. Your payment stays the same, but your payoff will come down. We have another text from Steve in New Jersey. It says, good morning, Earl. This is Steve from New Jersey.

Regarding the mini Cooper caller, even if the car is in limited supply and the price is fixed, suggest negotiating for free or reduced costs for routine maintenance. maintenance, and or accessories. Lastly, when minis are unique, lastly, while minis are unique in fun cars, they are notorious for repair issues for consumer reports. While most cars don't need an extended warranty, in my opinion, minis aren't one of those brands, suggest negotiating a discounted extended warranty price. We agree. Right. Unfortunately, in Florida, you can't do that. So their insurance products and the prices are set by the state insurance commission, registered by the dealer with the State Insurance Commission and you can't negotiate those. But in a lot of

states you can. Yeah, but you know, the fact of the matter is an extended service contract is a big fat profit to the dealer. And it's a big fat profit to whoever you buy it from. It's a fatter profit when you're buying it on the TV or online ads. These people are making fortunes on these extended service contracts. So let's get back to a car. You're buying an extended service contract. The state of Florida says this is a fixed price. That doesn't say they can't reduce the price of the car. That's correct. And so that's the way you do. It's like a dealer fee. They give you the

nonsense about the dealer fee. I can't take it off the car. I said, don't take it off. Leave it on there. Reduce the price of the car by the amount of the dealer fee or by half the amount of the dealer fee. Do the same thing with your extended warranty. Sometimes that even happens by the finance manager in

violation of the dealer's policy where he'll cut the price of the car so he can sell a warranty and make a commission on it and then all hell breaks loose at the dealership. But that does happen. Robbie and Stewart has another question about the paint. It says, we bought a new four-runner limited four-by-four from you a year ago. It's got the upgraded white paint.

That's the pearl paint called Blizzard Pearl. You were just talking about white paint. Is that all Toyota is affected by this? And the answer to that, Robbie, is no, there's a limited set of vehicles that are, and the newer ones aren't part of that recall. And, you know, they're painting warranty anyway for three years or 36,000 miles. That's correct. Okay, let's go to David. David's calling us from North Palm Beach.

Welcome to the show, David. Thank you very much. I heard that Arrigo Dodge was sold. Is that correct? What, I haven't heard of. Is that owned by Chrysler? If it's a big place like that that has more than one franchise or more than one location, is that partially owned by Chrysler or is that singly owned by the Arrigo's?

In Florida, there is a law that says a manufacturer cannot own. a retail car dealership for more than one year and the reason that says one year is because sometimes their car manufacturer wants to find a different dealer and they buy maybe their dealership let's say the dealership the dealers a convicted of a murder and rape and mayhem and they have to get rid of that dealer because that's about all the only reason the manufacturer will get rid of a dealer today I'm being a little facetious So if they want to get rid of a dealer, they can buy the dealership and take one year to find another dealer that wants to buy it.

So if Arrigo sold out and Chrysler bought it, it would only be an interim situation. They'd be looking for somebody else. And I don't think that Arrigo, I'd really be surprised if Rigo sold their dealership. If you have any information on that, I would be personally appreciative. Yeah, I hadn't heard that either. And usually something like that happens, the rumor mill goes into overdrive and it starts spreading around. Even salespeople will hear about it. Where did you hear it, David?

If anybody else that hears about it today and they talk to you, I'd like to be informed about it. So give me a call or I'll be listening to you. Oh, okay. Thanks, I appreciate it. And we actually mystery shopped the Rurigo West Palm Beach today, so you'll hear all about them today. Great. Thank you. You're welcome.

Give us a call again. 9960 or you can text us at 772-49760. Don't forget, ladies, $50 for the first two new lady callers. And we also would like you to take advantage of www. Your Anonymous Feedback.com. Now back to Stu. Okay. Bob in store says my question is, does the current Rav4 hybrid need special tires when replacing? I'm going to turn that over to Rick. I don't think so. Nope. Just the proper size tires, which are a normal, very available size. Okay, very good. Jumping over to anonymous feedback, which we have a ton that started coming in just after the show last week. So let's see if we can get to some of these. I have a 2014 Grand Jeep Cherokee, or a Jeep Grand Cherokee. I took my Jeep to the auto shop for an oil change. He stated that I needed new air filters. The charge was $25 each.

Was that a fair price? And how do I know if I really needed the air filters? Please respond, thank you. That sounds pretty cheap. That actually is a pretty decent price for them. And I would go with the old Missouri thing. Take me out to my car and show me the air filter in my car. Don't bring me the air filter because you can bring me anything that could be nasty looking.

Take me out to my car and show me the filter in my car that is dirty. and then I'll authorize it good idea okay love it just also bear in mind that some of the car manufacturers do include air filters as part of the required maintenance or the recommended maintenance on the regular intervals and so just bear that in mind but like Rick says I never even thought of that they could have used the same filter for years oh sure get the dirty filter all right more anonymous feedback hello Earl I have read on many car blogs that that the 2019 Corolla Hatchback has some serious transmission issues. Toyota has even replaced a bunch of those transmissions.

Do you know if Toyota's identified the transmission problem and corrected it for the 2020 Corolla Hatchbacks? I actually checked that out, and I talked to Mark Feldman, and he checked it out with Toyota, and we don't know anything like that is going on. If you're listening, we'd like to, maybe you could tell us which blog you saw that on it. Rick, you're not aware of any of that, are you?

The only thing that we did have was, I believe, it was 17 to 19 corollos, and it made me a couple of other years. With the CVT transmission, we had a reflash reprogramming that we would do, and in some cases, if that wasn't done in time, the valve bodies could have a problem, and then it would require replacement of the transmission. but as long as you've got it done in time before any damage was done then you're totally fine they were completely safe and we've done hundreds of those that's a good idea just looking online on those forums because oftentimes a problem that appears you'll see it out there before it becomes a recognized

or admitted problem by the manufacturer and that actually was a safety recall that every owner was sent it was put out as a recall to bring car in for us to do that reflash on the computer okay the next one is exactly why we have anonymous feedback on the dealer fee issue so what you're saying are all is that basically the dealer should make a profit on the car and then there's a little concerned thinking emoji like the stroking the

chin sounds about right they shouldn't be a business and more they should be a charity and they should make a profit on us and I'll turn it over to the recovering car dealer for that one Well, yes, you know, it's very simple. That is a common dealer argument, and nobody has a problem with a dealer fee that is thoroughly and obviously conspicuously disclosed. And we talked to a guy from New York earlier on the show, and no, I was from Lake Worth. He used to be in New York, sold cars in New York, and they have a $75 dealer fee. All the dealers have a $75 dealer fee.

It's printed on the buyer's order If you buy a car in New York You're going to pay a $75 dealer fee That's okay. Well, it's not okay I don't like it, but it's not harmful It's just annoying In Florida Every dealer has a different dealer

There is no cap It can be any amount of money It can be by any name It is not, the law is not enforced Cars are advertised excluding the dealer fee and consumers are taken advantage of and really wrecked over the coals

paying thousands of dollars, not 75, thousands of dollars more and they don't know they're paying it. So a car dealer or car salesman that wrote that text at anonymous feedback, you're crazy. Right. You're wrong.

We're living proof that you can make a profit without a dealer fee. Exactly. Exactly. There you go. Okay. anonymous feedback. I waxed my car two times within the first six months of it being new and the paint still failed. I have a three-year warranty on the paint and the idiots at the dealership say this is because the outside influence is ruining the paint. I washed my car before I took it to them to examine it and they said that they found traces of tree sap on the paint. What should I do

about that? It's a Nissan leaf in black color and that's from real hi-fi help. Well, you know, This is environmental can be a lot of things. Treesap is this going to hurt your paint. Bird do-do will hurt your paint. Love bugs will hurt your paint. These are all environmental things. So there are elements that no paint is going to be impervious to. On the other hand, manufacturers like to use that environmental to get out of pan.

So it becomes a debate. I would be persistent if you're sure that you don't have a tree. that you don't have a tree sap on your car, I would make the argument, and I've asked them to prove to me that you found treasap on my paint, but it's just a shame you have to get in that kind of argument. As far as I'm concerned,

they ought to come up with a paint that would that you could wipe the treasap off. I mean, this is the 21st century. Mano technology. I mean, I guarantee you that the space shuttle or the, you know, the Falcon 9. Yeah, the rockets that are going up. starship yeah well there's no trees in space there isn't cape canaveral but i mean why can't

you come up with a paint that when a when a dove flies over and goes boop on your roof that you have to paint your roof that doesn't sound right no i agree with that it becomes part of the paint yeah all right bob and stewart has a question about electric cars he says how much does it cost how much does it cost you to charge an electric car? We've never heard of that cost electric cars before. And I can answer that because we actually have at the dealership. We have several charging stations from a company called Charge Point. They have a big network across the country.

You can find them with an app. It's about $0.5 a minute is what it costs you. So it's cheaper in gas. And it depends on your battery, how long it takes to charge the car. Well, five cents a minute. So can you give a, or if you don't know, you don't know. Well, 30 minutes, you can get a partial charge, an hour. get you a little bit down the road. I mean, usually people don't go to like a convenience store with

you. You can Google that. There's probably a Google. On the average, it costs you X dollars per mile on a charge. As long as you happen to be mentioning the electrics on YouTube, Josh Goldstein, apparently he's got some good information here. He says that Tesla uses proprietary ports. All others pretty much are on an industry standard of the Solution. S-A-E-J-1-7-2 type plug, and there's two different fast-charge standards, but they all use that same plug, and Tesla's, when they come from the factory, have an adapter to use the J-1772, and, of course, now they're also, people, outside companies are coming out with adapters to let these other cars use the Tesla type charges.

Tesla's a monopoly now. They own the electric car market. They got chargers all over the USA, and so they can do anything they want to. The other manufacturers should copy, they say, it's proprietary. Elon Musk should allow anybody to copy his chargers. Why fight it? Well, now that he's charging for electricity, it makes sense.

When he was giving it away, I understood why he wanted to make it exclusive. Did you know that Tesla is worth more than, all the Detroit cars. Yes. I mean, and Tesla is worth more on, you know, stockwise than Toyota and Volkswagen combined. Yeah, Elon is now the fourth richest man in the world. Definitely. Yeah.

So, you know, electric car, Tesla, the same thing. Nobody's close. Next, Texas. I heard that the Tundra will get a design change to the model year 2021. Have you seen one? And when will they be introduced? And that's from Everett. But I think that the redesign is coming in 2022, actually.

And there will be a hybrid tundra, which will be pretty neat, too. But we've got to wait a little bit longer for that. And we have a repeat on the last question. I'll jump over to anonymous feedback. Boo-hoo. It's too bad that car buyers are now informed smart buyers, thanks to people like you, Earl. I kind of feel sorry for the next new car salesman I encounter because it's going to be a well-in-form battle, punctuated with a lot of nose, LMAOs. Good. That's good to hear.

Yeah, I guess that's not being sarcastic. No, he's, I think he's serious. Yeah, he's being sarcastic towards the, to the dealers. Yeah. I love it when they use my name. It's just, it's just, you know, because, you know, the show is well known. And I say that sometimes almost tongue in cheek, and I'll say to somebody calls me from, you know, out of the area. Everybody knows about the show in this area.

But, you know, somebody will call me from Tampa or Jackson's. and I'll say to them, tell them that Earl Stewart, your friend of Earl Stewart's, and people in Jacksonville have heard about this. So it's really kind of cool. When you're not buying a car, we know, you know, we sell Toyoters, we have a toilet wheelchair, but that's only 15% of the market, so 85% of the time you're buying something else. So when you buy a Cadillac, you're buying a Chevrolet or whatever you're buying, and you go in there and just say, Earl Stewart's a friend of mine, and he wants to

to review the deal. Give it a try. See what happens. It's a great feeling. It might save you a couple thousand dollars. Great feeling. Or they might attack you, I'm not sure. Maybe we could make t-shirts with your picture and it says, friend of Earl. They might throw you out of the dealership. You know, here's a typical evening.

Last night, I get a telephone call. Someone is asking about purchasing a vehicle. Stu, amazing. And because Earl Stewart Toyota has been heard just like Earl just said, everywhere. So Frank says to me I have heard about Earl

Stewart Toyota I asked Frank where he was from he said Orlando I said wow this is not an infomercial thank you thank you so much well it's not an infomercial as much as it is to know there's a lot of players here

including Ashley Moody but it's great to know that you're doing something right and that that kind of news is spreading that every single dealership is trying not trying to take advantage advantage of you. That's my point. Now back to Stu. This one's interesting.

I got my Subaru W.R.X, which had an MSRP of $36,000. I got it for $26,000 because I went in at 5 p.m. by myself the day before Mother's Day and waited until 10 p.m. until they caved. I was the only one in the dealership and they had six staff working two hours past their closing time, L.O.L. I was like, I can wait all day, bro. I got my smartphone with me that's that's that's that's amusing but i you probably could have gotten a good price without spending you know two days in the dealership just by following some of our advice uh you know competitive bids if you have stamina stamina very committed you'll have courage but still and even though you may be a little obnoxious uh if you're strong enough and you can wear down the car

sales people it works to your advantage i mean let me put it this way Being Mr. or Mrs. Nice guy does not work buying a car. You can be the nicest person you want to be. But you have to have a certain amount. You have to be aggressive. You have to be thick-skinned. You have to be able to weather a lot of BS. And that's the reason it's so difficult.

To go out there to get competitive pricing is not an easy thing to do. And this show helps you make it easier. and online buying is a great way to do it. They're easy ways to do it. But he's right. If you got a smartphone and you can play words with friends for five hours at the dealership, then that might work too. Nothing more impressive. Then to walk into a dealership knowing what you're talking about.

All right. I'm about to go on a cross-country trip. My car uses synthetic oil. Well, I have to check the oil level every 1,000 miles like I would with regular oil. how often should you check the oil level of synthetic? Rick? I check mine when I change it. You don't have to check it every thousand miles. Someone this informed you and just read your owner's manual

and that'll tell you when you need to check your oil. That's right. Okay, here's a fun one. It says, could Earl and Nancy get in and drive a car with a stick shift today if they had to? I'm going to guess, yeah. It's like riding the bike. Most definitely. You might stall that once or twice, but I think you guys could get handled it once you felt it again.

I think I could pull that one off. The challenge will be finding a car with a standard transmission. Very much so. I've tried. You have to find an older car to do that. It is amazing to have somebody call you and ask you if you could find them a stick shift, and I didn't realize that they're few and far between. I haven't seen one in a long time.

I learned to drive on a stick shift, and I'm pretty confident if you put me behind the wheel, I'd pick it up. Yeah, Earl taught me how to drive on an old toy to do that. truck. I can hop in the car right now. I love to do it. It's their fun to drive. Did you take your test, your driver's test on the stick shift? I did take my driver's test on a stick shift, correct. Did you really? Yeah. I'm old. And Rick? I love

the part where people think women can't drive stick. My wife drives stick better than I do. She's got the clutch down. Yeah, she's got rhythm. Yeah. Yeah. I'd love the opportunity to show that all from my kids could be like, what ancient contraption are you driving? You remember the term double

clutch? Yeah. Yeah. Where you can shift without putting the... I could do that. What is it you do? There's something you can do where you can feel it and you force it in the gear. There's something you can, yeah, where you can raise the RPM of the engine to match the transmission. Right. So you can shift without using the clutch. You could feel it. That's, that's shifting in sports cards. That's when you're shifting without using the clutch where you're matching the engine and tranny speeds. But like when you're driving heavy trucks, your double clutch is actually where you are shifting. You're hitting the clutch twice.

Once when you come out of gear, then you let off and put the clutch back in. The other one's power shifting, right? Yeah, power shifting. And then it matches synchronizes because heavy trucks don't have synchronizers in the transmission like sports cars do. Okay, moving right along.

Okay. Hello there. I live in Alachua County. I'm considering buying a car from your dealership. Would the taxes I pay be for Alachia or your county? They will be the taxes in the county that you register the car. Alachua, that's University of Florida, Gainesville. Yeah, I lived in Alachia County for nine years.

Yeah. I don't know what the tax rates are, but if you're going to register it in Alatua, you're going to pay taxes in Alachia County. Alachua was dry when I was going to the University of Florida. We couldn't buy any booze, so everybody went down to rubies, a place right across the county line south, and we go down there and buy a bunch of liquor and go back and make fools out of ourselves. Alachia County was not dry when I went.

when I was living there, and that's why I stayed there for nine years. Greetings from North Carolina, enjoy your show. Are today's lower-stant sedan designs here to stay? I'm a 69-year-old, and I drive a small SUV, easy access, and sitting high or nice, but I miss the positives of driving a sedan, comfortable ride, quiet cabin, good fuel economy. I am thinking of trading my SUV for a new Camry or Corolla. Should I wait for the next generation of designs? Thank you.

the trend has been away from sedans into SUVs and crossovers and all that Ford I think is eliminated I think everything except for the Mustang right yeah and but there's there's still gonna be sedans I don't think they're gonna get naturally taller in size I can tell you the Cameron Corolla you're seeing like longer wheelbases lower stances for better handling and things like that so I don't anticipate this taller like I'm on a picture that when I was growing up the the Monte Carlo's and the Grand Prix and that have that taller profile

things are getting sporty or more aerodynamic so yeah if you want to hire a ride maybe something like a Venza where it's not quite a full SUV right but it's kind of like a midway cross over yeah

the Venza not making the commercials coming out again they cancelled it for a while and it's coming back and it looks when I looked at the pictures it looks like an SUV to me yeah some of the superiors have a model like that Yeah. Okay, we'll skip that one.

Here we go. Did you ever mystery shot, Bev Smith, Kia, Fort Pierce? We did a couple of weeks ago. My guess, based on my experience, buying a car from them, is that there are a bunch of, quote, sleazy weasels. By the way, their tires for life program sucks. The tire is nearly bald before they replace it. To answer your first question, yeah, we did Bev Smith Kia recently.

and we had a good time, I think. Was that last week? Yeah. Time flies, I can't remember. No, it was Napleton Kiel last week. But we've done, yeah. Is best on the recommended list or none? I don't think so.

I'd have to check. They're one of those dealers that go either way, like they're on the do not recommend list, and then they'll do something nice. They flip back and forth, yeah. So we're all cut up with anonymous feedback. That was a pretty good lightning round. It was.

Yeah, it was, absolutely. Okay, keep texting in at 772. 4976530. Well, we'll get into the mystery shopping report, but we're starting early, so we'll probably be able to get some texts, so you can do some YouTube, you can do some Facebooks,

or you can text us at 772-4976530. We're going to turn the phones on, well, are we, Nancy? Yes, we are. So you can, as are all said, continue to text. And don't forget, take advantage of www. Your Anonymous Feedback.com 8777 or excuse me

772-4976530 is the text number and ladies I am disappointed that I didn't have any new lady callers but there's always next week and it will be $50 again for the first two new

lady callers. Don't forget you can vote on the mystery shopper report. Agent Lightning has brought us an interesting report. Okay, this is a mystery shop of Arrigo in Westpambi, Arrigo, Chrysler, Jeep, Dodge. They have stores in Weston, Fort Pierce, and I think that they have a forest store somewhere? I think so.

They also, I think they might have changed the name of the dealership, because their website is, it's just Arrigo West Palm now. Oh, anyway, we had a call earlier that said that he heard a rumor that Arrigo is, sold, we'd heard nothing of the sort, and frankly it would surprise me if they did sell, I think they're very successful, I think they're making money hand over fist, and sell a ton of cars. He advertised, he's the

largest Chrystler's a Jeep Dodge dealer. I don't think they mention Fiat anymore, but in the USA. And don't they have Aston Martin out there too? I don't know. I don't know. At any rate, so it's interesting, we are

shopping, there we go, and we are excited to bring you the first solo mystery shop by our newest investigator, Agent Lightning, who happens to be a female. And we have hopes that she will continue as our regular alternative to our male shopper who is Agent Thunder. You get it? Thunder and Lightning. We had a lot of fun picking this week's target for Agent Lightning to hit with a brand, I kind of like a Lightning to Hit. That's good. With a brand new agent, possibilities are endless because we can talk to all sorts of people. She's unrecognizable, at least now, and we can go back to stores sooner.

We tried to rotate with Agent Thunder, and we would try to keep them out for a period of time. With Agent Lightning, we're not restricted anymore, so watch out, car dealers. We can go back in right away because we have another shopper, and she did. She passed her test. She went out last week with Agent Thunder, and did. a great job and went out this week and did a great job. So beware Agent Lightning.

So who would to be? We weren't sure we thought about the Grecoes. Is it the Grecos or the Grecos? Grecos. Kind of like Keiko. Yeah. Yeah, Greco. The Napletons, did we do with the Cotta test?

We were just tickled about this. Giddy, as Stu wrote in his shopping report. I like the word giddy. To help us narrow our choices, we did a quick survey of the websites of the biggest dealerships of town. I was looking for an ad that was Swayas. We found this ad on Rigo's West Palm Beach site.

I'll hold it up. You can see that there. And you know, you see something with a $14,000 discount. Whoa! You know, $14,000 discount, that's a big discount. And that's the ad we chose. And we went toward Arrigo Dodge. Chrysler West Palm Beach 14,000 dollars off new vehicles that will get your

attention of course we immediately knew what the catches were the first catch which negates the promise of the headline is the phrase up to you know we should do this for the blog sites too we should get a list of the words that are so virtually the tell to almost I mean there's there are words that are famous and It's probably you can probably Google it. We don't have to come up with a list. But there are words that don't seem to distract from the fact, but do. It's an out.

So up to is one of them. All this means is there is only most likely just one vehicle or model with that gigantic discount. It's usually something like a big truck SUV, land cruiser. Toyota dealers like to advertise discounts. as a land cruiser has a huge MSRP. Right. You could discount at $10,000 and still make a nice profit. Yeah.

Yeah. And they imply you can get it on a Corolla at a toilet. They imply you can get it on a Jeep at Chrysler Jeep Dodge. Now, Jeep is a hot car. You don't get good discounts on Jeep. And someone's seeing an ad, think I can get $14,000 off on a Jeep. It brings them on the door. Get some of the door.

And the other catch, of course, in this one was a... was a it only applies to 2019 models while a lot of dealers may have 2019s on their lots they are increasingly rare when the second half 2020 and the 2021 models are already showing up so 2019 is an old old car and remember this isn't on the subject of the shop here but you're better off to buy a current model car because the discounts are available on one or two-year-old cars do not compensate for the depreciation. You buy a new car, 2019 today. You got a two-year-old car.

When it becomes a used car, it's not a used car that you just bought. It's a used car that people think you bought two years ago. Yeah, and if you buy a 2021, they think you bought it from the future. And you have thousands of dollars in depreciation. And the discount they offered you to buy it doesn't make up for that thousands of.

Forget about it. Forget about these last year models. negotiate hard on the current model year. We didn't even need to read the fine print to know that Agent Lightning would not be getting a $14,000 discount, but here it is anyway. Yeah, that's the size. That's the accurate size. You see that black line there? There's print inside that black line. You can't see it, but that's what it looks like. That's a fine print.

And again, Federal Trade Commission says that anything that modifies the price that's being advertised has to be clearly and conspicuously located near the price that's being advertised, clearly and conspicuously. Folks, that ain't clear

and conspicuously. Clearly it is not. But luckily, I have nice progressive lenses of my bifocals. I can read it. So, Stu blew it up. You may be the only one. Here's what the fine print says. Subject to prior sale,

amounts vary on select in-stock vehicles. I just like the amounts vary. This is interesting, in-stock vehicles. So that's an out right away, because car dealers sell a very high percentage of their vehicles that say what we call dealer trade with other dealers. So the guy's looking for a black Jeep, and you don't have a black Jeep,

but the guy down the street's got a black Jeep, you call them up and everybody does this. We swap cars back and forth between dealer inventories of the same make. Toyota dealers swap all, I'll swap a car for the guy in Miami or Jacksonville, even out of state sometimes. And all dealers do this. And so when they say that the ad applies only to in-stock vehicles, it precludes you from probably 25 to 50% of the cars he normally sells. So there's another out.

Where am I here? Okay, yeah. Plus tax tag title dealer installed options. Okay, we know about that one, don't we? The other installed options are virtually worthless, things like tint, stripes, nitrogen of the tires, mud guards, paint sealant, fabric protection. The VIP experiences. Yeah, VIP experience.

I mean, they find something that has practically no cost, and they raise the price astronomically just to boost the MSRP. basically why we've had the dealer list their Wi-Fi yeah and the Wi-Fi in the dealership not in the car the car yeah for your phone so when you buy this car you get to use the Wi-Fi and so well I guess I go through the customer lounge they say did you buy the Wi-Fi no because Agent Thunder uses the Wi-Fi and he never really buys the car I'm sorry we'll have to hold your iPhone until you leave you did not buy the nickel can't make this stuff up My goodness, it's sad.

We'll bill you. Okay, we're all digressing here. Okay, a dealer's sold options, and here's the $799.95 dealer fee at Arrigo, Dodge, Cheap, Chrysler, and all applicable fees. What is applicable? Applicable is whatever Arrigo says is applicable. I'm applying that. It doesn't say the government fees. That would be okay.

It says applicable fees. Let's throw it at the wall and see what sticks. Exactly. All discounts, rebates. I'm still in the fine print of the Rigo Jeep. You're still in the very beginning of the fine print. Not in the very beginning, yeah. All discounts rebates and centers apply to dealer.

That means that you saw an advertisement on this Jeep that happened to be a rebate, and you mentally calculated that in there as a rebate. It isn't your rebate anymore. It's Rigo's rebate, baked in to the advertised price. So dealer rebates, customer rebates, any kind of a rebate,

And I have the finish here. Customer must qualify for a rebate. So that opens the door. So you have to be a fireman. You have to be a farmer. You have to be a member of this credit union. Real estate agent. You have to, you know, a real estate agent.

You have to be driving a Jeep now or, you know, the make of whatever they're selling. What else they got? Military. Convoy. Conquest. Yeah, conquest. Loyalty. Yeah.

So there's. What about llamas? What if I raised llamas? That would be able to be the agricultural revenue, exactly, and Alpacus too. You can do that. You can make anything up you want to. You put it in a fine print, and that's where we go. Customer members qualify for all rebates.

Nobody qualifies. Credit approval, financing through capital, Chrysler Capital may be required. Other qualifications may be required. By the way, they should just put that. That should have been the fine print. Other qualifications may be important. Yeah, yeah.

Hey, listen, you. you're wearing sneakers, you don't wear, you don't qualify. Today's low for day. You have to be wearing hard sole shules, and it says right here, other qualifications may apply. Sneakers, not all buyers will qualify. Well, nobody's got to go off. Not in conjunction with other offers, a seed dealer for details. There's another catch-all.

I mean, the fine print totally exonerates the dealer from any semblance of, I'll sell you the card that price. They don't have to sell to you for anywhere near that price. Art for illustration purposes only. Well, you said this Jeep was for sale. Oh, that's just illustration. We're talking about the fiat. Or, hey, I want the fancy alloy wheels in the ad.

That's just for illustration. Anyway, they're going to save some space on the ad by replacing disclosure. And I own this website, by the way. www ain't going to happen.com I actually own that website and we need to populate that website We're saving it for Yeah

We use that a lot of town Let's put pictures of Bigfoot Neleckness Monster Along with car advertisements on it Okay, we're shopping a Rio Jeep Dodge West Palm Beach The ad wasn't posted to communicate a real proposal to pay some customers

it was posted to attract the desperate and the gullible. What's on the Statue of Liberty? Give us your... Give us your poor, tired, huddled masses, yearning. Yeah, it's the huddled masses. It was posted to get him in the door. Oh, boy. Okay, here's a report.

And this is a historic, the first solo journey by Agent Lightning. And Agent Lightning, I hope you're listening. I really do. because you did a fabulous job and you've got a great career here and we look forward to many many more shops i'll be reading in the first person as if i were agent lighting should i use a falsetto no no that would be embarrassing it would be for my first mission i brought my 16 year old son to help with my cover story i intended to buy a new jeep wrangler for him we arrived at 120 p.m park headed to the showroom along the way we we saw a jeep wrangler being unloaded from a flatbed truck.

And blazing on the windshield was a big yellow sign that read 2019. The Monroeley label, which was sloppily scotch-taped and lying on the seat, showed it had an MSRP of $53,735. They're proud of those things. Yeah. My son and I entered a rego showroom, a young mask woman. Who was that mass woman? He had a mask woman.

Was a cat girl. Yeah. Seated at the front seat behind a plastic shield said hello. That's all good. Plastic shield, mask, that's good. And asked if we had been there before I said, I hadn't. The reception is called a salesman named Adrian, wearing a mask. That was a male Adrian, right?

Adrian asked me what vehicle I was interested in. I introduced my son, myself, and I said, I've seen their ad for $14,000 off. I said I was buying a new wrangler for my son, and $14,000 off would be a huge help. Right away, Adrian reported that he didn't think he had any 2019 wranglers left. It is kind of strange they had one.

He said we would need to check the area of the lot where they kept all the 2019s. The three of us went outside to the 2019 area. Adrian said he didn't see any 2019 wranglers. my son, in objection to say, we'd seen one when we first got here. He asked me where, and I said, led him back through the showroom, and outside again to where we saw the Jeep, Adrian Joke, this was a sign, and it meant this was for me.

That's fast. Adrian's fast. It's a good answer. The 2019 Wrangler, at first when I read this, I didn't realize, and then I put two and two together. Adrian probably didn't know the vehicle was there, just came in on the flatbed, and it wasn't logged into the computer yet

so Adrian wasn't being deceptive I don't believe at that point it was unlikely that he knew the Jeep was there it was unlocked we began to explore Adrian picked up the Monroe label reported this was fully loaded it had every option available I asked him if he could get the keys

so we could drive it Adrian left to get the keys in a dealer plate without asking for my driver's license or anything else now that's probably shouldn't be using Adrian's name now because Adrian's in trouble and when the regals find out that the salesman put lightning out in a vehicle driving it without seeing the license driver's license or making a copy of it. There's two things. When they copy your driver's license, they have a lot

of good private information. They know your date of birth. They know your address and your name. They have your picture. This is all good stuff. But it also covers them with their insurance company. If you wrecked the car and you have their driver's license information, then that protects you because you did your due diligence. Without that, she wrecks the car. Irrigo's liable. So Adrian's probably going to get scolded for this. I hope it's nothing more serious than a scolding. He returned. Adrian did it in eight minutes. We hopped in, drove off a lot. I joked that I hope to pass my driving test. No, I'm Agent Lightning. I said, I hope to pass my driving test. get a license soon which resulted in a panic look this is really funny I'm Adrian's face

I mean I can't do it I got a mask on but I'll do my eyes and and then my son started laughing and said mom's just messing with you I love that mom's messing with you anyway that would a bit he guy you know a guy probably thought oh I forgot to get the driver's license and then she says I don't know how to drive I don't have a driver's license Yeah. Agent Lightning's got a good sense of humor. On the drive, Adrian explained that the Wranglers don't usually qualify for big

discounts. Like the $14,000 off ad, he said they don't need to because they hold their value. I warned him and I promised my son I'd get him a Wrangler day and I hope he would not be disappointed. Now, you know, you've got to get the devil it's due. He's right. Jeeps do hold their value

and they don't discount them. And sometimes you're better off buying a car with a high resale value that holds its value than to buy a cheap one like a fiat with a big discount. Now there's two vehicles sold from the Erego sells.

He sells fiats, he sells cheeps. I'd rather pay sticker for a Jeep than give a $1,000 discount off a fiat. Because a fiat is a junk pile and they depreciate and nobody wants to use fiat

and ranklers and jeeps have extremely high resale value. Ah, but I digressed. I warned him that I promised my son to him, okay. I said I was reasonably divorced, but my ex was going to help out with a purchase. Adrian said he would do his best to get me a deal and suggested looking at a lesser equipped 2020 model

and lower price. Again, that would have been a good idea if you're really buying the vehicle, buy the current model. I said I wanted the deal promised in the ad. I want $14,000 off that Jeep, and that's what he had said. Surprisingly, Adrian never jumped in and said anything about qualifications.

He just stuck to his guns. We returned to the lot of Adrian's gave us a thorough presentation. He was a Jeep expert showing us every feature on the vehicle. He said if we didn't have any questions, he would put some numbers together for us. We went inside, said, out of the desk. Adrian left to speak with a manager. He returned with a piece of paper labeled guest sheet. Guest sheet.

Nice touch. Instead of worksheet. I like that guess sheet. The top portion of the document where the vehicle information was supposed to go had blue ballpoint pin chicken scratch written on it.

The bottom part and big green sharpie read 53,735 and then like a 3985 and then parentheses and then 49750 with plus plus plus.

I asked Adrian for details like an itemized breakdown in estimated payment. but he kept pushing me to submit a credit application. I said, I'd only do that after I'd seen the details. Smart. You don't. A lot of dealerships, they just almost handcuff you until you give them a credit statement.

Don't give him a credit statement. Adrian said, this was not his specialty. His job was simply to find a vehicle and learn everything about it. That's a system in a lot of court dealerships. The price is always handled by a business. handled by a manager. And then I asked him, what's plus, plus, plus, plus mean, Adrian replied,

taxes, title, and plates. It should be plus, plus, plus, plus, plus, plus, plus. That ain't true, I mean, obviously. Adrian asked me if I had a number in mind that I'd like to negotiate. This is really old school. He said he would take my offer to my sales manager. Here we go.

You know, it's like musical chairs. Let's go, I'm going to talk to my manager. and the two of them go outside, smoke a cigarette, have a cup of coffee, and you come back and you play the game. I said I wouldn't even know where to start. I don't know any specifics. I don't know what sort of payments I'm looking at. He said he was going to get his manager.

Adrian got his manager and began speaking without any introduction. I never said, hey, I'm George. How are you doing? Thanks for coming in. He just went into his spiel. He told Adrian to sit down next to him and said he understood I want to know what my payments would be. He said, generally speaking, my payments would be $21 for every thousand finance.

Now, that means 8%. And saying. Truth in lending requires you to disclose it by the amount per thousand. What a stupid government bureaucratic idea that is. Who knows unless you have a chart what $21 per thousand is? Well, we do have a chart, and it's 8%. Why not put in 8%. And then you don't have to go back.

They let them get away with this. They should disclose both. Yeah. I asked him what he could do about the price because I came in on the $14,000 discount and not $3,985. The sales manager laughed and said, everything's negotiable.

Oh, ho, whoa. He said maybe he could go another $3,000, maybe $4,000. Then the sales manager looked at Adrian and asked him, what if she leases? she could buy at the end of the lease. Adrian replied that the 2019s do not

have a lease program. The sales manager said, hold on, picked up. The guest sheet left. He returned with the guest sheet with new figures crawl on the back of the sheet and black ballpoint pen. For $1,500 down plus tax and tag

I could lease for 42 months and 10,000 miles per year. That's low mileage for just $599. dollars. Ooh. Advise, believe me, I have 32 salespeople who are fighting to sell this Jeep. Probably true. It's the only 2019 left. It's not even officially in our inventory yet. You better grab it while you can. I'm not trying any sales tax here. I guarantee you this thing will be gone Saturday. Old school, albeit true, last year. I pretended to get flustered and I was feeling overwhelmed. My son comforted to me, comforted to me, and suggested we'd walk outside get some air.

He told the man that I just needed some space. Give mom some space. Hey. The sales manager said, sure, and sit up. My son and I walked outside for about five minutes and came back in. I listen to this. I love this. I'm Agent Lightning.

I worked up some false tears. I love it. False tears. Found Adrian told him that this was too much right now. I said, I understood the Jeep, Mike is old, but I need to leave. He handed me his card, and he'd follow up. Wow. What a round of applause for Agent Lightning.

Great job. Great job. Love the tears. And there we are. And now we come to grading time. And what do we do with, there we go, across for Jeep Dodge, West Palm Beach, and the first solo female shop for Agent Lightning. want me to tell you what to do with them as long as it's not going to be bleeped we don't have a bleeper so yeah so who's got some scores here on nancy let's go to uh i got a bob

on facebook gives them a d we have chris who just texted in a f i'm waiting for lindas i'm going to i don't know i'm i'm going to say a d i mean i think this is standard i think on the curve, it's a D. I mean, it's not a wholehearted recommendation, but we've seen worse. Yeah, I mean, it's standard old school. We shopped O'Rigo many times,

and there's no nobody's breaking the law. It's... Well, they're breaking the law in the sense that they don't include the dealer fee and the advertised price. And, of course, everybody's doing that.

All right. Bob, we have somebody in Wellington. Jonathan Wellington gives him a D. Okay. Well, I've got Tim Gilliland, D-minus, including all applicable fees. Mr. Hand, stormed the dealership with pitchforks and torches, F. Mark Ryan with a D-minus, Wayne with a big D. And myself, personally, I'm going with a D. I think it's a pass. But you've got to be ready for them when you go in there. Yeah, absolutely.

I'm going to give them a C. You know, it's just an average dealership. You can serve with Bob and Maryland gives them a C also. Oh, really? I'm going to give them a D. It's better than last week's Napleton report, that's for sure. And I'm going to give an A to Agent Lightning and her son. Absolutely.

Well done. Great job. And we look forward to many, many more shops. Absolutely. Absolutely. Sorry. Linda does not agree with our grades. She gives them an F-minus.

Oh, geez. Well, you know, just so everybody knows, we grade on the curve, and the curve means that the best of the worst. There are actual scores like a 49, but it's a D. I mean, if we grade on a straight A, B, C, D, there'd be no dealers in Florida we'd recommend. And I've got Mark Anderson, A for Thunder, I think he meant Lightning, and D for confusing negotiation. and Guy with a D-minus. Okay, folks, we have one minute left, and I am going to thank all of you for tuning in to roll steroid on cars,

and we will be right back here next week. Have a wonderful weekend. Stay safe. Thank you. Thank you.