Earl Stewart on Cars - 09.07.2024 - Your Calls, Texts, and Mystery Shop of Wallace Kia of Stuart, FL.

Episode Date: September 7, 2024

Earl and his team answer various caller questions and responds to incoming text messages. Earl’s female mystery shopper, Agent Lightning visits a local Kia dealer to see what they have on the lot an...d how much they will charge for a lease on a new 2024 Kia Forte GT-Line coupe on their car lot. Earl Stewart is the owner of Earl Stewart Toyota in North Palm Beach, Florida, one of the largest Toyota dealerships in the southeastern U.S. He is also a consumer advocate who shares his knowledge spanning 50+ years about the car industry through a weekly newspaper column and radio show. Each week Earl provides his audience with valuable tips that prevent them from "getting ripped off by a car dealer". Earl has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, U.S. News and World Report, Business Week, and other major publications. He has also made numerous appearances on CNN, Fox News, CBS, and other news networks. He is frequently called upon by local and national media to comment on major trends and newsworthy events occurring in today’s rapidly changing auto industry. You can learn more by going to Earl's videos on www.youtube.com/earloncars, subscribing to his Facebook page at www.facebook.com/earloncars, and reading his blog posts at www.earloncars.com. Join us on Zoom during the live show via Meeting ID 926 589 0586. To purchase Earl’s book, “Confessions of a Recovering Car Dealer”, go to www.earlsbook.com. This will forward to Earl’s Amazon page to complete your purchase. All proceeds from the book go to Big Dog Ranch Rescue. For more information or to adopt the dog you have seen today or any of their other dogs, please visit their website at www.bdrr.org. “Disclosure: Earl Stewart is a Toyota dealer and directly and indirectly competes with the subjects of the Mystery Shopping Reports. He honestly and accurately reports the experiences of the shoppers and does not influence their findings. As a matter of fact, based on the results of the many Mystery Shopping Reports he has conducted, there are more dealers on the Recommended Dealer List than on the Not Recommended List he maintains on www.GoodDealerBadDealerList.com”

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:00 Hello, I'm Earl Stewart. I welcome you to Earl Stewart on Cars, a live talk show all about how to buy, lease, maintain, or repair your car without being ripped off by a car dealer. With me in the studio is Nancy Stewart, my wife, co-host, and a strong consumer advocate, especially for our female listeners. We also have Rick Kearney, an expert on how to keep your car running right. I dare you to ask a question that Rick can't answer about the mechanics or electronics of your car. Also with us is my son, Stu Stewart, our link to cyberspace through Facebook, YouTube, text messaging, and our encrypted anonymous feedback service. Stu is also the spymaster director of our mystery shopping report. He dispatches our secret shopper weekly to an unsuspecting the car dealership. And now, on with the show.
Starting point is 00:00:47 Good morning, everybody. We're back. Well, we're not completely. One missing person, my son, Stu, is not feeling well this morning, so he'll miss a show. but we got the rest of the group, Rick Kearney, our certified diagnostic master technician, and my co-host, on Nancy Stewart. We've got a, this is a very special show
Starting point is 00:01:08 because this will be the first Earl Sterone Carr show that we have broadcast and televised and zoomed where the Attorney General for the state of Florida, that's where we're located for you folks out of state, The Attorney General Ashley Moody, the State of Florida Attorney General, has committed to enforce the law that's been on the books for 20 years. I mean, I've got to laugh when I say it, but those were her words, not mine. She is committed to enforce the law unfair, deceptive trade practices. The lawyers call that for dupta.
Starting point is 00:01:49 Fraud is a commonly understood word. When dealers are fraudulent in the sales of their vehicles and their advertising and the bait and switch of the rest of it, well, if you're a listener to the show, you know what I'm talking about. But on September 1st, on September 1st, that law wouldn't have effect. So it's going to be up to us. And by us, I mean you and the folks on this show to get the word out.
Starting point is 00:02:19 Because think about it, you've been blind, selling cars or you've just been buying cars for a long time and you know what the dealers do and you know that there's no punishment there's no fines there's no lawsuits to speak of dealers get away with a bloody murder they can do just about anything advertise any way they want to and nobody seems to have done anything but now we have a commitment from the number one law enforcement officer in the state of Florida. Ashley Moody, she's in charge of all the law folks in Florida. So she's gone on record, we have it in writing,
Starting point is 00:03:02 that if car dealers violate the Florida statutes on unfair, deceptive trade practices, bait and switch advertising, junk fees, dealer-installed accessories that are not as close, any deception of this nature, they are going to be, well, they're going to be fined. they can actually have their motor vehicle retail license revoke so exciting times this this show is the first show that we've done where we can state that maybe we can really clean out clean up Dodge especially South Florida which is the Saddam Gamora of all
Starting point is 00:03:40 card he was in the country of the world for that matter now we're going to offer to pay you for your time if you are legitimately buying a car and you're in the market and you go into a car dealership and either if you buy a car or if you decide not to buy the car but if you legitimately are buying a car and you and you are subject to these unfair and deceptive trade practices bait and switch junk fees dealer install accessories if the advertised price of the car or the price that the salesperson accorded you if you called on the telephone if you would have person if they led you to believe that the price of the car was much less or any less than the actual advertised price they violated Florida law you can file a
Starting point is 00:04:33 complaint with Ashley Moody's office by calling this number and Nancy Stewart will be mentioning this Rick Kearney will be everybody's going to be mentioning this we want you to hear this number it's a it's a fraud line for the Attorney General Ashree Moody and that number is 866-966-966-2-26-8-66-9-66-7-226 you might want to make a note of that and even if you're not in the market for a car if you have a friend or a neighbor someone is thinking about it equip them and prepare them for this we will pay a hundred dollars for a A buyer of a car, intended buyer, you don't have to buy the car, but you must intend to buy the car at some point.
Starting point is 00:05:26 And then if they treat you in a manner that you feel is unfair or deceptive, if they misled you, if they gave you a price, they wouldn't honor. If they advertised the price, but the real price, excluded government fees, to the real price, when you had the junk fees back in was higher than the advertised price, then you can file a complaint with Ashley Moody, Florida Attorney General, office by calling 866-966-7226 and if you're streaming us that number is up on the screen now along with Ashley Moody's photograph and I think we can get something going here folks I've never been more positive about making a change and we'd be doing the show for over 20 years so that's that's my main message I'm going to get I'm going to turn the mic over to Nancy Stewart. She's my co-host. Most of you folks know her, regular listeners. 20-some-odd years ago,
Starting point is 00:06:25 we founded a 30-minute show on Thursdays on the C-Vue Radio, a little station, C-View Radio. And since then, the station has changed owners. We're now on for two hours every Saturday, and we're on from 8 to 10 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, 8 to 10, Eastern Standard Time. And she co-founder the show with me, has been with me all the way, and she is a very strong female advocate who has built the audience in this show from practically zero females to just about 50-50. Nancy, the mic is all yours. Thank you.
Starting point is 00:07:01 Boy, I'll tell you what, what an exciting day. I think we got some traction, Earl. What do you think, Rick? How about you, Jonathan? Everybody excited? I think I feel some energy in this room. just a little bit different. I say that it's, well, hopefully the roof is not going to come off this building
Starting point is 00:07:22 because we really are excited, and Earl has worked hard to get to this day, and we've joined him. We've joined him in this crusade, and Ashley Moody is finally giving us some attention, the attention that we need and the job that she should be getting. getting done. With all of that said, you're not going to, well, you're going to hear this number a lot. And this is the number that you can reach an attorney general Ashley Moody's office. 8669667226. Without you folks, we're nowhere. We appreciate you. anything that you can do for us, taking advantage of the phone number, making that call,
Starting point is 00:08:18 letting your voice be heard. We need more than one voice, and we're here for you to fight this, these dealers that take advantage of everyone and have been, hey, take a look at our ratings. You know, you can help us, you know, just get our ratings. out of the same spot it has been in for how long earl 20 years 22 23 probably yeah and we've been stuck yeah stuck at the bottom so help us on another note we've got a great mystery shopping report from Stewart and also you know ladies tell you weekend and we got how important you are and we show it by giving you $50 for the first
Starting point is 00:09:11 two new female callers, $50 for the first two female callers. Give us a call toll free at 877-960-960. And don't forget, you can text us at 772-497-6-5-3-0. But don't forget that number for Ashley Moody. It's very important. And Earl's going to talk more about this. during the show. So jot the number down. Like I said, we'll be mentioning it throughout the show and that number is 866. 866-966-7-2-2-6. Give us a call. Let us know what you think about this fight
Starting point is 00:10:04 that we have been part of. My husband has, he's put his blood, sweat, getting tears into this and it's all for the consumer and he has done one hell of a job. So there you go. We have a show to do, give us a call, be part of the show, you are an important part of the show. Again, that number, 877-960, 9960, don't forget your anonymous feedback.com. Now back to the recovering car dealer. You know, I just was remembering when you were talking about this Ashley Moody thing,
Starting point is 00:10:44 the Attorney General's office, many years ago, I had a senator from Miami, a state senator, who invited me to Tallahassee to speak to the group, to the Senate in Tallahassee, about enforcing the relatively new law at that time, the Florida statutes on unfair Deceptive Trade Practices Act. So I never, I think I might have been, no, it was my first trip to Tallahassee. I was there many, many years ago. I went to Florida State University for a visit. But this is probably my second time in Tallahassee. And I walked into the state capital all by myself. And I stood in front of the group, the legislature, the Florida legislature. And They also had the Attorney General there. That was like three or four Attorney Generals ago. The name will come to me. It was a male Attorney General.
Starting point is 00:11:51 And I made my presentation. The state senator that invited me to speak about the car dealer's misbehavior was with me. And I made my presentation. I thought I did a pretty good job. And it wasn't a standing ovation or anything, but everybody was nodding their head like they understood what I was talking about. And then the Attorney General came up and made his side. He was, the thing that shot me down was, you know, Your Honor, or whoever he was talking to,
Starting point is 00:12:28 all the, all the politicos there in the legislative room arena, they have practically no complaints from the consumer. So that was the problem. That was the excuse that the Attorney General used for not going after the card deals. We don't get very many complaints. I can't remember the exact number, but I think he said in the past six months I've had two complaints. So we got to complain, folks. You know, we have our opportunity.
Starting point is 00:13:02 Now, you probably got tired of complain, and if you were 20 years ago, because they probably would ignore it. they won't ignore it and we're not going to let them ignore it so you heard the number and if you can just call 866 966 7226 that's Ashley Moody the Attorney General and file the complaint the fraudulent complaint you'll have to do it in writing and we're going to give you a hundred bucks I mean I'm not trying to bribe anybody to complain I don't want anybody who's mad at a dealer but has no evidence has no reason to be bad or not this isn't a personality contest this is a legal situation where when
Starting point is 00:13:45 they break the law when they're trying to sell you a car they need to be taken into a responsibility they need to be worn fined or perhaps they even have their license suspended so if you'll call that number 866 966 7226 give us the information we'll confirm that it's a legitimate uh you made a legitimate company plane and we'll pay you $100 for your time how long ago was that we were both in Tallahassee and was the Attorney General his last name Butterworth it was a Bob Butterworth yeah he was he was the Attorney General at the time that's right it was about probably about about 20 years ago I mean the law back in 1982 the law
Starting point is 00:14:32 was relatively fresh but about 1982 the law was relatively fresh now we've given the number out so many times we haven't given out a number that's arguably as important almost is our number and that number is 877 960 960 960 and we have a call already yeah we do we have a couple of callers and I would like to welcome Dawn to the show he's calling us from Coconut Creek. Marty, we'll be right with you. Good morning, Dawn. Good morning.
Starting point is 00:15:13 Welcome. Thank you. Good to be with you. I live in South Florida. I moved here about 40 years ago and got into the car business, started selling cars. And after about a little bit less than two years,
Starting point is 00:15:31 I was put into F&I. And as you know, 40 years ago, it was a lot worse than it is now, and I've seen F&I evolve in those 40 years. I became an F&I trainer and traveled all over the country to dealerships, training them how to do F&I ethically, and I'm very proud of that. One thing that I'd like to talk about is that you discuss what you call extended warranties frequently, and I learned a long, long time ago that calling it an extended warranty is not the proper way to call what a service contract is.
Starting point is 00:16:19 An extended warranty insinuates that you are extending the manufacturer's warranty, and that's not what you're doing when you sell a service contract. So we were taught very early on not to call. an extended warranty, but to call it a service contract. So first of all, I wanted to get that out. Secondly, I wanted to let people know because a lot of people have really bad vibes about service contracts, and there are a lot of finance managers that try to stuff service contracts into your contract, and there are a lot that do it legitimately. And I believe that a service contract is valuable if you're going to keep the car longer than the three-year manufacturer's warranty.
Starting point is 00:17:08 If you're going to keep the car five, six, seven years or more, I think a service contract is extremely important. I purchased a used vehicle not too long ago, and I intend to keep the car for a very long time. And so I purchased a service contract, and I've used it already. and it saved me a lot of money. So if you're keeping the car longer than three years and you don't want to put out any kind of money out of your pocket, that could be very expensive for what repairs cost today. I just wanted to say that I think it's a good idea.
Starting point is 00:17:43 Well, Don, I appreciate that. And coming from a professional, I can't tell you how much I appreciate your call on the show. We get very few people with experience in the retail automobile business or the finance business, as you're experienced, you're in both. So I really appreciate your taking the time to call the show. I agree with, in general, with what you said. And you'll know this, because you were in the business, that all service contracts are not created equal.
Starting point is 00:18:13 And a lot of service contracts are created by the car dealers, and they form companies, and they put them in offshore companies, for tax reasons. and they decide what the what components will be covered and how completely on the contract on the other hand that's one end of the spectrum on the other end of the spectrum are the manufacturers they have extended service contracts Honda Ford General Motors vehicles they offer these these are legitimate service contracts and they do cover a reasonable amount of components on the car and one other thing So I say to people, service contracts, if it gives you peace of mind, if you feel better about owning the car and not as much fear of what happens if it breaks down and I can't afford to fix it, if that's going to make you feel better about owning the car, buy one. But be sure that you get a legitimate service contract, and I always point to the manufacturers because those are virtually all legitimate, not one that's designed by the dealer to maximize his earnings. Also, it depends on what kind of car you buy. If you buy a car with a very low maintenance requirement
Starting point is 00:19:35 and very high reliability history, I'll say Lexus is an example. Or if you buy a different car, let's say a Jeep. Now the Jeep has a high percentage of breakdowns and high maintenance and a lot of other things are wrong with it. I'm quoting consumer reports for that. So if you've got a good quality car, you might think less about buying an extended service contract than if you have a high quality car, which if you maintain it properly, according to factors on a amount, you're probably not going to have very many problems. But I agree with everything you said. I just want to be a little bit more specific.
Starting point is 00:20:17 Well, I think three important words that you just said are peace of mind. You know, if you want the peace of mind and knowing that you're not going to have to put out a ton of money in the future if your car breaks down. And I'd also like to say, and I'm sure you're aware of this, you're familiar with Car Shield that advertises a lot on TV. Yes. Are you aware that they were fined and had to pay $10 million a fine for deceptive advertising? I was, and I wasn't at all surprised, but yes, I'm glad to see someone would take that step. And for every car shield that gets fine, there's other extended warranties out there.
Starting point is 00:20:58 See, they were above the radar. They were on TV, they were in your face, and people saw what was going on and checked them out. The extended warranty companies that get away with it are the ones that fly under the radar. They get your name on a mailing list, they send you a mail solicitation, email, text, phone call. There's a huge number of boiler rooms around the country
Starting point is 00:21:22 calling people and saying, we have a special opportunity for you to extend your factory warranty. And so those are the ones that don't get caught. Car Shield got too arrogant and got on television. And someone probably in a position of authority said, we've got to go after this company. You know, Dawn, we talked about Car Shield. This is Nancy Stewart. We talked about Car Shield for months and even became more irritated when we saw them on TV. as long as we did.
Starting point is 00:21:53 Ice tea was doing the commercial. Pardon me? Ice tea, isn't that the guy that was doing the commercial? Yeah, exactly, exactly. I'm too old to know who Ice T is. He could have been Clara Bell, I don't know. But at any rate, they really took advantage of a lot of people. But rather than give them any air time,
Starting point is 00:22:15 let me move on to something important that I think is important. How long ago did you work in F&I? Uh, 38 years ago, I started an F&I. Okay. How long would you say you were in the office with the customer finalizing the transaction? Uh, I say that I probably did that for actually in a dealership, uh, full time, probably for three or four years until I was promoted to a regional, uh, and I director where I went in, I worked for a group that had several dealerships and went into training them in an FNI regional director capacity.
Starting point is 00:23:00 Yeah. And, you know, this is, it's really a shame that there are a lot of consumers out there right now. I never thought I'd hear this and even announce it on the air, but they're financing. They have to finance their service. I can't afford to get their cars fixed. So anyway, and there's ways of, you know, solving that problem, you know, by getting finance. But I see where Earl has something he might want to add to the conversation.
Starting point is 00:23:31 We got some other call was waiting here, but I had to ask you this one question. Back 38 years ago, have you heard of the Wang machine, W-A-N-G? Absolutely. I used it. I had the first Wang machine in Florida. I had a Pontiac dealership in West Palm Beach. And when Dr. Wang, the inventor, came out with that, I had the first F&I machine in South Florida. So the Wang became the name of the game back in all the dealers bought them.
Starting point is 00:24:10 I went from Wang to UCS. Yeah. Yeah, that was the system we used after Wang. It was UCS. Well, listen, it was a pleasure talking to you, folks. I enjoy your show and keep up the great work. Thanks, Don. Thanks, Don.
Starting point is 00:24:25 We're going to go. One more time, I'll give out that number for Attorney General Ashley Moody, and that telephone number is 866-966-7-226. That is 866-966-7-2-26. You can win yourself $100 this morning by helping us here at Earl Stewart on Cars to let all of our voices be heard. And you can also, you get rewarded with $100. So it's a win-win situation. Call Ashley.
Starting point is 00:25:10 Yeah, I know her. I'm on a first name basis with Ashley. Her number again is 866-966-7-2-2. Now, we're going to go to Morty. Good morning, Marty. Welcome. Good morning. I have a couple questions for Earl.
Starting point is 00:25:25 Okay. If a car dealer has his two or three junk fees in his price, as long as he tells you that price up front, he's not violating the law. Is that correct? That's correct. Yeah. It's called profit. I mean, you don't have to.
Starting point is 00:25:48 make up a fee and put an amount there to increase your profit if you just put the profit into the advertised price the whole purpose of the junk fee is so you can advertise a lower price than your competition and make the customer believe they're going to pay a couple thousand dollars less than they really can't pay so yeah if you want to put in on nitrogen and tires and pinstripes and all the other crap the mudflaps you know they charge your 500,000 two thousand dollars for something that the dealer probably paid to have installed, you know, $500. I mean, they mark these things up 1,000%
Starting point is 00:26:27 and that's just to conceal the profit. So, yeah, if you want to put a bunch of junk in your price and advertise the price and quote the price when someone asks you what is the out-the-door price, go ahead and put as many junk fees on there as you want and dealer fees and dock fees and the resident. We don't care what you want to name your profit as long as you admit,
Starting point is 00:26:48 this profit and not something we need to have or have to buy. Right. Okay. My next question is, up until this past week, a lot of dealership put in market adjustment. Now, for me personally, I get rid of that, so I don't even bother with that number. But does that have to be in their price if they're going to charge you that? Can you say it's not something that they have to put in there? They have to.
Starting point is 00:27:25 The market adjustment, I have no problem. Well, I have a slight problem with market adjustment. The MSRP is not the price, the maximum price that a car dealer can sell the car for. The manufacturer suggested retail price, the Munrooney label, is the suggested retail price. But if a car dealer wants to charge a million dollars for a car that he paid $50,000 for, that's okay. As long as he advertises that price, he might not sell too money, but as long as they advertise a full price. So the market adjustment is nothing more than marking up the NSRP. And you see this a lot with dealers when a limited edition car comes out.
Starting point is 00:28:09 The Toyota Super was a great example when the new Super came out a few years ago. dealers were charging hundreds of thousands of dollars more. I mean, literally, it was crazy. Collectors will pay, wealthy collectors will pay a lot of money for a classic car. And one of the, first off the assembly line, a guy by the name of John Stalupi, who is a big car dealer, he paid a million dollars for a Supra off the assembly line. And so, yeah, it's no law against charging a lot of money as long as you tell. the buyer up front, this is all the money to pay.
Starting point is 00:28:48 And if they say yes, it's perfectly legal. And you know, Marty, that market adjustment that you mentioned, do you remember the first time you saw it, you heard it? It was right after COVID. And everybody, these dealers jumped on the chance to take advantage of the consumer. Why? How? Because of market adjustment. And they're still using it.
Starting point is 00:29:14 Right. The other thing I just wanted to say is for when you go to the finance guy, I get out of there very fast personally because I tell them I want nothing. Smart. And that's it. And I sign all the either knows or, and I know they don't like it, but I don't buy anything extra and I've been buying a lot of cars. So I think that, and you're the finance guy that called you,
Starting point is 00:29:46 I don't care how long you keep the car. You're better off saving your money, and if you have to repair it, use the money for that. Now, I never kept the car for 15, 20 years, so I don't know how they worked out, but keeping a car four, five, six years, usually you'll be ahead of the game by not buying the warranties. Well, thanks, Marty.
Starting point is 00:30:09 Rick had a comment. I recently saw a post on Reddit that was the Monroney sticker and the market adjustment on a 23 Dodge Challenger demon. The sticker price on the car was $121,000. The market adjustment was $150,000. That's one hell of a market adjustment. Absolutely ridiculous. And I can tell you from personal experience, if you find a car that's a relatively. liable vehicle. There's nothing wrong with keeping a car well into double digits. My first
Starting point is 00:30:46 Tacoma that I had, I kept it for 17 years, and I never experienced any major problems with it. My wife's Highlander was 13 years old when we traded it in for her RAV-4. And certain cars, Hondas and Toyotas, Subaru's, Accura, and Lexus, with basic good maintenance and just reasonable driving habits, they'll last 15, 20 years easily and still be worth a fortune when you go to trade them in. Absolutely. I guess if you really get a lemon, you know, you could always have a problem. And you'll know that quickly.
Starting point is 00:31:25 Most cars, if there's a major problem with that car, you're going to find out within the first eight months to a year if there's really a problem with that car. Otherwise, with routine maintenance, modern cars will just... keep right on going. I mean, you know, I used to make a fortune when I was a lot younger off of drive belts. Drive belts, most our guys would forget to look at them. You'd see big cracks in it. You'd take a picture. The customer would buy new drive belts, and that was it three years. Now, the drive belt on my pickup is 13 years old, and it's still perfectly brand new. There's no cracks in it. Everything just lasts forever.
Starting point is 00:32:05 Well, it'll be very interesting to see how many people, you know, what dealerships really change. Well, we're going to find out. Yeah, you're right. Marty, once you go out and buy a car and if you have any problems, Father can play with Ashley Moody and let me give you 100 bucks. Yeah, the problem is I bought the car six months ago, so if I buy another one now, I want you to buy the whole car. 100 is not enough
Starting point is 00:32:36 Hey Marty Did you see the You're still driving your crown Correct Right Right I better be I hear where you're coming from Okay
Starting point is 00:32:48 The reason I ask is because in the road report For the Consumer Report You know they have the Toyota Crown Signia And the Crownsignia SUV offers improvements Over the Crown Sedan I believe the sedan is the one you have, correct?
Starting point is 00:33:05 Yeah, yeah. I don't know whether you need this feature or not, if you have a lot of tall people in your family, but that is something that has changed on the crown that's come out. One of the many things that have changed, if you can believe that. My grandson, 6'4, and he sat in the back of my crown, and he was hitting his head on the top there. Well, he's going to like the new crime.
Starting point is 00:33:34 It has definitely, it's very visible that it can hold your grandson. Hey, Marty, we're going to roll. Okay, have a good weekend. Thank you. Help us out. Call the Attorney General. Okay, folks, I'm going to give you the meeting number for Zoom, and I want to thank Jonathan last week for calling us.
Starting point is 00:34:02 from Orlando and what an informative call and he was really great. I hope he spread the word to his circle because it's going to make for really great calls. But the Zoom ID number is 926-589-0586. That's 926-589-0586. When yourself $100,000586, win yourself $100, first two new zoom callers we're just giving away money left and right why you deserve it and you deserve to be compensated for your time and you are giving to this fight this march this what we want to achieve uh what earl has been working towards so we're just not giving out money frivolously we're just you know we just want to give you an incentive okay earl You know, we've been talking about service contracts
Starting point is 00:35:05 and buying cars and attorney generals. I sometimes overlook the most important part of the show, which is how do you keep your car maintained and repaired without being ripped off by a car dealer? And you've heard from Rick Kearney. He comes in and talks about the sales process too because he's part of the business, but what he's uniquely qualified to diagnose,
Starting point is 00:35:32 know it's a problem you might have with your car. And you know what it feels like when you suddenly notice that symptom of your car. There's a noise you can't quite positively. I can't tell where it's coming from, but it's a tick, tick, tick, or a boom, boom, or maybe it's the smell. And then you start to sweat, or maybe that infamous check engine light comes on. And you wonder, what's going to happen? on an article of the automotive news this week that the average cost when a check engine light
Starting point is 00:36:06 comes on is about between four and five hundred dollars, four hundred dollars or something like that. So here you're on a dark road in the middle of the night and you don't know exactly where you are. That check engine light comes on. Maybe the family's in the car with you. I mean that's got, that's scary. So if you have something that's really worrying you about your car. Ask Rick Kearney, if you're on YouTube.com forward slash Earl on Cars, he has a huge following on YouTube.com forward slash Earl on Cars. You can post and ask him a question. Rick has worked for me for over 25 years. He's a certified diagnostic master technician in all categories, whether you're talking about transmission, air conditioning, the engine, every part of a car. And
Starting point is 00:36:59 You don't just get a badge that calls you a certified diagnostic master technician. What is it? Every two years, Rick? Every five years. Every five years. He has to go back and graduate again because the technology is moving so fast that a technician that took the test 20 years ago, he's on a date. Every five years, he's got to go back and pass another test. And as a tip to you, when you're choosing a technician from wherever you do, independent or a car dealership,
Starting point is 00:37:34 ask what he's qualified then on ASE. ASE is the Automotive Service Excellence. Automotive service excellence. So you want a free diagnosis? Give us a call at 877-960-9960. That's 877-960-960. asked for Rick and Rick will
Starting point is 00:37:55 listen to what you had to say what's really cool if you want to do this if you happen to Zoom us or if you want to be online you can send him a video clip or even an audio clip that's really cool because oftentimes that'll give him that little
Starting point is 00:38:12 extra information that he needs to make an accurate diagnosis but 877 960-9960 and Rick Kearney can answer any question you have about your car. And I actually have had it happen that someone has sent a clip to me,
Starting point is 00:38:30 a short video clip where customers come in and said, hey, I've got this sound, but it only happens once in a while, and they play the clip, and I can hear it, and it gave me a way to help me duplicate it and solve the problem. And it makes it so much easier because cars are so complicated nowadays
Starting point is 00:38:49 and trying to communicate to a, mechanic what you're hearing and when you're hearing it so but folks if you really want to a quick word of advice if you've got something odd happening with your car and you're really not sure what's going on you know you want to go go to the where the mechanic is get the mechanic ask them to go for a ride with you yeah and do your best to duplicate what that sound or noise is for them and if you can show it to them 99 times out of 100 they can fix it. And let me jump in there because I've been in the business a long time and I get a lot of calls. I'm pretty much open to all of our customers. And if you didn't know this, we are,
Starting point is 00:39:33 we have a car dealership. And that's why I say that. I always say, this is not an infomercial. But we have a car dealership in North Palm Beach, toilet dealership. And I've been there since 1975. Customers call me all the time. And I get complaints on our service department like all car dealers do and one of the complaints that I get is my car was making a noise I took it in and they looked and they couldn't find anything wrong and they gave me the car back and on the way home I still heard the noise the same thing replied to shake rattle or roll or an odor symptoms that you observe with your senses now we all know some people can't hear as well as other people and that
Starting point is 00:40:21 It includes mechanics. I would think technicians, because you're around engines and you're probably around some loud noises, I would think some technicians suffer some amount of hearing loss. Oh, yeah. Yep. So if you've got good ears and you hear a noise that really worries you and the technician, the road test the car with you, you should ride with him. If he can't hear it, you're not going crazy.
Starting point is 00:40:45 He just can't hear it. Ask for verification, ask for another person. another person to go with you and the same thing with the smell some of these things are subtle and I won't say that sometimes you know my joke is you know something hurts until you go to the doctor then it doesn't bother you anymore
Starting point is 00:41:02 this can happen with a car you know it makes a noise all the time but when I take it into the repair shop it stops making the noise I know that happens but more often than not it doesn't happen that way it happens if the person can't smell it feel it hear it see it
Starting point is 00:41:18 The five senses are not sharp enough, so don't give up. And the other side of that is when you're driving your car, you get so used to what it feels like. You know the instant, something odd is there. You can feel that oddity. You smell it, you hear it, you see it, you know something's wrong because it's something that changed in your environment that you're in all the time,
Starting point is 00:41:44 whereas the mechanic is driving 20 or 30 cars a day. day maybe and every one of those is different so he's never really sure you know now he may get in your car and hear your noise and be able to say oh okay yeah I know exactly what that is but it's you know it's maybe it's not something you want to mess with and while we're on that subject yeah it may be something so tiny it'll be like look well you don't want to spend money on this while we're on that subject ask the person here's a here's a comment I get a complaint they told me that this is the way the car is supposed to sound or smell or feel and they all do it that way so now that that excuse really bothers me so I tell my
Starting point is 00:42:31 customers and I'm telling you asked for another car or maybe more than another car and see if in fact that has that same problem yes if the manufacturer is building these cars where there's Toyota General Motors or Honda and it's making a noise or it's pulling or shaking or smelling, then the factory should be advised and there should be a recall campaign on the thing. So don't let they all do it. All the cars do that. Why are you complaining? Because everybody that bought that model has the same problem. Somebody needs to be responsible for that problem and you need to find out if it is in fact and all the cars have that made. Just a funny story on that was when cars,
Starting point is 00:43:17 first came out with electronic parking brake for the rear, when you put the car in park, you would hear this, and all of us were like, what in the world is that? And it wasn't until we actually thought and realized that that sound is actually the electric motors on the rear calipers engaging those brakes. So that is a noise that every one of them is going to make. And sometimes it's a little louder than others. If you have your windows up and you're sitting in a quiet room, a quiet, area, you'll hear that noise a lot louder than if there's a lot of traffic around you
Starting point is 00:43:51 or your windows are down, the air is blowing, whatever. So we had customers come in and say, hey, this, making this weird noise, and we'd explain what it was, said, nope, this is a normal sound. You're going to hear this. And that's another reason why you should always test drive the car that you buy. Exactly. You'd be surprised how many people buying a used car or a new car do not take it on a thorough test drive but they got you
Starting point is 00:44:16 if you didn't do that but when you hear it and you say I'll buy it if you'll fix that noise and they say I'm sorry I can't fix it you're going to save a lot of money and Rick is here to answer all your questions and he can answer all of your questions I said that last week and
Starting point is 00:44:32 he just looked at me he knows all the answers you know he may not know one or two answers but he knows all the answers that telephone number is 870 7-960. Let me point out to the ladies, if you're listening. Did you know that 85% of ladies, 85% you influence a purchase of a vehicle. You influence. You are a huge part of this industry, a real moneymaker.
Starting point is 00:45:06 And if the dealerships don't get that by now, financial disaster for them. Okay. And I, and I, I have $50 for the first two new lady callers, which brings me back to the phones, and I'm going to talk to Joan from Stewart, who is a first-time female caller. Good morning. Morning. Thank you for holding, Joan. Okay. How are you? What can we do for you?
Starting point is 00:45:36 I'm good. Well, I was told to call this number by a friend of mine, and I found the conversation interesting. I don't know what radio station it is. I could tune to to to hear this more often. True oldies. We're in North Palm Beach, Florida, and we have settled through oldies station all over South Florida. Oh, okay.
Starting point is 00:45:57 It's a great station. If you like the Goldie Oldies, I do. I mean, I love movies. I do. The 60s and 70s music, you ought to try this station out. It is all talk shows. We have some talk shows, but a lot of times they just play the Goldie Oldies. It's a great station.
Starting point is 00:46:13 Okay. Very informative. What's the number of the station? Number? 877-960-90-9-60. 95-9 FM. Oh, you're looking for the... 95-9 FM.
Starting point is 00:46:28 Okay, that's... And it's true oldies. True oldies, okay. I'll look for it. TRU, TRU Oldies, yes. Oh, T-R-U-oldies, okay. Well, thank you very much, John. and I'm, spread the word, and if you've got any friends that are female that haven't called the show before
Starting point is 00:46:48 and like to pick up $100 like you did, tell them to give us a call. Okay, I definitely will do that. Thank you, Jim. We're building the female audience, Nancy Stewart, my wife, and co-host. We founded the show 20 years ago, and she has been able to bring our female listing audience up to 50%. And that's one of the ways we do it, is introduce the, uh, the prize of $100 to folks who haven't called before. So we hope you'll call again, especially if you have any questions about buying or leasing
Starting point is 00:47:20 or maintaining your car. That's great. I'm glad I can do that. That would be very helpful. What else you could do, Joan, is to leave your contact information so that I can send that check out to you. Oh, okay, sure. Have a great weekend.
Starting point is 00:47:36 Thank you. You too. You too. Spread the word. We're building a platform. here for the ladies. Okay, we're going to go to Roadrunner, Steve. He's a regular caller from Pointe Beach.
Starting point is 00:47:50 Good morning, Roadrunner, Steve. Good morning, everybody. It's good to be back talking to everybody. Where'd you go? I was in New York. I got COVID somewhere, so I was aggravated for two and a half weeks. Oh, boy. So with that.
Starting point is 00:48:09 Okay, last week I was listening to the show. about the hammer in the cart and not the glass out? Uh-huh. Okay. Well, if you've got to doubt it, where you can pick up four hammers for five bucks. Keep two in the front, two in the back. This way you ain't got to go searching everywhere.
Starting point is 00:48:26 Yeah, you don't want to have to do any searching when you're under water. I know, I know. It's hard to find a pen sometimes in a call when you've got to write something. I'm going to work on my road on in a few minutes. What is the best way to find a friend? find a vacuum leak? Old school like yours, I would actually go with a simple
Starting point is 00:48:50 can of starting fluid and go very, or WD40 actually might be a little safer for you. Go very, very careful and gentle with it. And if you have an RPM gauge that you can put on it outside to watch under the hood,
Starting point is 00:49:06 spray a little bit of WD40 around where you suspect the vacuum leak is. and when those r pms jump you know you found it for folks okay well I would hear the motor rev up right you you'll hear a little rev up yeah but depending on your engine
Starting point is 00:49:22 you know depending on the sound of it how it's built you know your idol may not be perfectly smooth anyways if you're running a good cam in there you might have a little bit of lope so your idle may be adjusting up and down anyways what's lope in the engine is when you have a big cam shop you hear a
Starting point is 00:49:39 Brum, brum, brum, brum. Oh, okay. Yeah. No, the loaf is on the bottom of your ear where you put the ear. Yeah. For folks that are wondering what we're talking about here, engines, of course, are basically just a big air pump is what the engine really is, and they're sealed to a certain point in areas,
Starting point is 00:50:01 so that it knows exactly how much air is coming into the engine. Now, if you have a leak somewhere that a hose is not, has disconnected or the hose is split or something and it's sucking extra air in, that's called a vacuum leak. With newer cars, there's ways we can easily track that down by using different sensors on it. But in older cars like Steve's old roadrunner, you get the old school mechanic style, you spray a little bit of W-D-40 where you think that vacuum leak is, and when it sucks that extra
Starting point is 00:50:35 hydrocarbon into the engine, the engine will actually speed up. up because you're giving you extra gas. So you'll see a change in the RPMs of the engine when you find where that leak is. Okay, the other thing is I talked about with my transmission, I heard noises and all this stuff
Starting point is 00:50:54 like that. Well, I went down to my guy, performance transmission in Del Rey on Congress. He put the car up on a lift called me the next day. He told me all I did was drop the pan, cleaned it up, put new tranny fluid,
Starting point is 00:51:09 in it and new filter. He went from the front to the back. He said everything was good. Nothing leaking, how good? I was expecting to build for like $5,000. You know, because all I got charged was $200 and I was like, oh, I was happy
Starting point is 00:51:27 as L. Steve, what is the name of that? Wow. Transmission Company again? Performance transmission. In Delray? Yeah. Well, let's get my plug. You know, when you find a honest for Bear Shop, they're worth their
Starting point is 00:51:41 weight and goal. So you folks in South Florida, you got a transmission problem. We have a positive testimony there from Roadrunner, Steve. Performance transmission. He does all the cars, because I've seen all the cars there. So. Very good.
Starting point is 00:51:57 Hey, Steve, what? What's you running in that for a transmission? 727 or a 904? Yeah, the talk flight. You got the 727? Yes. Nice. with that and uh that was about it the uh i was going to say something else i forgot now
Starting point is 00:52:16 well thanks for calling him i'm glad you're okay that uh COVID is scary so i'm glad you're back in action yeah some of them are i was getting aggravated sitting in the house not doing nothing yeah yeah terrible drive you crazy okay okay everybody's safe and well have a great weekend you too bye bye bye bye we are going to go to uh Let's see. I mean, me, me, my, y'em-o. We're going to go to Susan. She is a first-time caller.
Starting point is 00:52:46 And she's calling us from Stewart. Good morning, Susan. Hi. Welcome. Yes, I just have a question about a Toyota truck, and my husband was asking me to ask you. If you take it, if he takes it in to buy another new Toyota, can the dealership tell what,
Starting point is 00:53:09 and he did not buy it from Toyota because you did buy it used. Can they tell how much you paid for it? No. Unless it's listed, it would be almost impossible to find out that. If he bought it from a used car a lot or another dealership,
Starting point is 00:53:26 the price that he paid is not going to be listed. It won't be listed. No. I wouldn't be able to know how much we bought it for if I was trading it in. No, if you got a killer deal, on it and you really saved a bunch of money when you bought it there and you didn't buy it from that dealership they won't be able to even track that down ever
Starting point is 00:53:48 Susan what you can do is I get an accurate description of the vehicle and the Venn number would be good but the exact year-making model and mileage and you can go back in the database of a number of sources like Mannheim auction there's There's a lot of sources accessible to you and the general public on a particular your make-model car as to what the wholesale value is now and what the retail value is now. So it would be a kind of a general way to get an idea of what the person paid for it. The average retail for that vehicle would be a number that would be close to what he paid for it. And actually, what you're going to want to do now, if you're planning to trade it in or to sell it to them, go to at least three other good places and tell them that you've got an extra vehicle, you know, somebody retired, they can't drive, whatever, but you've got an extra vehicle and you want to sell this vehicle and ask them what is their best price that they will give you, someplace like CarMax, maybe talk to Carvana or one of those. and I would pick
Starting point is 00:55:07 if it's a Toyota pickup I would go to another dealership entirely and let them give you their best price because a Toyota dealer would normally give you a little more than like a Honda dealer might that's a great idea I should have said that that's exactly right
Starting point is 00:55:22 that's better than checking with the Mannheim auction numbers but that's a real localized accurate number if you do what Richard suggested and Suzanne you're in the driver seat you know you can really you can get a good price for your car. And as Rick said, CarMax, Carvana, we buy any car.
Starting point is 00:55:42 So it's definitely worth, you know, the time that you're going to have to put into it. And remember, too, that use car prices right now are really, really high everywhere. So don't let them lowball you. You're in the driver's seat, Suzanne, and you can get a good price for that vehicle. trust me you really can you're going to be shocked and what was the name of that website again manhunt manhine is almost a monopoly on wholesale auto auctions they are largely online now but they actually have physical locations every car dealer virtually every car dealer will sell cars to manhine auctions and they also buy cars they make the market and cars and if you go
Starting point is 00:56:31 M-A-N-H-E-I-M, if you Google that, you can check prices on, from California to Florida as to what your make-model cars are. And it used to be that pricing a car telling a person with the wholesale value, the actual cash value, car dealers call it, what that number was, was more of an art. Now it's a science because you can look at the Mannheim
Starting point is 00:56:57 and you know exactly real time, you know, at 859, on this Saturday this is what a 2014 2012 Chevrolet Corvette sells for so it's M-A-N-H-E-I-M and the data is available to everybody okay thank you for you're very welcome Susan next all I wanted to know hey Suzanne before you go remember to leave your contact information so I can get that $50 check out to you as a first time female caller please spread the word we want to build a female audience here at eran cars yeah thank you okay um i think that we are going to go to dawn is don holding
Starting point is 00:57:48 he's just watching he's just what hey don thanks for tuning in uh on zoom dawn is one of our zoom callers from weeks past and hey don i can see you Can't hear you, though. Okay, let's go to Rick. I bet he has... Well, I've got... You've got FaceTime. I got one quick one to read from Donovan here.
Starting point is 00:58:19 He says, Hyundai this week showed off the refreshed 2025 Ionique 5. It has several updates, including a bigger battery for a range of up to 300. And it'll be made in a U.S. factory in Georgia, a brand new factory in Georgia. But most importantly, this is the first non-Tesla EV to have the NACS, which is the Tesla's name for their charging port, natively on the car. So from the factory, the charging port for it will be the Tesla-style charger. if you have access to the Tesla Supercharger network and all non-Tesla networks. So basically you could charge this car any charging port.
Starting point is 00:59:11 He says, a lot of people are waiting on the sidelines for vehicles to start to show up with the NACS port natively on the car and on the vehicles, and they're going to start to roll out within the next year and into 2026. How are we doing on the Zoom? Did we ever figure out what the audio problem was? No, Don isn't speaking, so we need to have Don, we need to get Don to speak. I think we, do we have two Zoom callers out there? Well, actually, we have three Zoom callers that are watching.
Starting point is 00:59:44 Yeah, so we've got three people, and we can't hear any of them. Oh. Well, I've asked them if they want to, you know, ask the question, and nobody's responded, so they're just watching. Oh, okay, you're just watching. If any of you watching would like to speak, let us know. I thought our audio wasn't working, but Jonathan's told me that you're just watching. And Donovan, I hear somebody.
Starting point is 01:00:13 You hear them? I heard it, yeah. Yes, I'm a little looking at you and hearing. I hear it. Can you turn off your microphone, please, on Zoom? Turn it for. Or not your microphone. Which is that they need to turn off, Jonathan?
Starting point is 01:00:31 We're getting the echo effect. No, you should be working. Go ahead. Can you hear me? Oh, I think, Dawn, is that you? Yes, that's me. Now we got you. Excuse me.
Starting point is 01:00:48 Okay, now I see. We see you know. You see me? Can you hear me? That's the question. Yep. I can hear you. Finally, because when I received your $100
Starting point is 01:00:59 the last time six weeks ago, you could hear me, but I could hear you, but you couldn't hear me. Well, thanks for coming back. That's great. Well, thank you for the 100. You're welcome. I had a real exciting vacation.
Starting point is 01:01:15 I drove an electric car. Oh. It was very interesting. The The car itself is, uh-oh, is to lose me again? No, we still got you. We have another Zoom caller holding, and when he makes a noise, it knocks you off.
Starting point is 01:01:39 The car itself is very, very unusual. It's fast, for sure. Hey, Don, did you use autonomous on your trip? No. You said you drove an electric car. electric car. So what happened was I picked it up at the airport and I think I put around 300 US miles, something like that on it. I had enough juice when I got back that there was about 62% less, something like that. The interior and the way it works is I have a Mercedes GSL, 23 and with all the whips and whistles. And the whips and whistles in this car are very similar. and act almost identical. It was easy to drive for me, at least.
Starting point is 01:02:32 It was fast, like I said. What was the model? What model, make a model? Yeah, I think it was a 23, or maybe there's a 22, Pulsar 2. Well, I'm not familiar with that, but that's very interesting. Well, it's a car made by Volvo, which is China, really. but it's interesting. It's similar, I guess, a lot to your Tesla in the interior and stuff.
Starting point is 01:03:02 But it was interesting. The biggest problem I had was the rental car company, Hertz, gave me a little dongle to use on a shell gas station. So I just pull up, use this dongle, and fill up electricity. Well, there was no shell station within the airport area. Oh, boy. So I couldn't use it. So I had to go back to the dealership, to the rental car. I paid 43, no, 42 euros, which is $46 or something like that, maybe more, to fill up from 68% to, they said 100%.
Starting point is 01:03:40 But I don't believe them. So I got hose there. Oh, boy. Well, that is great. That's so interesting. And I'm so happy you're on Zoom. I don't think about people renting electric vehicles. You must be a gutsy guy.
Starting point is 01:03:57 When I used to travel more, I think I'd be scared to death to rent a brand new technology car. But you did it and you lived. The price for the car was a special, $85 as opposed to $220, $225 for gas. So I said, what the hell? Might as well give it a shot. Yeah. I was happy. Like I said, we, coming back, we were worried about, we went out of electricity and where
Starting point is 01:04:28 do we fill up? Because in Europe, although there are a lot of stations, when you get out into the countryside, there's nothing. Zero. Are you, did you, did you accelerate, were you, have you driven an EV before? Weren't you impressed with the acceleration of an electric vehicle? Yeah, the acceleration is unbelievable. I mean, it was, it put you back in your seat.
Starting point is 01:04:55 Yeah, yeah. And my daughter, who drove with me, said, what the hell is that? She thought she was in an airplane. That's what Nancy says when I accelerate the Tesla. Don't tell her about it. Hey, Don, where in Europe did you rent the Polestar? What year? Where?
Starting point is 01:05:17 I'm sorry, say it again. What country? Where did you rent it? It was Italy. In Italy. Okay. Kim, Kim appreciates life on our YouTube channel was asking where you rented it from? Where in Italy? Airport. I don't ask me what you want. It was outside of Boulon somewhere. Cool.
Starting point is 01:05:44 And that was the Polestar 2? Paul Star 2. Yeah. Interesting, interesting car. But I like my Mercedes. I'm sticking with it. I wish Volkswagen hadn't screwed up because the ideal car for me would be a diesel electric hybrid. You get all the benefits of the diesel economy.
Starting point is 01:06:09 On top of that, you get electric hybrid. And, of course, the fuel course is different, but it would work good. I had diesel rabbits for years. One year when my wife was alive, she said, I have a car I've been looking at. Well, from there on in, it was Mercedes all the way. But this 23 that I have is very nice. There's been problems reported with it, but the only problem I've had with it was the running lights. They had to replace them because the air would come on.
Starting point is 01:06:47 but I had nothing but praise about it so anyway so would you would you go electric again I go hybrid hybrid electric but not all electric yeah that's what I go yeah particularly yeah I just I mean why did you guys when you're a Toyota dealer have a Tesla for a primary car I've I've listened to the show a number of times. I've never heard you talk about that. Well, we'll be talking about our cyber truck pretty soon. You can blame that on me. I'm a tech freak, and I started out as an electronics engineer,
Starting point is 01:07:33 a jury in physics and mathematics, and anything technical is always fascinated me, and I've never been more blown away than by the technology of electric vehicles, the autonomous, Nancy and I have a Tesla plat and we use the full autonomous function everywhere we go. This morning we left the house. I pushed the button. I put true oldies radio and that's the last I had to drive.
Starting point is 01:08:04 I just sat there. You got to keep your hands on the wheel and it took us from our home right to the radio station. So the answer is anything. anything that's new and exciting, I can't resist, though. That's why a toilet dealer is driving a Tesla. Yeah, that's interesting. I'm a gadget
Starting point is 01:08:26 freak, too. I'm not an engineer by any means, but the autonomous driving for the Pulsar and the Mercedes is very, very similar. It'll follow the car at wherever you said it.
Starting point is 01:08:40 It'll stop when it has to. It'll start when it has to. And and what have you but it's not as sophisticated i don't think is as tesler because although i can you know i mean right now i just programmed the car because i hadn't done i could close and open my garage door with the car uh with uh my queue i don't know if you know of my cue but it's a garage door oh yeah yeah and i can put that into my uh mercedes they had problems with it maybe a year and a half ago, and now it's fixed, and it's working now.
Starting point is 01:09:19 So that's one of the tech things that is pretty neat. Well, Don, listen, we got some other calls holding. Now that we got this Zoom thing figured out, I'd love to hear from you again next week, and other Zoom people hearing about a successful Zoom conversation will promote that. I look forward to doing a good percentage of our show on Zoom. So thanks again, and please call them. Thank you. The next time I'll call to talk about leasing.
Starting point is 01:09:46 Oh, sounds good. We would definitely love to hear from you. Thank you so much. Have a great weekend, you and your daughter. We're going to go to John in Palm City. Morning, John. Good morning. I'm just anxious to see about this reinforcement of this existing law
Starting point is 01:10:02 and what gets done about it. And the example I want to give you is, like seatbelts. Seatbelts came into effect. You don't hear of anybody anymore. that's getting a ticket for not wearing a seatbelt. They came in effect, August 15, 1973, that they were made mandatory. There was a problem right away. Your car wouldn't start until you adjusted or put your seatbelt.
Starting point is 01:10:28 They had so much flack over it that in 1974 October, due to complaints, they had to stop that law because you can option to put them on, but the car could start again, but then they put the blinking lights on your dashboard to remind you to set the seatbelt. There's one law after the other. The Montroney's law, 1958, it was so strict. When I went on my sister to buy a first car,
Starting point is 01:10:58 the dealer handed you a razor blade, and only you could take the sticker off. Now go to dealer after dealer, and you won't even find a sticker attached. It's in the glove compartment. It's in the back seat. or whatever, and the federal law says it must be attached. But how many dealers are getting fined for not attaching that to the window?
Starting point is 01:11:20 I could go on and on and on. Dark windows on cars. There's a law, especially in some states like Florida, that it can only be a certain amount. I've never heard of anybody that got stopped for having too dark windshield or driver's window. So these laws are all great if they're enforced. So let's see now how Ashley Moody is going to enforce the complaints of this existing law that's been on the books for a long time.
Starting point is 01:11:50 Thank you, John. I'll say you really said it, John. You know, we've got all kind of laws. Let's enforce them. John, I agree with you. John, I got some information for you because I know you're a buff on older cars and you're an old guy like me. And we think with great sentiment about the way the cars were, you know, 25, 30,
Starting point is 01:12:11 40 years ago, or even further years ago. And I just found out, this is an automotive news. There's become an overwhelming number of old used cars being imported. And the reason being that the federal law on emission control and safety, if you bring a car from Japan or Europe that's 25 years old or older, then it's legal. You can take a car that has no emissions suppression and that has safety, never been safety checked, and you can bring it and buy it in the United States.
Starting point is 01:12:54 I'm not suggesting people do that. Of course, it would be illegal to drive it on the road, but you can buy the car now. And there's a guy named Gary Duncan, D-U-N-C-A-N, and he's in Tennessee, and he is selling a lot of thousands of these cars are being sold and think of a
Starting point is 01:13:17 goldy, oldy model that you'd like to have either European or Japanese car, you can buy one he'll even put the emissions on it so you can drive it on the road for about $10,000 but that's a lot of money but if you drive it off road or you just have it because you're a collector
Starting point is 01:13:34 just think it's a treasured of all these old cars. I'm thinking about buying, I want to buy a 1975 Toyota because that's the year I started in business as a Toyota dealer. I'm going to call this guy Duncan and see what he has available
Starting point is 01:13:51 in the 1975 toilets. Put it on my showroom floor. One of the guys that works, one of the guys that works in our detail department has a Toyota a Rusty. Yeah. It's a Japanese
Starting point is 01:14:05 Toyota. with a right-hand drive. Yeah. But it's the same as the GS-300 Lexus. Yeah, this guy sells him there. He has these on his lot. He's got several hundred used cars, 25 years and older,
Starting point is 01:14:19 European and Japanese, on his lot in Tennessee. And you ought to check him out, John, because I know you love all cars. Yes, they've been doing this for a while, different dealers, distributors, but you have to be careful of what state of into because some of the states, we're okay in Florida because there's basically no inspection in Florida, but when it comes into certain states, it's checked very thoroughly, and if it doesn't
Starting point is 01:14:48 meet their standards, it's rejected, and you won't be able to register it, so that's an important thing as to what state that it's bought into of the United States. Yeah, exactly. You can't buy a tag for it unless you have to, I don't believe they've issue a registration, a tag on a card that didn't meet safety qualification, so that would be a problem there as to buying a license plate.
Starting point is 01:15:15 Yes, good point, though. Thank you, John. Appreciate the call. Great hearing from you. Thank you. Great hearing from you, John. Stay tuned for our mystery shopper report that's going to come to our audience from Wallace Kea. Wallace Kea in
Starting point is 01:15:32 Stewart. Hey, have you all of you out there have you signed up have you signed up for earl's vigilantes it would be a great help to your neighbor anyone else that you may know a relative and if you know
Starting point is 01:15:50 anything you know about cars and you don't have to know how to take an engine apart but you can sign up and you can help a friend you can help a friend buy a car so go to www.
Starting point is 01:16:06 Earlsvigilantes.com. You can get all the information right there. Most of the people often say we're preaching to the choir here at Earl on Cars. Literally, we have callers that know more than we do about a lot of things, especially on YouTube. And so we're kind of like preaching to the choir. Most of you don't need our advice on being ripped off. But if you're knowledgeable and you have some time. to help other people go to Earl's Vigilini sign up.
Starting point is 01:16:39 We'll put your name and contact information with your permission on our website. So let's say you're in Louisiana, you're in Tennessee, or wherever you are, and someone in that area has an issue with a car dealer, be it repair, maintenance, or buying, or selling. They could call you for advice. It's kind of like giving back a little bit, and if you're really car savvy, like so many of our callers are we'd love to have you join the vigilantes yeah you can share your expertise with you know as I said your neighbor your relatives and guess what we'll send you a vigilante
Starting point is 01:17:18 cap it has a logo on it it's a real neat looking hat I believe we lost ours I think I'm still my hat I'm looking at your briefcase I think it's among the missing anyway take advantage of that earlsvigilantes.com okay let's take let's share some text on I got a couple here Donovan wants to know he says Earl when you get your cyber truck are you going to install Tesla power share it allows you to power your house from your cyber truck he says I think it should be included with your order and he goes on to say that he's installing a transfer switch this weekend so that he can power his house using his EV-9.
Starting point is 01:18:07 Well, I'm glad I didn't know. I thought my cyber beast had everything. So I have to add that to the car. I've got it. I've got my notification that my car is being built. I'll contact Tesla because I did not put that power share. Actually, I don't need the power share because... You've probably got backup generator, I'm sure.
Starting point is 01:18:31 I do. but I think it would enhance the resale value because when I eventually sell the car I think that's a really cool option so I'll see if I'm not too late for me to add it well that that also would depend if the power shares something goes in the truck over something that just goes on your charger in the house
Starting point is 01:18:50 so that it can back feed to power your house if you need it yeah okay let's go for Anne-Marie's text and you know the cyber trucks that we've been seeing lately We're seeing more colors. I mean, in the beginning, it was just the silver. Well, they're wrapping them. A lot of people are getting them wrapped.
Starting point is 01:19:07 And now we're seeing black. But they look so nice in silver. We saw a white one, a black one. I meant to send Earl the link for the TikTok I saw where they polished it to a mirror finish. Oh, yeah, I like to say that. Oh, yeah. Total mirror chrome finish on the stainless steel. I mean, as reflective as any mirror.
Starting point is 01:19:33 How long does it take to keep that clean? I wouldn't even want to imagine. So, good morning. Oh, I'm sorry. Frank's, Frank is on the line. Okay. And we'll get back to Rick. Good morning, Frank.
Starting point is 01:19:49 Well, good morning, you guys. Just so I say hi, has been down the country for a while. Yeah, we haven't heard from you. Yeah. Frank, what do you think about this? time that we're in now with the Attorney General committing to penalize fine, maybe even suspend dealers that are not following the Florida laws. Does it give you any thoughts about possibly letting the Attorney General know about some
Starting point is 01:20:24 of these dealers that are still flaunting her promise to treat people with honesty when they sell them a car. Oh, absolutely. I'm, unfortunately, I'm going to wait to see if this really going to happen with Moody. But, yeah, by far, people should be aware. I mean, that's like a little, like I said, sometimes before I call you guys, I feel like a little mystery shopper on my own with my free time. I might just go in a dealership and drive a car and pretend when thinking about buying it
Starting point is 01:20:56 and see their reactions and all the add-ons. In fact, a couple of months ago, I heard you guys talking about the Crown, and I went up to Beth Smith, Toyota, way up north, and they had one, and I drove. But wasn't that impressed with all their add-ons of almost $8,000. It was a black one, and a few weeks later, I saw the exact same car in your lot. You were selling it. I guess you got it from them. And, of course, you didn't have their add-ons, and that's why they probably bought it from you.
Starting point is 01:21:22 But it was interesting to see the exact car that I had driven a couple weeks earlier. Yeah, there's a lot of work for Ashley Moody's. to do and as I said earlier in the show they were bragging about the fact that there were no complaints made to the Attorney General and that was one of the reasons they weren't clamping down on car dealers so we're trying to stir up the action especially in South Florida to get some complaints in to Ashley Moody's office that number is 866 9667-226 if you dial 866 966 9666 626 7-226, and you have a complaint against a car dealer,
Starting point is 01:22:02 she has vowed after September 1st to go in, investigate, and punish the dealer as necessary. I actually just wrote that number down. I'll put it in my speed dial, because when I come across, I'll be one of the first ones to call Ashley about that. We would really appreciate that. Okay. I appreciate the call, Frank.
Starting point is 01:22:27 One quick thing. It made me think back when he was talking about listening to noises. When I start first working at gas stations in the 60s, the mechanics had like an extra long screw dryer. They would put down on an engine nudge to their ear to hear tapping noises or noises like that. I was wondering if Rick remember those days or that was too long ago. That was probably a week and a half ago. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:22:56 Okay. That old school technique, it's still, we do that all the time. It's a long pry bar. You reach down in, you get it right near the pulley that you think is making noise, you put your ear on it, and the sound will transmit through that solid shaft, and you just move it until you find the spot where it's loudest, and that tells you where the noise is. That's old school diagnosis, and there are certain techniques that just they will never die,
Starting point is 01:23:27 they work you know you got new chassis ears and all these things you where you can clamp microphones all over the vehicle and it sends a signal back to a controller and you watch the little tips on the screen but even those are are not as accurate sometimes as the guy that looks like a little monkey crawling around inside the car listening to each spot to try to figure out where the sound is loudest while you're going down the road. Yeah. Well, one last thing, and then I'll get off you.
Starting point is 01:23:59 But when you were speaking of road run this morning, asked about his transmission, and I had them in my barracuda to 727. And it was ironic because later in my career, when I became a pilot at Eastern and American, I flew to the 727 from all seats. It's the reminiscent of why I like that airplane so much. With that, let me let you guys get back to your other callers,
Starting point is 01:24:20 and you have a great weekend. Hey, Frank. Thanks, Frank. Great hearing from you. Okay, back to Rick. Okay, we have got Anne-Marie's text. She says, good morning. Good morning, Ann Marie.
Starting point is 01:24:33 It seems there's an app for everything nowadays. Artificial intelligence is becoming more efficient, and auto manufacturers can't seem to resist cramming technology into vehicles whether the customers want it or not. Passenger side screens, subscription heated seats, for example. What happens if auto company, apply excessive technology to dealerships. Is it possible that car buying will go totally digital in the future?
Starting point is 01:25:04 I'm thinking of those touch screens at McDonald's now. That's what I'm seeing in my head. The app, for example, each dealership would have the manufacturer's app with the total buying experience built in. The app with artificial intelligence would handle the would-be buyer's questions. provide a virtual test drive, take the order, automatically set up the financing, and apply for the vehicle registration, all the while eliminating the human sales and financing staff and the fancy showrooms. Fewer staff equals lower cost equals higher profits for the dealer.
Starting point is 01:25:45 The only humans the dealer would need would be in the service department, until reliable robots routine and the body shop if the dealer chooses to have one. Number one, from your viewpoint as a dealer right now, is this scenario a realistic dream or a nightmare? Number two, if it's a nightmare, how would one counteract it? Thanks. Boy, Ann Marie, I know I say this every week, but I really mean it. You're a genius. You're also a mind reader. You can foresee the future. What you describe is being pursued by some manufacturers. Toyota, our dealership, they have a system, and AI is part of it already, so that when you want to buy the car, you can do it entirely online.
Starting point is 01:26:37 You can finance it. Other manufacturers are beginning to pursue this. It's in the very early stages, as you might guess. So you dealers out there listening, I mean, this is going to put the fear of God into all the dealers that are not playing by the rules that are bait and switch advertising and unethical and dishonest, outright dishonest. But, yeah, all the manufacturers that really understand the situation, I think most of them do, most manufacturers are not vocal about their dealers. If you're a Ford CEO or General Motors CEO and you get up on stage somewhere and you say, I got a bunch of dishonest dealers, that's not going to work too well. First of all, you'll be sued.
Starting point is 01:27:28 Second of all, you'll lose a huge amount of business. Dealers are your retail outlet. And by law, you can't sell cars like Tesla can. Tesla built it, got around the law because it's an electric vehicle. And so when you buy a Tesla, you buy it directly from Tesla, the manufacturer. General Motors, Ford, Honda, Toyota, all the manufacturers would love to sell you cars directly. But unfortunately, they set up tens of thousands of dealers with contracts, and they're locked in by state law. Only a dealer can sell a car.
Starting point is 01:28:03 So one way to combat that without selling direct is to come up with the system, Ann Marie, as you suggested. and make this app readily available. And what you're going to do is you're going to equip all the savvy people, all the intelligent, aware people and consumers to have this app. But we'll still have the problem of those that don't even have a smartphone, those that don't deal online, that they don't know how to contact somebody on the website. People that are English language is not their first language, people that are maybe high school dropouts, people that, you know, for whatever reason,
Starting point is 01:28:47 the very elderly, I refer to them as victims. They're still going to be victimized by car dealers. But the aware manufacturers like Toyota, they're already doing, which you suggest. So, Anne Marie, thanks for the great comment. Thank you, Ann Marie. Okay. All righty. Let's see.
Starting point is 01:29:07 I think, yeah, we were pretty well caught up. I've got a, I've got a, I didn't mention, I'll let Nancy do it. The battle of the Consumer Report. What are you looking at? Well, I said that the current issue of consumer reports has a list of the safest and the least safe car. I'll address the car less safe and then I'll let Nancy address the cars that are safe. I'm going to hold it. That's what I was going to, I was looking at.
Starting point is 01:29:41 the unsafe cars? Because we're always talking about the safe cars. No, you go ahead. This is what it looks like. Hey, we're live, Jonathan. And a lot of people, a lot of people say, I'm not going to waste my time with consumer reports. I know this car is a good car.
Starting point is 01:30:03 I'm not telling you to look in consumer reports to buy the car they recommend. I'm suggesting to you consider not buying a car if they tell you it's not safe and why. I'm looking at the page here. These are the cars that are in writing by consumer reports dangerous. So if they're not dangerous, someone's going to be suing consumer reports, but they got their facts and figures. So don't buy a Dodge Durango, don't buy a Jeep Wrangler, a Chevrolet Tahoe, a GMC, a GM see Yukon, a Toyota Sequoia, I did say Toyota.
Starting point is 01:30:44 Yeah, I was really surprised to see that on the list. Toyota Sequoia, Land Rover Defender, Lincoln Navigator, GM Sierra 1500, Mitzibishi, Mirage, and the Chevrolet Silverado, 1,500. Now, I notice most of these are large vehicles, and that's inherently, the comment they make on most of these is, scores and consumer reports emergency handling test AEB with pedestrian direction unavailable here's a jeep Wrangler low braking and emergency handling scores AEB with pedestrian detection unavailable so do yourself a favor in your family whoever's going to be riding in this car and if you're going to buy a new car go to consumer report and don't buy one of these there's one
Starting point is 01:31:35 two three eight there's ten of them don't buy one of those ten cars buy something else buy a safe vehicle and this here is what Earl is looking at is the October 2024 consumer report
Starting point is 01:31:49 and you know I was really surprised to see this Toyota Sequoio and it just came in short for breaking emergency handling the tests
Starting point is 01:32:01 they just came in very low I'm not surprised to see Jeep Wrangler on the list without a doubt So, anyway, go ahead. I figure, Jeep Wrangler, they sit high, they're top-heavy, the center gravity is very high, and they have such a short wheelbase that they are easy to flip over.
Starting point is 01:32:21 Yeah, and what about their pedestrian detection? Automatic emergency braking. They don't have one. Yeah, it just, well, they're dropping the ball there, but that's... But this here, yeah, this here is a... a great magazine that you might want to pick up. It has everything in it. And they have a great road report and the safest cars.
Starting point is 01:32:47 I'm not going to go over the list. We're getting into the time where we need to get to the mystery shopper report. So pick up the Consumer Report, October edition. We're going to go back to Rick. I know he's sitting on a lot of caller. No? We're actually pretty well caught up right now, except, let's see, yeah. There was one question that came in.
Starting point is 01:33:08 Automania asked, he says, I was told by a Cadillac dealership that the $7,500 E.V credit on a lease is tacked onto the buyout at the end of the lease. Is that true? And Donovan came back to say, Automania, if you lease an EV, the credit is passed to you by the leasing company,
Starting point is 01:33:32 it does not get tacked onto the buyout. He continues to say, if you lease, you don't own the vehicle. The leasing company does, so you would not get the credit, but they can choose to pass it to you in the form of a capital cost reduction when you take the lease. Boy, isn't that interesting. I never thought about that, but that's absolutely true that the leasing company owns the car. I think that's been worked out. I'll do a little research on that, but my guess is you probably don't get that $7,500 rebate right away because you're not buying the car, you're only using the car for three years.
Starting point is 01:34:14 So the owner of the car is entitled to the rebate, he'll pass it along, and he'll pass along the benefits. I'm not sure the entire benefit, because the benefit is buying the car, and that means you bought the car, it's permanent. Leasing means you can use it for three years. So maybe they give you 50% of the 7,500. But I don't know. Well, we'll research that. I bet you Donovan knows. Oh, he was the one that gave that answer.
Starting point is 01:34:40 Yeah, well, if a Texas smacker, calls back, or whatever, if I got it right or if I got it wrong. He says, you do get the credit right away when you lease the car. The whole 7500. Because he just leased the EV-9, so I'm pretty certain he said he leased it. That's interesting. That makes a leasing even more attractive. We've always thought that leasing an EV was a better way to go. But with this, with these tax credit, it's just, it's a no-brainer.
Starting point is 01:35:12 Well, and especially when, for the average person, when that $7,500 might be the money that you need to put the charging station on your house so that you'd be able to charge it at home. There you go. There you go. Okay. We're getting close to the mystery show. shopping report and that mystery shopping report was done by no other than Agent Lightning. Boy, I'll tell you what a great asset. She has been. She's maneuvered her way in and out of a lot of dealerships. And let me tell you what, she's done it with sophistication. She has really
Starting point is 01:35:49 kept herself together and there are times when it was pretty rough, a real knockdown. Okay, Wallace Kia in Stewart, if you want to, you know, give us your rating on this dealership, you can do so at 772-497-6530. Yeah, vote for ABC, DRF. Are they doing a great job or they're doing a terrible job? Great on the curve. Before you do that, I have to interrupt you for something very important. Please, ladies and gentlemen, use this week to take advantage of this number is really important.
Starting point is 01:36:31 It's important to us. It's important to you. Give Ashley Moody a call, the Attorney General. She's going to work with us. We have to work with her. She has to hear our voice. You can do so by calling 866-966-7-2-66. No, 7-2-26. that is 866 966 7226 and that is attorney Ashley Moody back to the recovering car dealer okay now remember this mystery shopping report of Wallace Kia and Stewart for that just a little bit north of North Palm Beach area it's only about a 20-minute drive from New Jersey I live in Jupiter and it's about a 20-minute right so it's all part of the big South Florida
Starting point is 01:37:20 of Sodom and Gomorra complex. When you buy a car here, expect to have a tough situation going for you. And remember, this was done on September the 5th, this mystery shopping report, and that was after September the 1st, which is when Ashley Moody vowed to enforce the law. So as you listen to this mystery shopping report, think, is this somebody that Ashley Moody should have a discussion with him, possibly fine or suspend or penalize in some fashion. The commitment from the Florida Attorney General is if you do not put the complete price
Starting point is 01:38:01 on your advertiser quoted price and you do anything else that falls under the Florida Unfair Disempty Trade Practice Act, I'm coming after you. And she's committed to do that in writing. So here we are. How does Wallace Kia in Stewart, Florida, stack up? Ashley, I hope you're listening. I'm speaking, and the first person is that I were Agent Lightning, the undercover shopper. We arrived mid-afternoon and were greeted by a salesman named Effie, EFE.
Starting point is 01:38:32 He greeted my daughter and made by asking, is there anything I can help you with today? My daughter smiled really big, and I replied, she has a job now, and she's looking to buy her first car. Hopefully, a Kia Forte, a little aside here, I'm speaking again about H.E. lightning it's really cool because she takes her family long at least mystery shopping here's her 16 year old daughter she had last week she took her husband so it really it really is difficult to spot Kia I mean spot a mystery shopper when they come in with the family I just all these characters that you know join in this crusade Effie matched her excitement and asked which one do you like
Starting point is 01:39:14 my daughter asked if the Forte hatchbacks are the same price as the Forte cars. Salesman replied, no, the forties are our cheapest line. I wouldn't have used that word if I were trying to sell something. I'd say less expensive. But assured us that all their cars have amazing safety features. He then asked us to come inside and warned us our AC runs very cold, little too cold, in my opinion. Once in his desk, he asked my daughter what color she likes and also took my license and scanned it into their system on his iPad. My daughter said she loves the white. We finalized our search and landed on a new 2024 Kia 40 GT. The MSRP,
Starting point is 01:39:57 Monroney label, was $24,150 in Snow White Pearl. Effie excused himself to go get the keys. I disappeared for about five minutes and then returned to take us to see the car. Once outside he popped the hood, showed us how it has a breakaway engine and a fire retardant-type protector out of the hood. I've heard a breakaway engine, and I guess that's just the fact that
Starting point is 01:40:25 when you're in an accident, the engine will break free and not crush the occupant of the car or catch on fire or something like that. He then insisted that he needed to drive it off the lot to show us his safety features before we could drive it.
Starting point is 01:40:42 Customers are not allowed to drive the cars off our lot, he said. But he also refused to show me any numbers before I drove it. Wouldn't tell me anything about prices. Effie and my daughter both knew I was annoyed at this point, and I challenged him about me driving it versus him. He wanted to go through all the features and offers,
Starting point is 01:41:02 but I told him we have a lane assist and are familiar with that. The car was on empty, which added an element of anxiety to the adventure. I can't stand driving a car that's on empty. And he drove from their lot all the way to PDQ. I wonder what that is. I should have asked. Pre-to-delivery quality? Actually, PDQ, I think it's that chicken place, isn't it?
Starting point is 01:41:28 Oh, that's probably what it is. You have to PDQ chicken place. Okay. They pulled over for me to drive. I adjusted the seat and made it you turn and then headed back to the dealership. Being a bit of a smart ass, I asked, am I allowed to drive it back onto the lot? He left and said, yes.
Starting point is 01:41:44 I don't make these rules. I just have to follow them. That's an insurance regulation that they're worried about. Of all the things they do, to worry about a customer driving the car back in a lot, that ought to be at the bottom of the list. I parked a forte, and then he tried to get my 16-year-old daughter to drive, but she declined.
Starting point is 01:42:04 We headed back inside, and Effie said he'd be right back. He returned with a printout of the Monroney label. He highlighted the safety features on the copy of the Monroney label, and then I asked, What are we looking for? What are we going to do today? I said, hopefully buy a car. He cheerfully said, oh, let's do it then and grabbed his pen, flip the sheet of paper over. He wrote, MSRP, $24,115, $950 dealer discount, $1,000 financing through Kia, and the bottom line being $22,465, and he put plus, plus, plus, And that's what bothers me, is the plus, plus, plus. I asked him if you're going to be able to show me the price in writing with the fees. He pointed to what he was writing on the back of the minority elbow,
Starting point is 01:42:57 said, this is what I'm doing. Once we agree on a number, I will then get all your info for finance. So he dodged the bullet here. She wants to know what the junk fees are, what the additional fees are. She wants to know the whole price. She wants to know the out-the-door price. But he won't give it to her. I said, I don't like that.
Starting point is 01:43:21 I want to see the sales tax, the dealers fees, the plates, or whatever. He replied, at this dealership, we don't really do that. But let me see if I could get my manager to make an exception. He walked off. So, Ashley Moody, are you listening? F.E. returned and asked us to follow him. is finance manager, David, needed to go over a few things with us. So the salesman basically refused to give the delivered price to the Mr. Shopper.
Starting point is 01:43:56 You come in to buy something, the salesman gives you a price, but it doesn't give you the out-the-door price. It doesn't give you the real price. He went to David's office and he said, Well, I don't really have anything to print for you. I can give you a pretty good idea of your total price and monthly payments. He showed me his computer screen.
Starting point is 01:44:19 Now this is the F&I manager in the F&I office. You can imagine you're sitting there and there's the computer screen. And you've got numbers on top of numbers. And you can't possibly identify junk fees or anything else that's important to you. There was also a payment of $433.85 based on financing $25,527 for 72 months at 6.79%. I asked him about the pricing and the fees.
Starting point is 01:44:56 He said, thankfully, I don't have to do anything to, I don't have anything to do with the numbers. David then said, we are all transparent with everything here at Wallace. Look at this invoice of ours. Then he showed them the factory invoice, a printout from on this particular car. If you're a regular listener to this car, to this show, you've heard me say dozens of times, the factory invoice from a manufacturer to a car dealer is packed with around $4,000 as profit on the average. Of course, the lower price cars have less, but this key, a forte, does have kickback
Starting point is 01:45:37 holdbacks and other refunds of hidden profit on the invoice it should not be called an invoice it is not an invoice so showing this invoice was just another act of deception I asked him about the pricing and fees he said oh okay okay he asked if I had any other questions I did not so excused himself to find Effie we waited for a few minutes and then snuck out the door before they know Now, I had my son, Josh Stewart, who also works at our Toyota dealership, to back it out and find out what the junk fees were, what the hidden profits were, that neither the salesperson nor the NFF and I manager at Keya, Wallace Kia, would give him. And he said there are about $1,000 in junk fees. And he did that by calculating what the quoted price was and what the state.
Starting point is 01:46:36 sales tax was because the way to identify a junk fee is the fact that they have to pay sales tax on it if it's a government fee you don't tax a tax so a government fees are legitimate they paint all the with one paintbrush they say they're all fees are okay but only a government fee tax and tag is all you should pay the prices the there was an $849 electronic flying fee and $159 and dealer installed options that he could find. But there were other fees to tune to about $1,000, which we had to do because of our knowledge of cars
Starting point is 01:47:18 and doing a mathematical backup to find out what the junk fees are, which were not disclosed. So that wraps it up. September 1st, laws are being enforced. What happened here would not be considered legitimate in today's Florida statute that has unfair and deceptive advertising, that the quoted price, the advertised price, has got to be the price you pay to take it out the door plus government fees only. And we would welcome your votes. Remind you that there are no A's. They're
Starting point is 01:47:56 like hen's teeth, black swans, or whatever you want to call them. We have a couple, but that's about it and F is pretty harsh because that means that the dealers are doing something illegal now illegal has a new meaning now with the Attorney General's commitment to enforce the law in Florida that's been here for 20 years and again that number if you want to let Ashley Moody noody know if you happen to have been into Wallace Gia or another dealership that violated the Florida law you give Ashley a call at 866 9667-226 that's 866-9667-226 and we'd like to hear your votes okay okay I'll see
Starting point is 01:48:46 nothing coming in on text just yet we'll go here to one of the YouTube channels we got T-cash says D-minus welcome to the evil world of Steelerships new driver so much for our new Florida law and junk fees Earl question mark question Mark, question mark. Donovan says, F. It was not a single thing transparent about that place. Tom Steckle, F. Failure to provide a detailed out-the-door price,
Starting point is 01:49:15 I'd be a breakaway customer. Andrew Placinski says F. Johnny Z. Fradley, F, for Find Me, Ashley Moody, fast. Cramm 1624. Have Agent Lightning call Ashley Moody now. F, enforce the law. Joseph Kelleher, F. Zero transparency at that dealership.
Starting point is 01:49:38 Mark Smith. Wallace Kia gets an F for me. Brian said Latko, fees, fees, fees. F for me. Mark H says D. Old school pricing policy won't fly nowadays. And Captain Mike, whoop, no, that was he wasn't put a greeting. Pardon me, folks.
Starting point is 01:50:09 For me, I know Ashley's supposed to be getting in there, but I'm going to say a D because they're playing games like all the rest. But with proper assistance, I think you could probably beat them up and make them give you a proper deal if you get in there and work on them. I'm not going to go F right now because I don't see anything there that was like really outside the norm for South Florida. Gotcha. And until Ashley Moody gets down there and really starts putting the spurs to them, they're all just going to sit and wait to see, is she going to do it or not. Well, there's some truth to that.
Starting point is 01:50:52 We'll see. Nancy, what's your score? Well, my score for Wallace Kea Stewart is Ashley Moody, the attorney. general. I'm going to give you her phone number. Write this down. You're going to need it. You can to help us. We're going to help you 866-966-7226. And my grade, you know, without a doubt, you know, I know someday I'm not going to be giving out these type of grades because I know things are going to change. And we have Ashley Moody in our back pocket now. So my grade today is a Yes.
Starting point is 01:51:33 Okay. Yeah, our whole scoring is going to have to be reflected of the new intent by our Attorney General. And if you tuned in late, remember, if you have a legitimate complaint against a car dealer, if you've been shopping for a new used car, and you realize that you've been victimized because the price that you were told was not the price they were going to ask you to pay, plus government fees only, that's allowable. If you have that experience,
Starting point is 01:52:07 and you follow that complaint, we're going to pay you $100, and we'll see how that goes. It has to be a legitimate complaint. You have to have visit in the dealership, and you have to have the intent to buy, and if you experience what we just experienced here with our mystery shopper,
Starting point is 01:52:30 that would certainly be a complaint. I mean, if I was really going to buy a car and they wouldn't give me the price until I went into the financing office, they basically said, you've got to buy the car, and then when you go into the financing officer, office, you'll get the breakdown of the fees.
Starting point is 01:52:47 Well, they refused to give the delivered price to me, if I were in Wallace Kia in Stewart, Florida, and that's a violation of the law. So what's your grade? You know, I'm teetering between a D and an F. I think I'm going to stick with you. It's too soon. It's too soon now to eliminate all the dealers from consideration.
Starting point is 01:53:13 If Ashley Moody is not going to fulfill her promise, then I would say we have to keep on a conservative curve basis. So I'm going to stick with a D, and I'll match your D. and, of course, Mrs. Sunrise, I was going to say, and then she said, an F. I see the perfect movie quote for this is from my cousin Vinnie, and when he looks over and says,
Starting point is 01:53:40 You were serious about that? And that I see as the dealerships in South Florida, when Ashley Moody, if she comes in and starts swinging the bat around and doing some damage down there, I can see them looking at it. You were serious about that? Yeah, I just, but...
Starting point is 01:54:00 Here's what I'm serious about. The email that we received, and I'll read it word for word. The Carr's rule case has been scheduled for oral argument for October the 9th in New Orleans. And the attorney ends the sentence with saying progress, and it definitely is... Yeah, that's the argument. You could call it in Texas, where the Texas Auto Association joined the NADA National Automobiles Association to block the FTC Cars Act, which is combat auto retail scams. It was supposed to go to the fact in July. And our attorney, because we filed an amicus brief to the Texas Circuit Court to support the Federal Trade Commission,
Starting point is 01:54:54 the judge has agreed to hear the oral arguments in October. Now, the bad news is that's October 10th, I think. And they've held it up because it was supposed to go in the fact of July. But my attorney tells me the fact that the judge agreed to hear the oral argument is encouraging to us because he could have thrown it out without even allowing that argument. So we've got to wait until October to find out. And that's October the 9th. October 9th.
Starting point is 01:55:24 New Orleans so October the 9th in New Orleans okay I think we're we got about wrapped it up here didn't we Nancy I believe that we have Jonathan just said I was off camera probably where I should be Rick what I just said what do we get okay well Rick's checking okay says Don on Zoom has a question do we know if the Attorney General will have a scorecard for the new law compliance that's a good idea it would it be nice if she would join forces with us have her on the show even if we're only Zoom
Starting point is 01:56:05 and we really work together just think what this group in this room here at through all these Earl and Cars if we worked in conjunction with the State Attorney General I mean the Attorney General's office Ashley Moody could we ever turn things around or what? I'm sorry I wasn't paying attention.
Starting point is 01:56:29 I think we're, I'm trying to fill in so we can, don't have dead air. So I was talking and you and blah, blah, blah, blah. Okay, hey folks, thanks for joining us this morning. We definitely enjoy your company and you can see how, and hear, how excited we are. And we have a good dealer, bad dealer list. We're going to have a better, list than that. Stay tuned for all the excitement. We'll be back here next week.
Starting point is 01:56:59 Same time, 8 a.m. Have a wonderful weekend.

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.