Posted on 06/14/2011 10:03:12 AM PDT by Son House
Edited on 06/14/2011 10:06:16 AM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
The drop in auto sales was 2.9 percent, the sharpest drop in 15 months. But it was due, in large part, to temporary factors: Buyers received fewer dealer incentives, and dealers ran short on popular fuel-efficient models. The natural disasters in Japan disrupted shipments of cars and component parts to the United States.
(Excerpt) Read more at startribune.com ...
” retail sales down; wholesale prices moderate “
Question for our resident experts —
Might this combination indicate that business has about reached the limit of pricing power??
(I think that’s one of the ‘modern signs of the apocalypse’...)
Many good used cars were destroyed by obama’s “cash for clunkers”.
Didn’t Obama and his flunkies recently say that GM and Chrysler paid back their loans, and the car business was doing great?????
Can’t buy a car if you don’t have a job.
Can’t buy a house either.
And the sun was in their eyes and the referees were all against them.
I’m starting to believe that by election day 2012, folks will call 2009 the “good old days”.
After evaluating the California sales tax and insurance on a new Ford pick-up, decided to buy used.
Unreal sales taxes out here have killed our auto sales.
“Many good used cars were destroyed by obamas cash for clunkers
And, in a not-too-surprising related development, the prices of good used cars has NEVER been higher relative to new. 2-5 year old cars with 30-60K miles routinely go considerably OVER book. Just Obama helping out the middle class...out of the middle class, that is.
Just because people have older cars does NOT mean they have bad brakes, bald tires, or no maintenance.
It is MUCH easier for me to take care of those things on my 12 year old car because they tags are 25% the cost of a new cars, I have ZERO car payments AND my insurance is MUCH cheaper.
I dare say my car with it’s new tires and 15% warn brakes is in better shape that the 3 year old car owned by someone struggling to keep up with the payments and letting other things “slide”.
poorly maintained cars come in all age brackets.
Good point, and usually your not getting a vehicle that is up to date on the maintenance schedule, the oil, transmission fluid, timing belt, coolant flush, air filter, fuel filter, ect hasn’t been touched unless they absolutely had to to make it run.
Think of it as being aware of what is going on around you, not everyone is keeping up their cars and there are many possible tragedies just waiting to happen. I appreciate that you can drive and maintain an older vehicle, being frugal and resourceful may buy enough time to run out the clock on the Democrat economy.
When I was a mechanic I saw cars that would scare you right off the road. some 4 years old, some 20 years old. It was not the car, it was the owner that let them get that way.
I will say that I saw more run down cars that where less than 5 years old than I did over 5 years. This was back in the hay day of drive it, trade it. They never owned the car longer than 3-4 years so they NEVER did anything that might prolong the life of the car.
now those cars are on their second or third owners and can be found on many buy here pay here lots.
I asked a foreign car mechanic if his business was UP with fewer people buying new cars (in spite of the recession), and he said “far from it”.
Most people are spending the bare minimum to keep a car movable under its own power, and not all of them are doing it out of being “penny wise and pound foolish” - there’s simply no choice for many.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.