I went to fueleconomy.gov and it is shows 18mpg city and 26mpg highway... So is it qualifies?
No. The combined mileage is 20. In order to qualify for the program it would have to be 18 or less. Unfortunately your car may be a worn-out piece of junk, like most of the cars I've owned, but it's not legally defined as a "clunker."
the program doesn't have to be brilliant, it just has to work, right here, right now. Designing the perfect program for use in one year from now would be even more idiotic--because it would be too late.
I think of C4C as a somewhat gross filter--it'll work for 90% of situations, and that's good enough.
Ah, but if it had worked out such that you could cash in your pile of junk for $4500, then it would be the greatest government program ever created, right?
That would be similar to a Gun-Buyback program that some cities have run. Get the product off the street. I guess if the C4C program really wanted to be envionmentally friendly it would do that, and not encourage buying a new vehicle. The program would simply encourage a smaller driving public. But minimal though it is, the program is trying to stimulate the economy, which at $1B is not going to be noticed, especially with much of the money going to foreign manufacturers and workers. Maybe C4C should be rewritten so that you needed to purchase a Ford, Chrysler or GM product made in the USA (not Mexico, Canada, Korea ...)?
Did I ask the government to pay me $4500? They came up with the program with intend to boost sales of "green" cars and get rid of the dangerous junk that are currently on the road and pollute the air.. They probably spent a lot of $$$ (yours and mine) to come up with this... And what ever those geniuses came up with is a total garbage - not because I can not cash in (again I never asked them) it is because the purpose of this program will not be achieved.
The real purpose, as near as I can tell, is (a) to put money into the hands of customers who were otherwise qualified but were postponing the purchase of a new vehicle, and (b) to encourage those people to choose more efficient transportation.
If this is its real purpose, I think it will work well. If people are expecting it to do more than that (rescue the Detroit 3, make more than a small dent in "carbon footprint," bail out the poor, etc.) then they are expecting more than this program was designed to do. It's not a "chicken in every pot" (or "Prius in every garage") giveaway, and shouldn't be presented as such.
I think that they should get rid of the mileage limit completely. Regardless of the mileage - 20 years old car does not have an emission system as good as the new cars, so I might get a good mileage, but you still pollute the air even worst then 2009 Hummer!
"Then they could pay me to take my 31 mpg '99 Civic off the road and replace it with a new 14 mpg Explorer. Why should they do that?"
it is because you Civic have lower emission standards than 2009 Explorer. Think of this as second hand smokers.
this program, should be about getting cars with better emission systems, boosting sales of the new cars and getting old dangerous junk off the road even if it has good mpg - I'm sure 1986 Yugo has an excellent mpg, but are you sure everything else is working on this car as it supposed to be and its catalytic converter is in good shape?
The mileage is your problem - you have money to spend - buy a monster truck! as long as it a "green" monster truck - I do not have problems with that.
That's a good way to state it--I don't think it would 'save' the D3, but it will get buyers off the fence. It will "keep things going". The worst situation for an economy is complete stagnation, because then the ripple effects start to get very very ugly.
Helping dealers sell 14 mpg gas guzzlers is an amusing idea, but politically not feasible. Besides, there will always be buyers for trucks that can haul heavy loads and do heavy work. These are honorable vehicles in their own right. It's how they are USED that becomes ridiculous, when an F-350 is used as a commuter vehicle. Maybe C4C will encourage some people to get sensible about what they drive.
I have a 1994 Ford F150 which is listed as a category 2 truck. Will the program allow this vehicle to be used to buy a SUV? or does it have to be another category 2 vehicle? Its not clear.
It's how they are USED that becomes ridiculous, when an F-350 is used as a commuter vehicle. Maybe C4C will encourage some people to get sensible about what they drive.
Gas mileage and air pollution are two different things. They could be related, but not necessarily. If you want to use F-350 as commuter vehicle it is fine! You have money to burn (literally) - it is your personal preference. as long as it does not pollute the air!
I officially saw my first "buy this clunker to get money for a new car!" classified today. Selling an 89 Olds wagon for $895. Of course you are screwed if you take up the guy's offer but I wonder if he gets inquiries.
2015 Mazda 6 Grand Touring, 2014 Mazda 3 Sport Hatchback, 1999 Mazda Miata 2004 Toyota Camry LE, 1999.
Well I agree the two concepts of air pollution and energy independence are quite related.
Perhaps I am wrong, and too judgmental, but I would think that someone using an F-350 to commute to work is probably not all that thoughtful about the "big picture".
It's easier to feel pain at the gas pump then to know if the air around you is clean or not.
MPG is a concept readily graspable by just about everyone. The "air quality index" or "energy import percentages" is rather conceptual for most of us.
It designed first and foremost to sell new vehicles. It was written by the auto industry for its own benefit. It added the 'clunker' provision to bring the enviromentalists on board.
For this group they wanted to get the worst actors off the road. If your vehicle has deteriorated that much with an orignal sticker value of 20 mpg think how bad a truck or SUV of the same age which originally had a combined rating of 16 mpg???
And what ever those geniuses came up with is a total garbage - not because I can not cash in (again I never asked them) it is because the purpose of this program will not be achieved.
Of course it will work. If you think your Sable is bad just think how bad all the trucks and SUVs sold since 1984 are. Do you realize that there have been 50 million of these vehicles sold over that period? That's 50 million potential bad actors which could be traded - all of which are worse than your Sable. Many of them were worse than your Sable from the day that they were purchased.
Gun buyback program? Heck, all people were doing was turning in hopelessly broken relics and crappy old SaturdayNight Specials. "Hey, can I get $200 for my broken Rohm RG10 revolver?"
The impact of this program would be much greater if they would get rid of mpg limit. You are saying that there are many bad trucks and SUV on the road today, but do you realize that a lot of those trucks have BETTER mileage then 18mpg due to being lighter and smaller then the current ones? Are they suddenly became a "good reliable clean emission" cars that the government would want to keep on the road? I just quickly checked 1986 Ford Ranger Pickup 4WD 4 cyl - it has combined average 23.5 mpg - not bad for 23 years old pick up truck! Why it has to be excluded from this program?
Come on 'spyder, give the guy a break. Just the other day you were encouraging folks to "Bring out yer' dead!" Now this guy is bringing forth his dead and you are suggesting it's not dead!
Grinning from ear to ear...some of this stuff continues to crack me up!!!
The C4C "Poster Child"...kinda has a nice ring to it.
PS Was actually thinking about waxing ol' Bessie before strollin' into the dealership sometime this summer. Tires alone are worth more than she is right now so according to Jeff Foxworthy (You KNOW you're a redneck if...), well, ya'll get the point. Con't.
Ah! One of those nice cars where if you run out of gas they declare it totaled.
if they really want to get old heaps off the road they should drop that needing to have the car a year provision. then the guy in the paper with his $800 89 Olds would make sense. He'd be happy and whoever bought it would be happy and of course the dealer with the free $3,500 in the deal would be happy.
2015 Mazda 6 Grand Touring, 2014 Mazda 3 Sport Hatchback, 1999 Mazda Miata 2004 Toyota Camry LE, 1999.
is the worst idea since GM & Chrysler were invented. Look at the chaos the invention of these 2 companies has led to; billions and billions of lost burned up money going down the tubes.
Think of all the trees we could have planted in the rain forest with the money GM and Chrsyler have lost just in the last decade!
I don't just hate the idea because I don't have a car that qualifies, I hate the idea because it rewards the stupid and foolish, and punishes the smart and prudent.
Sort of like everything Bush set into motion during his Presidency.
Obama needs to back off and retreat from these inane ideas. Admit you were wrong and stop the madness.
I've read that GM and Chrysler will no longer be liable for prior lawsuits where they were found to be at fault. This is dispicable. How about for every clunker turned in, the Big 3 pay out one more claim they owe. If they hadn't wasted so much money on lawyers defending indefensible things, maybe they'd have the money to make a decent vehicle?
'18 Porsche Macan Turbo, '16 Audi TTS, Wife's '19 VW Tiguan SEL 4-Motion
They actually were close to passing a version of this that did not have an mpg criterion for the vehicle being traded in, just an age requirement. There were news articles about it being ready to be passed and my kid was getting ready to stake a claim with his 1996 Jetta. In the end the votes were not there to pass that version.
I think I'm a poster girl for this program. 2000 Chrysler T&C w/ 194,000 miles. Interior is trashed and air conditioning died. Been a great car but $3500 is nice trade in considering the goods.
Question -- wasn't there supposed to be some mileage requirement for the new vehicle that was greater than the one being traded in? Or did that go away from the bill?
billions and billions of lost burned up money going down the tubes.
is the money really lost? GM workers got paid, suppliers got paid, ex workers got retirement checks, workers and ex workers got health care paid for, car buyers got cars that were more costly to produce than was paid for them. Hundreds of billions of dollars changed hands each year. Tens of billions of tax money was paid from it all in the process.
A car was obtained for $2000 less than it was really worth. A worker got $2000 more pay than he earned. A hospital got $2000 more than the MRI was worth. The gov't got $500 more tax than it deserved as a result. The suppliers who can't get GM to pay them get $400 from the gov. The overpaid worker had a $2000 pool put in that the pool company made $800 profit on. The gov. got $500 more from the worker and 300 more in income tax from the pool company.
Now when GM stock falls 88%, that money vaporizes. Wall Street. that generates losses on tax returns and the gov't loses hundreds of billions in tax revenues. That is 'lost burned up money going down the tubes'.
I have a '97, 4 cylinder auto. Camry rated at 24/5 mpg. average. Since my driving is almost exclusively stop and go in urban and suburban environments, in hilly areas, I probably do get close to the 18 mpg. stated as a limit for one's current vehicle in order to qualify for "Clunker Cash".
In reality, I'm aware that the point is not to get 4 cylinder Camry's off the road but I've been beaten up pretty badly by this recession and I wouldn't mind a silver lining. I haven't read about any flexibility around the 18 mpg or less cut-off like I have around the 4 mpg improvement vs. the 10 mpg improvement.
Does anyone know if the type of driving is factored in or if a more limited reward is available for cars already getting decent mileage? Thanks Bill S.
If you buy a vehicle that is categorized as a "truck" the new vehicle needs to be +5 mpg in order for your T&C pile to get you $4500 or +2 mpg to get $3500. If the new vehicle is a car then it is +4 mpg or +10 mpg.
Read this statement and tell me if it is what it sounds like?
The vehicle that you are trading in is required to be destroyed. Therefore, the value you negotiate with the dealer for your trade in is not likely to exceed its scrap value. The law requires the dealer to disclose to you and estimate of the scrap value of your trade-in vehicle.
My take is you can negotiate over and above the $3500 or $4500 voucher amount for your trade in. If the trade in qualifies for $4500 and the body panels etc are all very good it may have a scrap value of say $200. The dealer is required to tell you that figure and you try to get as much of it as you can. The only part that has to be destroyed is the engine. So I bring in a clean vehicle with no rust the vehicle has the engine pulled and destroyed. However the salvage yard just happens to have and engine transmission from a wrecked vehicle of the same vintage that together makes a good used vehicle.
Do I see a cottage industry rising up here? Too bad I am retired and basically lazy.
is the worst idea since GM & Chrysler were invented. Look at the chaos the invention of these 2 companies has led to; billions and billions of lost burned up money going down the tubes.
Sorry this just isn't true. It's just a bit of moaning and whining.
First the money that was given to Chrysler and GM went back into the US economy. They didn't have a bonfire and set it ablaze. It went all over the place and likely kept a multitude of businesses afloat if only for a couple of more months ( Lear Corp ). It actually kept Chrysler and GM alive to fight another day as leaner companies with much better prospects of survival.
If the two of them do survive than the balance of the investments have a good chance of being recouped when the ownership shares are sold to new investors. Overall it's been a smart investment in a time of crisis.....and I work for a competitor.
If you negotiate a trade value above the $3500 or $4500 voucher values ( say $5000 ) then the program is moot. It would be dumb to take less for your trade than what it's worth.
What I can see occuring though is that owners will take everything of value out of the vehicle, but it still has to be drivable, presumably with all doors, signals and glass intact ( to be legal ), then the owner can sell the extracted parts himself if he so wishes. That sounds like good entrepreneurship.
I think you missed my question. Say someone brings in a 1999 4Runner with a great body and he qualifies for a $4500 voucher on a new vehicle. You the dealer sell it to a salvage company that is required to destroy the engine. They just happen to have a totaled 4Runner with a good engine and transmission and pop it into the 4Runner that you took in on the C4C program. Have you eliminated a gas guzzler or just given it new life? And you as the dealer are required to tell the customer what the scrap value is on their trade vehicle. The way I read the Cars site, that scrap value is something the dealer and the customer can haggle over.
The vehicle that was traded in would then be disposed of (i.e., crushed or shredded) in a manner that ensures it would never be used again, although parts of the vehicle, other than the engine block and drive train, may be sold prior to disposal.
The way I read that was the dealer has to tell you the scrap value because there could be a situation where the scrap value of the car is more than the voucher.
And maybe someone could rack their brain and figure out what car or truck would actually be worth $3,500 scrap. Maybe an older Suburban retired from the Secret Service fleet that has a few extra tons of steel in it?
Things have changed a lot since I worked in Wrecking yards in the late 1950s. While I was in getting my oil changed a fellow dropped off a tail light fixture from a 1990 Camry. The price $90. This part came from a salvaged vehicle. The wrecking yard did not even clean it up. The parts on a used car can add up to $1000s. So what does a dealer get for an old vehicle? If the scrap value is $1000 and the dealer gets that from the wrecking yard. Is that not fair game for the buyer of the new car? I get my $4500 C4C plus half the salvage value.
I would imagine that all vehicles turned in would suffer mandatory crushing--it could not be re-titled. This would be pretty easy to enforce, and if the wrecking yards start switching VIN plates, well that's jail time, for sure.
With BOF vehicles, it is not that hard to lift off the body and put it on another frame. You are also expecting our lame Federal agencies to have enough sense to keep track of VINs. That is a state function. Does the state get a piece of the C4C action. Or is it one of the Gun Control type laws that many states are telling the Feds to stick it?
Real wages haven't gone up since the 1970s. First time that's happened since the...oh....last 150 years or so.
Actually Union wages did go up while those at the bottom were stagnant. There in lies much of the problem. The Upper middle class (UAW and the like) made great wages while those at the bottom did not keep pace. Globalization which got going strong in the 1970s took the jobs at the lower levels. Now those people in China are chewing away at the Union jobs such as the UAW. Meanwhile the local, state and Federal government kept expanding with higher and higher paying Union jobs. Today there is not many left to pay the taxes for all the over paid public servants. Don't forget the 30 million illegals eroding the bottom tier wages. They are also sucking up free services that the few of US are paying. All part of a Socialist agenda started in the 1930s.
C4C will do Nothing to help our standard of living. We are going to lose a lot of ground that will never return because of our flagrant borrowing at every level of our society.
Theoretically it's probably possible but that set of circumstances stretches the limits of credulity. How many times might that perfect scenario occur?
The disclosure and haggling might be a situation if the vehicle is close to the limit for the voucher. Dealer: it's worth $3500....Buyer: I want $4000.
If the value is far below the threshhold then why would the buyer care what the scrap value is? The buyer can only get the $3500 or $4500
Dealers are not in the business of determining the 'chopped value' if you will of a trade-in. I don't know of any dealer that has the expertise to tell what a junker will bring at the junk yard when broken up for parts. There may be some certainly in this big country. But wasting a lot of time on this would not be productive I think because haggling with the scrapper over the value of a 'piece' would delay the certification and thus the payment from the Feds.
I could see a situation where an agreement is made between a large group whereby it will provide all its clunkers to a scrapper in exchange for one third of the June auction value ( I'd expect that the July - ??? auction values of these vehicles will be zero or close to it ). It appears that the scrapper will strip off the salable parts and crush the engine and other useless parts. Some value may come from the stripped off parts.
although parts of the vehicle, other than the engine block and drive train, may be sold prior to disposal.
Maybe one could buy back their own entire vehicle, without the drive train, before it is destroyed?
...and now for something completely different...I wonder how much traffic cars.com is going to get as a result of the official site for this being cars.gov?
Maybe one could buy back their own entire vehicle, without the drive train, before it is destroyed?
Now that is an idea I like. I really like my 99 Ford Ranger, EXCEPT for the gutless POC V6 FF engine and transmission. Buy back the vehicle sans engine via the salvage company and convert to electric or install a Cummins 4BT diesel engine with auto transmission. One of many things I have contemplated doing with my truck.
If it is only the engine block and all the fuel injection etc etc are salvageable, a person could just buy back his rig and buy a new short block. What all is considered drive train? My neighbor wants to put some kind of high performance V8 in the truck. So many possibilities to this C4C plan. Best get on the list for a new VW Jetta Sportwagen TDI. Or Golf GTD if they make it to market before this deal goes away.
Oh VIN records work very well. You try to register a stolen car in the 50 states and see if you get away with it. You won't.
Besides, the crap traded in under C4C is not worth the trouble. Wrecking yards are already very selective about what they will even accept. The money is in late model wrecks, not 1980s Oldmobiles.
I have a 96 Taurus SHO with 89,000 miles on the motor and 45,000 miles on the transmission. The Dealer offer me $1500 for trade in so it would be to my advantage to participate in the C4C program. I just have a hard time believing a junkyard would destroy the engine and trans.
I have a 96 Taurus SHO with 89,000 miles on the motor and 45,000 miles on the transmission. The Dealer offer me $1500 for trade in so it would be to my advantage to participate in the C4C program. I just have a hard time believing a junkyard would destroy the engine and trans.
Yikes. That one does just barely squeak into the eligible category, at 18 mpg EPA combined. I'd be inclined to keep that one, unless it just won't satisfy your needs anymore.
Not a great year for the SHO---the transmission is the same as the regular LX Taurus and that 3.4 V8 engine had severe camshaft problems starting arond 50K miles on up. Better for you to bail out I think.
Well it needs new Struts and Springs which are no longer available some front end work and it's starting to rust(lives in the state of Michigan). I figure I would need to spend a couple of grand just to fix the problems I listed or a could trade it against a Focus(4500) or Fusion S(3500) and have a more fuel efficient car that I could payoff in a couple of years and drive another 6-8 years.
Comments
No. The combined mileage is 20. In order to qualify for the program it would have to be 18 or less. Unfortunately your car may be a worn-out piece of junk, like most of the cars I've owned, but it's not legally defined as a "clunker."
I think of C4C as a somewhat gross filter--it'll work for 90% of situations, and that's good enough.
That would be similar to a Gun-Buyback program that some cities have run. Get the product off the street. I guess if the C4C program really wanted to be envionmentally friendly it would do that, and not encourage buying a new vehicle. The program would simply encourage a smaller driving public. But minimal though it is, the program is trying to stimulate the economy, which at $1B is not going to be noticed, especially with much of the money going to foreign manufacturers and workers. Maybe C4C should be rewritten so that you needed to purchase a Ford, Chrysler or GM product made in the USA (not Mexico, Canada, Korea ...)?
Did I ask the government to pay me $4500?
They came up with the program with intend to boost sales of "green" cars and get rid of the dangerous junk that are currently on the road and pollute the air.. They probably spent a lot of $$$ (yours and mine) to come up with this...
And what ever those geniuses came up with is a total garbage - not because I can not cash in (again I never asked them) it is because the purpose of this program will not be achieved.
If this is its real purpose, I think it will work well. If people are expecting it to do more than that (rescue the Detroit 3, make more than a small dent in "carbon footprint," bail out the poor, etc.) then they are expecting more than this program was designed to do. It's not a "chicken in every pot" (or "Prius in every garage") giveaway, and shouldn't be presented as such.
Then they could pay me to take my 31 mpg '99 Civic off the road and replace it with a new 14 mpg Explorer. Why should they do that?
That would help a US automaker get rid of a gas guzzler taking up room on the lot. :shades:
it is because you Civic have lower emission standards than 2009 Explorer. Think of this as second hand smokers.
this program, should be about getting cars with better emission systems, boosting sales of the new cars and getting old dangerous junk off the road even if it has good mpg - I'm sure 1986 Yugo has an excellent mpg, but are you sure everything else is working on this car as it supposed to be and its catalytic converter is in good shape?
The mileage is your problem - you have money to spend - buy a monster truck! as long as it a "green" monster truck - I do not have problems with that.
Helping dealers sell 14 mpg gas guzzlers is an amusing idea, but politically not feasible. Besides, there will always be buyers for trucks that can haul heavy loads and do heavy work. These are honorable vehicles in their own right. It's how they are USED that becomes ridiculous, when an F-350 is used as a commuter vehicle. Maybe C4C will encourage some people to get sensible about what they drive.
Vern C.
Gas mileage and air pollution are two different things. They could be related, but not necessarily. If you want to use F-350 as commuter vehicle it is fine! You have money to burn (literally) - it is your personal preference. as long as it does not pollute the air!
Perhaps I am wrong, and too judgmental, but I would think that someone using an F-350 to commute to work is probably not all that thoughtful about the "big picture".
It's easier to feel pain at the gas pump then to know if the air around you is clean or not.
MPG is a concept readily graspable by just about everyone. The "air quality index" or "energy import percentages" is rather conceptual for most of us.
For this group they wanted to get the worst actors off the road. If your vehicle has deteriorated that much with an orignal sticker value of 20 mpg think how bad a truck or SUV of the same age which originally had a combined rating of 16 mpg???
Of course it will work. If you think your Sable is bad just think how bad all the trucks and SUVs sold since 1984 are. Do you realize that there have been 50 million of these vehicles sold over that period? That's 50 million potential bad actors which could be traded - all of which are worse than your Sable. Many of them were worse than your Sable from the day that they were purchased.
Sorry your rant is way off base....
Grinning from ear to ear...some of this stuff continues to crack me up!!!
The C4C "Poster Child"...kinda has a nice ring to it.
PS Was actually thinking about waxing ol' Bessie before strollin' into the dealership sometime this summer. Tires alone are worth more than she is right now so according to Jeff Foxworthy (You KNOW you're a redneck if...), well, ya'll get the point. Con't.
if they really want to get old heaps off the road they should drop that needing to have the car a year provision. then the guy in the paper with his $800 89 Olds would make sense. He'd be happy and whoever bought it would be happy and of course the dealer with the free $3,500 in the deal would be happy.
Think of all the trees we could have planted in the rain forest with the money GM and Chrsyler have lost just in the last decade!
I don't just hate the idea because I don't have a car that qualifies, I hate the idea because it rewards the stupid and foolish, and punishes the smart and prudent.
Sort of like everything Bush set into motion during his Presidency.
Obama needs to back off and retreat from these inane ideas. Admit you were wrong and stop the madness.
I've read that GM and Chrysler will no longer be liable for prior lawsuits where they were found to be at fault. This is dispicable. How about for every clunker turned in, the Big 3 pay out one more claim they owe. If they hadn't wasted so much money on lawyers defending indefensible things, maybe they'd have the money to make a decent vehicle?
I think the ultimate cash for clunkers program has been our handing out money in gobs so that they can still make Sebrings.
The SUV would need to get at least 18 mpg to qualify.
lhttp://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/cars.shtml
Click on the "How much can I get?" tab.
Question -- wasn't there supposed to be some mileage requirement for the new vehicle that was greater than the one being traded in? Or did that go away from the bill?
is the money really lost? GM workers got paid, suppliers got paid, ex workers got retirement checks, workers and ex workers got health care paid for, car buyers got cars that were more costly to produce than was paid for them. Hundreds of billions of dollars changed hands each year. Tens of billions of tax money was paid from it all in the process.
A car was obtained for $2000 less than it was really worth. A worker got $2000 more pay than he earned. A hospital got $2000 more than the MRI was worth. The gov't got $500 more tax than it deserved as a result. The suppliers who can't get GM to pay them get $400 from the gov. The overpaid worker had a $2000 pool put in that the pool company made $800 profit on. The gov. got $500 more from the worker and 300 more in income tax from the pool company.
Now when GM stock falls 88%, that money vaporizes. Wall Street. that generates losses on tax returns and the gov't loses hundreds of billions in tax revenues. That is 'lost burned up money going down the tubes'.
In reality, I'm aware that the point is not to get 4 cylinder Camry's off the road but I've been beaten up pretty badly by this recession and I wouldn't mind a silver lining. I haven't read about any flexibility around the 18 mpg or less cut-off like I have around the 4 mpg improvement vs. the 10 mpg improvement.
Does anyone know if the type of driving is factored in or if a more limited reward is available for cars already getting decent mileage? Thanks
Bill S.
See:
http://www.cars.gov/
and
http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/cars.shtml
The vehicle that you are trading in is required to be destroyed. Therefore, the value you negotiate with the dealer for your trade in is not likely to exceed its scrap value. The law requires the dealer to disclose to you and estimate of the scrap value of your trade-in vehicle.
My take is you can negotiate over and above the $3500 or $4500 voucher amount for your trade in. If the trade in qualifies for $4500 and the body panels etc are all very good it may have a scrap value of say $200. The dealer is required to tell you that figure and you try to get as much of it as you can. The only part that has to be destroyed is the engine. So I bring in a clean vehicle with no rust the vehicle has the engine pulled and destroyed. However the salvage yard just happens to have and engine transmission from a wrecked vehicle of the same vintage that together makes a good used vehicle.
Do I see a cottage industry rising up here? Too bad I am retired and basically lazy.
Sorry this just isn't true. It's just a bit of moaning and whining.
First the money that was given to Chrysler and GM went back into the US economy. They didn't have a bonfire and set it ablaze. It went all over the place and likely kept a multitude of businesses afloat if only for a couple of more months ( Lear Corp ). It actually kept Chrysler and GM alive to fight another day as leaner companies with much better prospects of survival.
If the two of them do survive than the balance of the investments have a good chance of being recouped when the ownership shares are sold to new investors. Overall it's been a smart investment in a time of crisis.....and I work for a competitor.
It's good for the United States on the whole.
What I can see occuring though is that owners will take everything of value out of the vehicle, but it still has to be drivable, presumably with all doors, signals and glass intact ( to be legal ), then the owner can sell the extracted parts himself if he so wishes. That sounds like good entrepreneurship.
http://www.cars.gov/files/day-one.pdf
Leaves a lot of room for interpretation...
And maybe someone could rack their brain and figure out what car or truck would actually be worth $3,500 scrap. Maybe an older Suburban retired from the Secret Service fleet that has a few extra tons of steel in it?
Actually Union wages did go up while those at the bottom were stagnant. There in lies much of the problem. The Upper middle class (UAW and the like) made great wages while those at the bottom did not keep pace. Globalization which got going strong in the 1970s took the jobs at the lower levels. Now those people in China are chewing away at the Union jobs such as the UAW. Meanwhile the local, state and Federal government kept expanding with higher and higher paying Union jobs. Today there is not many left to pay the taxes for all the over paid public servants. Don't forget the 30 million illegals eroding the bottom tier wages. They are also sucking up free services that the few of US are paying. All part of a Socialist agenda started in the 1930s.
C4C will do Nothing to help our standard of living. We are going to lose a lot of ground that will never return because of our flagrant borrowing at every level of our society.
The disclosure and haggling might be a situation if the vehicle is close to the limit for the voucher. Dealer: it's worth $3500....Buyer: I want $4000.
If the value is far below the threshhold then why would the buyer care what the scrap value is? The buyer can only get the $3500 or $4500
I could see a situation where an agreement is made between a large group whereby it will provide all its clunkers to a scrapper in exchange for one third of the June auction value ( I'd expect that the July - ??? auction values of these vehicles will be zero or close to it ). It appears that the scrapper will strip off the salable parts and crush the engine and other useless parts. Some value may come from the stripped off parts.
Maybe one could buy back their own entire vehicle, without the drive train, before it is destroyed?
...and now for something completely different...I wonder how much traffic cars.com is going to get as a result of the official site for this being cars.gov?
Now that is an idea I like. I really like my 99 Ford Ranger, EXCEPT for the gutless POC V6 FF engine and transmission. Buy back the vehicle sans engine via the salvage company and convert to electric or install a Cummins 4BT diesel engine with auto transmission. One of many things I have contemplated doing with my truck.
Every one is happy. hmmmmm
Besides, the crap traded in under C4C is not worth the trouble. Wrecking yards are already very selective about what they will even accept. The money is in late model wrecks, not 1980s Oldmobiles.
Yikes. That one does just barely squeak into the eligible category, at 18 mpg EPA combined. I'd be inclined to keep that one, unless it just won't satisfy your needs anymore.
work and it's starting to rust(lives in the state of Michigan). I figure I would need to spend a couple of grand just to fix the problems I listed or a could trade it against a Focus(4500) or Fusion S(3500) and have a more fuel efficient car that I could payoff in a couple of years and drive another 6-8 years.