U.S. Auto Market News and Reviews

stever · January 2015

Welcome to the club. My highest was ~$22k, call it $23k OTD.

andres3 · January 2015

I've paid 25K, 30.1K, and 54.88K for my cars out the door. That last one was a big jump and hurt, but it's a great car.

uplanderguy · February 2015

Most I ever paid for a new vehicle was just under $24K for our '05 Uplander 7-passenger van. I know to never say 'never', but I just can't see myself paying $35K or more for any car, at any time. We could've afforded to, but I just have a built-in valve that wouldn't let me. Humble origins, small-town upbringing. For that kind of money, it better make love to me.

henryn · February 2015

The house I'm presently living in cost me $50,000. Purchased in 2011, HUD repo, 3-2-2 brick. I cannot imagine ever paying more for a car than for my house.

circlew · February 2015

Friday, Jan 30th, 2015 @ 4:13 pm

General Motors has reportedly slashed base prices for four different models.

The Buick LaCrosse has received the biggest discount of $2,570, bringing the entry point down to $31,065, according to a CarsDirect summary of the changes.

The GMC Terrain sticker has been cut by $2,490 to $24,070 -- $4,000 below the Ford Edge -- while the base Chevrolet Equinox now commands $22,120, a $2,400 discount.

The Chevrolet Cruze has also been included in the campaign, with a savings of $1,575 that brings the MSRP down to $16,170.

GM appears to be expecting dealers to share the pain, with significant narrowing of margins between the MSRP and invoice pricing, according to the report. For example, the basic LaCrosse now has a gap of just $150 -- down from almost $1,350.

stever · February 2015

"US automotive dealers had a strong start to 2015 as low gas prices and an improving economy sparked solid year-on-year gains in January for all the major manufactures.

“New car shoppers, seemingly inspired by winter weather and low gas prices, are buying up trucks and SUVs – particularly smaller ones,” Jessica Caldwell, Edmunds.com senior analyst, said. “At this point, most automakers and dealers offer products in these popular segments and are able to benefit from the trend.”

US sales in January are expected to come in at a Seasonally Adjusted Annual Rate (SAAR) of 16.7 million. This would be a 23.1 percent decrease from December but a healthy 14.4 percent increase from January 2014." (bulliondesk.com)

"General Motors' January sales rose 18%; Ford was up 15% and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles' jumped 14% from a year earlier, as lower gas prices spurred sales of pickups and SUVs.

Nissan sales increased 15%, while Honda posted an 11.5% gain and Toyota was up almost 16% with a new January record for light truck sales. Volkswagen was flat; selling 10 more vehicles than a year ago." (Detroit Free Press)

uplanderguy · February 2015

In the pre-paying-for-my-kids'-college days, about now I'd be seriously considering a Cruze L to replace my old Cobalt. The Cruze employs people where I live now and also where I grew up. But with disposable income gone, and the fact that my old Cobalt still runs great and I never do anything to it, I can't/won't.

circlew · February 2015

Top 20 Cars -1/2015 - Thinking about a new Mazda in 2015...

henryn · February 2015

Volkswagen has a long way to go if they want to succeed in the North American market. And this is only cars, pickup trucks outsell cars, and VW has no entry in that market at all.

circlew · February 2015

Top PUT 1/2015

andres3 · February 2015

the new '15 VW GTI is one helluva car and costs much less than $30K. I don't really see anything competing with it in its price range.

henryn · February 2015

andres3 said:
the new '15 VW GTI is one helluva car and costs much less than $30K. I don't really see anything competing with it in its price range.

The problem here is that you are talking about a niche market. They will never sell enough of the GTI to put them at or close to the top of the list that was just posted. The GTI is not going to put them in the same ball park as the Corolla or Camry, never mind the F150.

circlew · February 2015

Same with the Mazda3 will never make the top seller list, as good as it is.-

stever · February 2015

Sorry, this is a WSJ registration link but maybe some other sites will pick up on the story.

U.S. Car Exports Top 2 Million

"U.S. auto exports hit a record for the third year in a row in 2014 as strong demand for U.S. made cars and sport-utility vehicles, especially in the Middle East and Asia, offset concerns about a strengthening dollar.

The trend also was fueled by foreign-owned U.S. auto plants built in the U.S. Midwest and South that are now exporting more vehicles to other markets. Car makers including Toyota Motor Corp. and Honda Motor Co. that opened factories here to be closer to U.S. customers are now exporting too."

circlew · February 2015

With 17.6% of the U.S. market in January 2015, General Motors increased its market share from January 2014’s 16.9% but slid back from December’s 18.2%.

GM car sales slid 7% to account for just 32% of the automaker’s January volume. Light trucks at General Motors – including a pickup range that grew its sales by 42% – jumped 36%.

The big loser? That’d be the Koreans. Hyundai and Kia combined to own 8% of the U.S. market in January 2014, a figure which fell to 7.2% in January 2015. New vehicle sales rose 14% in America last month, year-over-year. Hyundai volume rose to a record-setting January level of 82,804 sales, but the 1% gain severely trailed the industry. Kia sales were up a little more than 3%, although the brand’s car division slid 3% on falling Optima and Cadenza volume.

henryn · February 2015

The most surprising thing about all of these sales figures, at least to me, is that no one is really competing with Ford and Chevy at selling trucks. The Japanese, the Koreans, the Germans, everyone is trying like crazy to compete in the North American market. But what sells here, way above and beyond everything else, is the Ford F150 and the Chevrolet Silverado. The Germans (VW, BMW, MB) aren’t even trying, neither are the Koreans. The Japanese have been trying for many years, with no visible success outside of the Toyota Tacoma, which does not compete directly against the F150 and Silverado, and in truth has over recent years had no competition at all.

circlew · February 2015

Caddy's On-Sale Soon

GM is reportedly softening to dealer demands for discount programs aimed at offloading 2014 models, resulting in price cuts and incentives totaling more than $15,000 at some locations.

http://www.leftlanenews.com/cadillac-dealers-still-struggling-to-sell-ats-cts.html

andres3 · February 2015

A vehicle purchase is a big deal, a lot of money is at stake, who do you trust?

circlew · February 2015

Trust yourself only.

circlew · February 2015

2014 Recalls

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2015/02/12/auto-vehicle-recalls/23312869/

imidazol97 · February 2015

Musk rat Love for Tesla. Need cash?

JP Morgan says underweight. That is polite Wall-Street-speak for the game is over and dump that loser!

P Morgan said the last six months prove the company does not have the ability to scale sales and production profitably. They have no faith that Tesla can meet its own prediction of delivering 55,000 vehicles in 2015 versus 32,000 in 2014. They are all but rolling on the ground over Tesla’s claim to ship 500,000 in 2020 and “millions” in 2025.

But the real back-breaker for shareholders is that 80% of Tesla quarterly earnings reports since 2011 showed negative cash flow. JP Morgan seems to wonder whether Tesla will eventually run out of cash. Musk can still raise money, but diluting shareholders at lower and lower prices will cause investor anger. If the stock continues to “dumpster dive,” as they say on Wall Street, Tesla could eventually be cut off from new cash.

http://www.breitbart.com/california/2015/02/13/tesla-blows-through-cash-stock-plummets-on-loss/

tlong · February 2015

I hope Tesla is successful. We need new thinking in the auto industry, and I'm glad it is coming from the US.

circlew · February 2015

Apple might test the waters with an iCar. With over 10X market cap than GM and a huge vision in comparison, i'd bet they are successful.

Find New Roads!

stever · February 2015

Cars are rolling computers anymore. Apple would just need some suppliers - they can phone the rest in.

Tech-Loving Drivers Are Trading in Cars as Often as iPhones (Bloomberg)

uplanderguy · February 2015

https://autos.yahoo.com/blogs/motoramic/the-most-popular-new-vehicle-in-each-state--not-what-you-might-expect-181118005.html

I consider myself a non-conformist by today's standards, but I see I fit in with my state, overall.

Midwest being Chevy buyers is probably as stereotypical as Subaru hittin' it outta the park in Washington State.

tlong · February 2015

circlew said:
Apple might test the waters with an iCar. With over 10X market cap than GM and a huge vision in comparison, i'd bet they are successful.

Find New Roads!

Of course a lot of an Apple car would probably be made in China, and would cost more than most people would want to pay.

stever · February 2015

The Toyota dominance in the SouthEast surprises me.

stever · February 2015

"Why in the would would any sane company want to get into the car business right now, when the risks essentially are huge?" says Bill Visnic, senior editor with the automotive website Edmunds.com.

"The margins in the car business are remarkably thin," Visnic says.

He points out that Apple can turn a profit of a few hundred dollars on an iPhone — the same cut a car dealer is happy to make on a sedan that costs 30 times as much."

Apple Must 'Think Different' On Cars, Or Join Ranks Of Failed New Brands (NPR)

circlew · February 2015

Consumer Reports': Lexus best, Buick tops domestics
Tesla Model S Named Top Model For Second Year In A Row

The ranking, best to worst, with overall score and the percentage of the brand's models that CR tested and recommends:

•Lexus, 78, 78%

•Mazda, 75, 67%

•Toyota, 74, 68%

•Audi, 73, 56%

•Subaru, 73, 80%

•Porsche, 70, 60%

•Buick, 69, 83%

•Honda, 69, 58%.

•Kia, 68, 78%

•BMW, 66, 50%

•Acura, 65, 40%

•Volvo, 65, 67%

•Hyundai, 64, 36%

•GMC, 61, 17%

•Volkswagen, 60, 46%

•Lincoln, 59, 40%

•Infiniti, 59, 29%

•Nissan, 59, 25%

•Chevrolet, 59, 36%

•Cadillac, 58, 25%

•Mercedes-Benz, 56, 20%

•Scion, 54, 25%

•Chrysler, 54, none

•Ford, 53, 19%

•Dodge, 52, 33%

•Mini, 46, none

•Jeep, 39, none

•Fiat, 32, none

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2015/02/24/consumer-reports-brand-ranking-lexus-fiat/23910563/

anythngbutgm · February 2015

GO Subie! Great job Mazda, heck 3 years ago we were predicting their demise after Ford sold their stake...

And Audi in 4th I find as surprising as it is encouraging.

uplanderguy · February 2015

I'm a numbers guy, but I'm confused. How can Nissan and Infiniti be ahead of Chevrolet with 59 as the average score for all three, but Chevrolet has 36% of their line "recommended" compared to 25% and 29% for the other two?

Also, for those who consider CR "the Bible", so much for Ford being the domestic darling.

circlew · February 2015

Here is the JD Power. Funny how numbers work!

http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2015/02/lexus-takes-gold-2015-jd-power-dependability-study/#more-1008050

uplanderguy · February 2015

At least I understand this chart--best is lowest number; worst is highest number...LOL

Steering back to the original question....does anyone understand how that happened or what it means? I think the objective reader would concur that it's a reasonable question.

imidazol97 · February 2015

uplanderguy said:
I'm a numbers guy, but I'm confused. How can Nissan and Infiniti be ahead of Chevrolet with 59 as the average score for all three, but Chevrolet has 36% of their line "recommended" compared to 25% and 29% for the other two?.

I haven't gone back to check, but I believe when posted elsewhere the CR summation was based on two factors and a then CR "balanced" those by throwing in some of their "magic," as they seem to so often have done through the decades, to give their take on what people should be thinking about each brand.

In the JD Powers data, based on objective facts, the meaningful point for a blank bar would
be at 140, with Mazda and Mitsubishi, rather than at 147. This would move BMW and Infinity to
148. below the typical. The 140 mark is the median. That is the halfway divider rather than the average.
149. The obscenely high scores of Land Plower and Flat pull the average down. Statistically
the median is more meaningful.

Ford and Hyundai are really down in the number of problems. I'm not as surprised by
Hyunda considering how much junk Hyunda/Kia pushed into the American roads the
last 15 years, but Ford should be higher. A breakdown of the particular models at Ford
would be elucidating. I hear various rumblings about different things that are problematic
at their shops.

*****
*****
I would expect Kia and Hyunda's problem records to be closer to each other than they appear
to be in this report.

A personal experience about Kia's higher than Hyunda record is from my shopping for cars
the last 3 years. I was in a Kia store in the evening, having stopped in after shopping
at a plaza adjacent. The older salesman was pushing me toward the gussied up Optima
called a Cadenza. He explained how he as a salesman added value to the purchase from
their store because he was make sure the guys in the shop would actually try to fix
things his customers were finding wrong that the guys in the shop would resist
recognizing as problems and actually fixing. He said he would go into the shop and
tell them to fix the things that needed it.

I conclude now that's how a company can keep
their warranty problems lower--refuse to fix them for the customer unless the salesman
intervens.

I can believe that a salesman did have clout in service at that store because months earlier
a service writer/repair manager had come out to help me when I was looking at their
used cars/new cars. If the service assistant can sell cars, the salesmen likely can
help run the repair department...

Needless to say, I wasn't as impressed as the older salesman thought I'd be as
to how things get fixed at a Kia store.

dieselone · February 2015

My guess is CU gives recommendations based on a variety of scores. Reliability is only one factor. Ex. the most reliable vehicle in the survey wouldn't get a recommendation if it had poor safety scores. This would boost that particular mfg. reliability score but would lower the recommendation percentage.

Considering Nissan/Infinity's model lineup. They have some vehicles I really like and several I really don't. So I guess I could see where their overall score could be good despite a low model recommendation percentage.

dieselone · February 2015

I don't know what's going on at Ford. All I can say is my wife's '13 Taurus has been 100% trouble free with nearly 40k miles on it.

FWIW, my '14 Ram has been good so far too at 30k miles. I've had a 3rd brake light go out (dealer replaced for free) and an LED map/dome light which occasionally flickers (dealer has on order).

While I really like the LED lighting, if they go out, you just don't go to a local auto-parts store to get a replacement. My truck has a lot of LED lights which should last a long time, but when and if they go out, it means a trip to the dealer.

stever · February 2015

That's the thing - all cars have gotten lots more reliable. The manufacturers hate having to pay warranty claims and they hate having to put a big pile of money aside to cover those claims, but accounting rules require them to do that. So it's cheaper to make 'em last (at least through the warranty period).

The other edge of that sword is that cars last a lot longer than they used to so in theory fewer new cars are needed.

That bottom feeder Land Rover is probably lights years more reliable than the typical car of just a decade ago.

uplanderguy · February 2015

I was under the impression that the first CR number is the average of testing scores for that make, and the second was percentage of that make's total lineup CR recommends. That seems like a pretty flat way to present the list to me--in a good way. The only thing I can think of is there are decimal points after the "59" score that aren't showing, and possibly Infiniti and Nissan had a higher score by a decimal than Chevrolet.

I think that after my snowblower, probably the best mechanical investment I've personally made is my '08 Cobalt. $9,900 new after rebate and GM card dollars, and before my trade, sits out all the time (and I mean all) and we've had many consecutive days of below zero, including double-digit-below-zero, and it starts every single time, on its soon-to-be-seven-year-old battery. Satellite radio is a thing I love too. Absolutely dirt-cheap to run and maintain, dirt-cheap to buy, and built (almost) locally. No bad in any of that I don't think.

imidazol97 · February 2015

I just got a link to the JD Powers release of the VDS.
The Highest Ranked Midsize Car is _____ Chevrolet Malibu !!!
Next mentions are Altima and Camry. No Optima, Sonata, Accord in sight on the site.

Midsize sporty car is Camaro
next mention Mustang

Highest Rank Large car is Buick LaCrosse
Next mention Avalon? and Taurus

http://www.jdpower.com/press-releases/2015-vehicle-dependability-study

uplanderguy · February 2015

And that's for 2012-model vehicles, correct? That's a good sign.

I'm liking that dark, dark red I'm seeing on 2015 Malibus. Good buys to be had if you don't have to mirror what this-or-that magazine says. Built in Kansas City.

laurasdada · February 2015

And, in a sampling of one, I can report no problems with my '13 Jaguar XF! Top of the list! Perhaps when Jag has the XE and the F-Pace, they'll have enough models for CR and JDP to test/rank. I know Jag has ben doing fairly well in some JDP polls the last few years, which my findings support.

Pace with grace.

andres3 · February 2015

CR won't recommend a car no matter how high it scores if its safety is below "acceptable" and/or its reliability is below "average."

Tesla must of made "average" by the skin of their teeth.

circlew · February 2015

I'd hold more weight to the CR scores since they recommend on actual tests. So do the bulk of the buyers.

Since batteries are my biggest replacement costs, how can I complain vs the GM junk I had in the past?

anythngbutgm · February 2015

laurasdada said:
And, in a sampling of one, I can report no problems with my '13 Jaguar XF! Top of the list! Perhaps when Jag has the XE and the F-Pace, they'll have enough models for CR and JDP to test/rank. I know Jag has ben doing fairly well in some JDP polls the last few years, which my findings support.

Pace with grace.

I've read multiple reports that Jag and LR have improved tremendously over the past couple of years. Unscheduled repairs are supposedly still wallet melting, but they are becoming less frequent. I've been following the Evoque for a while and it appears to be holding up well for instance...

Cheers!

andres3 · March 2015

It really is a complete and utter junk vs. refined, well-engineered automobiles. Sure, well engineered automobiles can still have some issues, but it just isn't in the same league or ball park as when you've owned some type of Big 3 junk in the past.

Most people can forgive a failure or two in the first 100,000 miles, but complete failure of just about every part?

uplanderguy · March 2015

I must really walk between the raindrops. I have not had what I would consider an expensive repair in thirteen new GM products in 34 years. Someone on one of the other forums said they had invested "tens of thousands" of dollars in repairs in their GM, Ford, and Chrysler cars, a handful of them. Believe me, several others there cast some doubt on those figures. Where I live, in rusty NE OH, I see more old Cavaliers (OK, built down the road) and second-gen Neons than any other small cars. Why would that be? I will say that most cars I see at night with a headlight burned out are Asian models. LOL

Mr_Shiftright · March 2015

Depends so much on the person, when they bought the car, how they perform maintenance, the climate they live in ---obviously you are doing something right.

tlong · March 2015

uplanderguy said:
I must really walk between the raindrops. I have not had what I would consider an expensive repair in thirteen new GM products in 34 years. Someone on one of the other forums said they had invested "tens of thousands" of dollars in repairs in their GM, Ford, and Chrysler cars, a handful of them. Believe me, several others there cast some doubt on those figures. Where I live, in rusty NE OH, I see more old Cavaliers (OK, built down the road) and second-gen Neons than any other small cars. Why would that be? I will say that most cars I see at night with a headlight burned out are Asian models. LOL

That would be because they sell way more US nameplates in that part of the country.

uplanderguy · March 2015

So rust-resistance, cost of repairs and parts, etc., have nothing to do with it?

Remember, too, that even then Hondas were built in Ohio.

tlong · March 2015

uplanderguy said:
So rust-resistance, cost of repairs and parts, etc., have nothing to do with it?

Remember, too, that even then Hondas were built in Ohio.

Doesn't matter where they were built. The sales are much higher for brands like Chevy in Ohio. So of course you are going to see more of them.

Besides, your story IS anecdotal so hardly a quantitative proof of anything. Just sayin'.

But we are happy to see you back here! It has been lonely and you offer a good counter to some of the others of us!

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