These days, there are a whole host of cheap cars on sale. And yet, even with budget options aplenty, it seems that car-owning Americans might increasingly be feeling the pinch amidst ongoing cost-of-living struggles. As covered by Bloomberg, an increasing number of people are missing their car payments.
It’s fair to say that America is undergoing some interesting economic times right now. Inflation has continued to take its toll on household budgets at the same time that higher interest rates have made loans more difficult to service. Add all that together, and it makes a perfect storm for borrowers that may have already been stretching to make their payments.
Collected by credit analysis firm Fitch ratings, the data is stark. The number of car owners missing their payments is now at its highest level in over 30 years. According to the agency, 6.56% of subprime auto borrowers are 60 days behind on their payments or more, which is the greatest level since the company’s records began in 1994. Meanwhile, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, those 90 days or later on their payments hit 3% last quarter—a level not reached since 2010.
From Bloomberg
Car owners are missing their monthly payments at the highest rate in more than 30 years.
January share of subprime auto borrowers at least 60 days past due on their loans rose to 6.56%, the most since the data collection began in 1994–according to Fitch Ratings pic.twitter.com/MkBZ2ytvlb— Vic Turbendian (@Vic_Turbendian) March 7, 2025
Speaking to Bloomberg, Fitch’s senior director for asset-backed securities, Mike Girard notes that it’s a particularly fraught time of year. “The lower income level has been really affected, and we expect that to continue to be the case this year,” Girard explains, putting the blame on higher inflation and high interest rates. He notes that the post-holiday period is often tough on households, with the following months offering some relief as tax refunds come through.
While payment extensions may get some out of trouble in the short term, it can add significant pain in the long run. As explained on Twitter by Car Dealership Guy, even a short extension of a few months can increase the total sum required to pay off the loan by thousands of dollars.
Extending auto loan payments adds up fast:
After a 3-month extension— the total interest on a $25K loan at 15% APR for 72 months jumps an extra $1,550.
A 6-month extension? Tack on about $3,100—instead.
Bottom line?
Payment extensions might offer short-term relief—but they… pic.twitter.com/9z73vxA8U4
— Car Dealership Guy (@GuyDealership) February 13, 2025
Beyond long term issues, the American economy has seen a lot of excitement in the last two months—and that’s not usually a good thing. Tariffs have been threatened, rescinded, then reinstated once again, while a tumultuous political environment has seen jobs slashed across the public sector and mass changes across a raft of government programs.
Economists will tell you uncertainty is bad for business, and it seems that’s very much the case right now—particularly in the auto industry. Indeed, it’s perhaps no surprise that dealers are bracing for the struggle ahead. As noted in the Haig Partners Auto Retail Profit Outlook survey taken in February, 42% of dealers expect to do worse than 2024. Contrast that to the January survey, where just 16% of dealers expected to do worse than last year. Amidst all the drama, confidence is down.
The vibe shift in auto retail over the past month has been wild.
Ask a dealer in January about 2025 profitability?
They’d tell you they were feeling good — maybe even confident.
Ask them again in February?
Whole different story.
Reality is starting to set in: 2025 might be a… pic.twitter.com/q0uv6tqa6e
— Car Dealership Guy (@GuyDealership) March 6, 2025
It’s anyone’s guess as to what happens next. While the Big Three automakers have scored a tariff exemption for now, the political environment suggests that more could land at just about any moment. Such measures would tend to drive car prices up. At the same time, if increased inflation and interest rates shrink buying power, the cratering of demand would see average sale prices drop in turn.
Whatever is coming down the line, it’s clear that the situation is a tenuous one for the auto industry right now. The numbers already suggest a lot of people don’t have the money to spend on vehicles that they might have had last year. It’s likely to be tough going for some time yet until calmer economic winds prevail. Ask any money meteorologist you like, though—few are predicting smooth sailing in the immediate future.
Image credits: Topshot via Graham Robson CC BY-SA 2.0,
I have owned 4 cars throughout my life, 2 new & 2 used. I got the used ones cheaply, so I didn’t keep them for long. But as for the 2 new ones, I drove the first for 29 years until it actually fell apart, I am still driving the second, which I’ve owned for 25 years. I am doing that because I don’t want to be burdened with CAR PAYMENTS!!!!!!
I am more than ready to stop living in the “interesting” times, where interesting is as in the Chinese curse.
However, keeping up with the Joneses, influencers, and the like has driven a lot of people to this point.
I guess some of them will find a way to blame it on those people, and not look in the mirror like they should.
People who confuse their “needs” and their “wants” are financially doomed.
You don’t need a Canyonero and a 3000sqft house to raise a family. You don’t need cable tv and multiple cell phone contracts.
You don’t need to eat at high end restaurants and pay $6 for a coffee you can make at home.
I could go on but the point is we are being fed marketing bullshit to keep the capitalist hamster wheel turning.
My daughter is taking Personal Finance in HS. They had a (overly simplistic) worksheet to do auto loan calculations. She texted me, “Why are we doing this? I thought auto loans were financially stupid? Cars depreciate.”
I was so proud.
// Although when she got home, we also had a discussion about 60 (72!) month loans, “under water”, but also about cash, investment risk, opportunity cost, etc.
In my opinion, any auto loan with a rate below what you could earn in interest on a short term investment is a good deal versus cash.
I would argue that the longer the loan, the better, as long as the interest rate is lower than what you are earning in short term investments (e.g., a high interest savings account) and the price of the car is reasonable versus income.
I admit my argument completely ignores psychology, and how a long payment can coax someone into buying way more car than they need.
That said: an auto loan at 0%? They don’t really offer those beyond 36 months, but if they did? Take as long as humanly possible. Holy free money, Batman!
Yep, that’s exactly the conversation I referred to as about “cash, investment risk, and opportunity costs.”
But that’s advanced level in any case. My first goal, that I have been successful at, is that auto loans are to be reduced or ideally avoided by 99.9% of buyers.
I think a lot of car buying itself probably should be reduced or ideally avoided.
My last auto loan was at .25% and I would be a fool to pass up the offer. I would still come out ahead letting the unspent cash sit in a low yeild account gaining interest at .6%
I’m not sure I get your point.
I was talking about my daughter and being proud of her being financially intelligent.
If I ever have a conversation about that one guy on the internet who that one time got a unicorn of a deal, which presented a highly unlikely exception to the rule, I’ll be sure to bring you up.
Given the that the lowest typical rate since 1972 was 3.85% in Dec 2021, I feel pretty comfortable not mentioning your almost impossible 0.25%.
https://www.mavericktruckclub.com/forum/threads/for-those-who-are-shocked-by-current-auto-loan-rates-here-is-historical-rates-since-1972.40833/
https://www.statista.com/statistics/290673/auto-loan-rates-usa/
I know some people like to sit on cash, but I take into account what my tax bracket is on the interest also. I wouldn’t get a 5.5% car loan while earning 6% on short term gains if I have to pay 20% of that gain on tax.
Totally fair.
I don’t like to sit on cash, per se, but it seems wild to me (like, personally; I’m not saying it’s right or wrong) to fork over, say, 30,000 dollars in cash all at once if I had an option to keep that money, and pay monthly out of my income.
I mean, I guess I’m out of the loop here, but 15% APR???
Holy hopping jesus. No wonder.
And that’s not even the worst rates out there. 20%+ isn’t outside the realm of possibility from buy here pay here lots
Well, I mean, I knew about BHPH scams…. but it sounded like the numbers weren’t referring to those. Maybe I was incorrect, and those were included.
Back in the late ’70s, mortgages were over 20%. Imagine that on a 30 year fixed!
Yeah but the house cost $50K, so even at 20% the payment was only a few hundred a month. Context is key.
True, but for context, that $50k is roughly equivalent to $300k today. 20% interest is brutal any time.
I did. I was at university at the time. The rates here hit 27-29% in the 80’s if I recall. The downpayment was 20% on a 25 year note. The place cost about 25k. I was smart about financing it and paid it off on the backs of the students I rented rooms to. The place was paid for before I graduated.
On the one hand, impressive financial management. It’s wild that you had $5,000 (or more) in the bank way back then, and that you got it paid off so quickly.
That said, as you yourself said, you did it “on the backs of the students”. Ouch.
Capitalism in action, I suppose.
I worked for four years before going back to university and had a decent nest egg put aside for university and the home purchase. I worked a ft a (autobody) and a pt (designing and building databases and spreadsheets for small businesses) jobs and did side jobs on the weekends (autobody repair and paint). My father co-signed the mortgage and loaned me $1500 of the downpayment. It was a four bedroom house to which I added another room in the basement. I rented rooms to university coop students for market rate. That netted me 2k a month which covered PIT plus profit. My mortgage was around 600 per month. I lived effectively rent free. I doubled down on the payments and ballooned on payments when possible. Smart money management and living within one’s means is not rocket science.
I provided a service that was in demand. Didn’t rip anyone off. My choice of words might not have been the most appropriate, but I was hardly a slum landlord. I learned a bunch about running a small business to boot.
I did the same thing when I graduated and started working professionally. I paid off that house in 8 years.
Nicely done.
Just bought a 2025 Cx-70. Was gonna pay cash ,as we generally haven’t taken on car loans, but they had a 3 year, zero interest loan offer. Couldn’t refuse.
Yeah, when I picked up my 2023 Integra it was just low enough interest that it made more sense to keep the money invested and take the loan than to pay cash. But it seems I may have gotten in under the wire (or maybe not, if you just picked that up).
My mother-in-law is in real estate and insists that prices will keep increasing, and that inventory is nearly non-existent, and it will never change. Cars are the canary in the coal mine for the economy.
Has she been living under a rock the last 2 years???
I’m in what was a BOOMing market and it’s ground to a halt with houses sitting for months on the market and prices coming down roughly 10%. Also PLENTY of inventory right now, even in the most desirable neighborhoods.
Not where we live. We’re not even in an expensive market but after a full year of repeatedly striking out despite offering at or above list, my brother had to waive inspection to finally get a house.
The only things that sit on the market are houses with ultra-serious flaws, houses that are listed 100k over what any even somewhat sane person would pay, and new builds that crack smoking developers think people will pay 600k for. In a market where nobody can afford more than 400k.
Same here.
Location is what matters in times like these.
What’s interesting is the repo lots filling up it’s been doing that for a year it did it before then got a little better. There aren’t enough tow truck drivers to repo all the cars. It’s a giant mess with multiple factors. Financial literacy seems to be at the top. Wage issues for sure. But when teachers tell kids to do all the stuff they did because they see in such a good financial situation and the dangers of being a blue collar who they seem to think makes less then them. It becomes roll down economics.
What’s with all these folks missing car payments? I haven’t had a car payment since 1988 and I don’t miss them one bit.
See if we had gifs there would be a good opportunity here for one of a snare drum followed by a crash cymbal.
I can’t wait for people to crawl out of the woodwork to tell us that modern cars are not too expensive.
I mean I got a really good deal on a new Leaf, but a new Leaf won’t work for everyone.
Cars HAVE gotten more expensive, and some price jumps really are ridiculous, but every once in a while, I’ll run an inflation calculator on a new car today vs 20 or 30 years ago. Often today’s price is pretty comparable to the older one, however one gets more with today’s cars.
On the other hand, that doesn’t account for wages being effectively lower now.
I saw something the other day, it said the average salary in 1980 was 30K, with the average home price being 150k. In 2024, it was 50k/400k. Those numbers sound relatively correct, however I did not run them myself.
Stagnant wages are the real problem
100%! They’ve actively been suppressed for years. There’s a study that shows that everyone would have an extra $1,400/month if wage growth had kept pace with the increase in productivity.
That’ll also set me off on a rant on the fact that the workweek hasn’t shrunk in the last 80 years.
You get a lot more in a 2020 and up car than a 20 or 30 year old one, a lot.. but we do need more “stripper” cars, that really drives the average price up, the lack of bare bones cars. I mean I remember (smacking you with my cane) cars without AC or radios. I’m pretty sure you can’t get a car without AC here in the US and the base infotainment system is way beyond, top of the line 30 years ago
I think with standardized manufacturing, it’s more expensive to offer cars without AC or manual windows, etc. Just more variation for the line and part numbers to stock.
I can do without cooled seats, 50 airbags, and voice controls, but you’ll have to pry AC from my cold, dead hands. My first car had no AC, and I vowed to never go through that again.
No argument, I’m sure they have done the calculous of where the “bottom” is. Otherwise they would probably love to sell just one trim level.
Base configuration: back in the day car salesmen called them “Sally Rands” in a nod to the late, great, burlesque dancer. Many units had no radio and get this, no heat.
Early 60s muscle cars i.e., 421 Super Duty Catalinas, 409 Impalas were frequently ordered this way.
I have two arguments for this.
Good point, you’ll get no argument from me on that.
Agreed.. I bought the base GTI because higher trim added literally nothing except leather seats and a leaky sunroof, there are no additional “wiz-bang” stuff until the Autobahn with self parking.
When I read articles like this it makes me wish more people new more about cars. And apparently how to use FB marketplace. The cars are so crappy today that they barely outlast the warranty, but not the payment period. My sister-in-law is a nanny and wanted to purchase a used range rover. I spent days and gave a few hundred reasons as to why that was a bad idea. She didn’t listen of course. She’s one of those people that is buying way beyond her budget. The fact that the car is used means it doesn’t have very long left on the warranty if any at all, and she’ll end up financing it WAY past the warranty period. When it breaks she won’t be able to get it fixed. Then it will end up getting repoed, and she’ll be another statistic.
I personally wouldn’t use a Facebook Marketplace Range Rover as the metric by which I judge all new cars.
No, of course not. Two different scenario’s. I wish more people knew more about cars so they could use marketplace to their benefit. She bought her range rover from a dealer. Which could be good or bad. You can buy a 15 year old range rover from marketplace for under 10k. There’s a reason for that though that most people don’t realize. It’s because they’re bags of hot garbage. Owning any luxury car outside of a warranty is just one repair away from a repossession. She wanted something newer so hers is only about 5 years old. So she’s making ungodly payments on a car that is known to be hot garbage and it’s out of warranty. This scenario is all to common unfortunately. Most cars today are better quality than even a new range rover but that’s an exceptionally low bar.
All this winning, but sadly the American memory is about 6 or 7 nano seconds, so those who voted for OJ because of the price of eggs and gasoline were so high, have yet to complain about the price of eggs or gasoline going up up up. In my LOL section, I noticed that the baguettes I bought at Costco yesterday were from Canada. When the actual price of all our shit catapults up 25% due to cost of ingredients (tariffs and bird flu) and the countries that OJ wants to tariff return the favor, the true shitshow will be plain as day. Which again will take exactly 8 nanoseconds for most of America to forget it.
I used to bemoan Americans’ apparent inability to learn from the mistakes of others, but apparently they are also unable to learn from their own mistakes…
Anyone who bought a new car at the peak of the car shortage and is now in trouble gets what they deserve, IMHO. With a side order of some people buying way more than they need or can afford.
I just heard through the grapevine (aka my nephew) that my dipshit brother’s 3/4ton diesel pickup that he didn’t need other than as a penis extension has expensively crapped itself, and he can’t afford to fix it – but he still has that $1000/mo+ payment on it. Boo-hoo, little bro. Saw that one coming from 1000 miles away. Be interesting to see if he joins the repo statistics.
Did he also put “I did that” stickers on gas pumps? I don’t know any douchcanoes, but I would laugh so hard if I knew someone who paid 150K (and up?) for the Cybertruck
Wouldn’t surprise me. Little Bro thinks Trump walks on water of course. I’d say he was in the bottom half of the class but he dropped out of high school as soon as he was old enough to. I think you have to be an especially special sort of special to buy a CyberTurd at any price.
The sad part is, he had a completely paid for truck that our grandfather bought him to set him up in business. It was aging, and needed a little work but was basically a good solid truck. So he traded it for another truck. But he didn’t like that one, so he very shortly traded that for the macho mini big-rig of his dreams. And rolled a whole bunch of negative equity into it. I still have access to his credit report – he has a $90K note for something like eight years on a used truck when all is said and done. The sadder part is our mother completely paid off all his debts to the tune of $80K because we were trying to get him to where he could buy her house (didn’t happen). Unfortunately, that got his credit rating to where he could get himself into this hole. Number than a pounded thumb, that boy. I should have strangled him in his crib, I was cute, I would have gotten away with it.
I’m sure none of this failure is his fault to him, right?
Of course not. It’s our mother and my’s fault. When she finally got fed up with him living in her house (after a big blowup where he and his even dumber wife berated her on a Facetime call) rent free for a decade and kicked him out so she could sell it, he badmouthed us all over town and hasn’t spoken to us for nearly four years. Which I consider a great start! Astoundingly, we didn’t have to evict them, they were gone and living in a place of thier own in two weeks.
But they left an unholy mess and trashed the house on the way out. Which I had to go up and clean up. Thank God I have a wonderful group of friends who pitched in for a whole weekend. And we were selling the house to relatives for business use so the trashing of the inside didn’t scupper the deal. They really only wanted the land it sits on.
I think the people who deserve it are who you said in the second half—over buyers.
The peak shortage was brutal. My car straight up died during it. I had no trade in.
I really didn’t want to choose to buy a car, but I literally had to have one. And used cars were going for, in some cases, more than new ones.
I don’t feel attacked by the sentiment, or anything. I can afford my car, and honestly, I wish I had just borrowed my parents unused second car and waited for the market to cool.
But a lot of people were forced to buy because they had no other good option.
The overwhelming majority of new car buyers are people who WANT a new car, not people who NEED a new car. I feel some sympathy if something happened that caused you to actually need one, but that is a pretty rare event, and you still could have bought some decent older car for a fraction of the cost of a new one – it’s just more work. I agree that nearly new used cars are rarely a bargain, even at the best of times.
Man, if there had been a used car available for a normal price at that time, I would have bought it.
But I wasn’t about to spend 25 (25!!) thousand for a five year old Volt, which two years previously had been 12 thousand dollars. Ditto every other used car out there. My parents’ piece of shit Fiesta appreciated during that time.
Anyways, I love what I bought and didn’t get a bad deal. But I know some truly responsible people who just got fucked by the situation.
You still could have bought a $5K beater to get by a couple of years, even if that was 2X what it would have cost previously. That madness was never, ever going to be the new normal. <shrug>
That was the reason I waited 2 years for a new Prius, after having an accident that totaled the penultimate one.
Not as many “let them eat cake” comments as I expected.
Most Americans are hurting with the price of everything being high. Eggs are $7 in Colorado. We now eat less eggs in our household…
This has happened across the board.
I was expecting a bunch of people telling everyone they should just pay cash for everything from their prodigious savings and investments. I did not see as many as I was expecting.
The eggs thing is always kind of funny to me. It’s a valid metric, but you would think everyone is out there running a home bakery as their primary source of income 🙂
I agree, eggs are the current extreme example, but they also don’t shrinkflate.
A couple of years ago I would feel fancy at the grocery store and buy a Toblerone (I blame my German friend for this intro).
The cost of the bar was $3.99 and it was HUGE. The bar is now 70% the size it was and $4.29.
I don’t buy Toblerones as much because the other stuff is more important.
Eggs can shrinkflate. Take a look at the size of eggs that pass for large and extra large these days. And mediums might as well be pigeon eggs.
Yeah, but they’re never going to sell you 11 eggs for the price that you paid 12 for like every single other thing that has shrinkflated lately.
They’re also no longer made in Switzerland and they just don’t taste the same to me nowadays.
For me the biggest cut has been restaurants – twenty years ago I would eat half of my meals out (at least); now it’s down to once or twice a month.
Try the various chocolates sold at Aldi. Most, if not all, are made in Germany and they’re especially tasty for the price. Guten Appetit!
I don’t get it either. Do people really eat so many eggs that the price of them matters? I sure don’t. I don’t NOT eat them, but I usually end up not eating a full dozen before they go bad.
And at least the rise in the cost of eggs has a real and legitimate cause, not nebulous “supply chain issues” that at this point is really just mostly corporate greed. There really, really needs to be a windfall profit tax again. But we can’t have that here in the Oligarchy.
At least one grocery store near me has 8-packs of eggs, so don’t be so sure of that.
Most people in who are now in their 30s were not directly affected by the 08-09 recession. At that point in time, driving something economical was a badge of honor.
I’m 44. Going through that experience in my late 20s skewed me to stick with the basics:
Buy a house for the size you need, not want.
Don’t finance cars forever
Be anonymous in your daily car (Toyota, Honda, etc.)
Drive your car until it become unreliable.
Save your money
Max out your retirement
Invest your extra cash (if/when that happens)
Vacations don’t need to be expensive (fun is more important).
I remember growing up in the late 80s and early 90s. My very boomer parents and their friends never flexed with their cars. They did it with making their homes comfortable: that new couch, getting A/C, etc… I remember getting A/C as a kid. It felt AMAZING.
I think cars have become a lot of people’s way to flex some status, due to housing becoming irrationally expensive relative to median income levels. These two problems need to be fixed.
Now, GET OFF MY LAWN!
As much flak as we give Boomers, most of them rarely lived an opulent lifestyle (despite amassing — collectively — quite a bit of wealth).
It’s just an interesting contrast as a Gen Xer, watching younger Millenials scream at Boomers across the fence, all while enjoying creature comforts that the old folks could never have imagined. Collective Priorities are an interesting trend…I feel like we have to fight them every day at our age, with kids’ activities that my parents NEVER would have paid for. Or nice vacations in lieu of material things (at least that’s a tradeoff).
I’m more than a decade older than you. I graduated from college/law school into the depths of the PREVIOUS recession. I couldn’t buy a legal job at the time, which is why I ended up in IT (thank God). And I was legit poor for the first few years out of school. Like rent or food poor. Agree with all of your points. Though in my case, I like cars, and I have spent lots of money on cars – for ME, not to show off to anyone. I can do that because I have spent $0 on children (other than very occasionally spoiling my nephew), and have ALWAYS spent the absolute bare minimum on housing myself. Even then, I do have some automotive regrets over the years.
A lot of the reason that housing has become irrationally expensive is that people have irrational wants and desires when it comes to houses. The family I bought my first house from raised *5* children in it – and until the last two (twins) it was a 2bd/1ba house of about 800sq/ft (and you had to walk through one bedroom to get to the other). They put a 250sq/ft 2bd addition on when the twins came. Can you even imagine a suburban modern middle-class family living like that today?
HGTV, Pinterest, TikTok, Instagram… say that is irrational :/
Where I see it is that I lived in many $600 apartments into my 30s. That option is now $1,200 with double the cost for groceries. Incomes have not doubled in that time period.
Where I live in Western Colorado, a 2 bedroom one bath house is $400k+ all day. That is unobtainum unless you figured out how to buy a house prior to 2012 and get interest rates locked at their lowest while keeping a decent job.
Plenty of money from other countries that can come in and buy that 400k and make it some sort of rental (AirBnb or other). That’s the scariest part
Yeah, especially in the mountain towns. Everyone wants to visit staying here is a whole ‘nother story.
Same where I am from in Maine, except my $570 apartment is now a $2500. You could move somewhere cheaper. I did. <shrug> Housing costs vary FAR more than wages do, especially at the low end. If you can’t afford a life where you live, move.
Watching the house porn channels (which are completely fake as a rule) certainly is a big part of the problem. The ease of seeing how the (largely fake) other half live is a big part of the problem with modern society in general. I didn’t spend much time whining about being poor when I was poor, but it sure seems like a popular pastime today.
You could come to rural Ohio where housing is expensive but still cheaper than most of the country but the problem is that there are no jobs. I make a good living through an amazing remote job that I’m basically waiting on this coming major recession to take from me. Then have to drive 2 hours one way to Pittsburgh for less money.
It’s not just irrational wants and desires. Everyone who owns a house has invested interest in housing prices going up, including the banks, because houses are not seen as shelter anymore, they’re seen as a monetary investment.
Also lots of localities have square footage minimums for new houses. As someone who really like “tiny” homes in many places it’s illegal for me to build a house under 1000ft², most of the square footage minimums I see are 1200ft² or 1500ft².
I’m currently renting a 470ft² House and I have a whole entry room that is the largest room in the house that is basically empty, gonna turn it into a home gym/workshop. The only reason this house has felt small to me at any time is because the bathroom doesn’t have room for a long tub, just a regular tub.
This. I hear this alot – “nobody wants a starter house anymore”. The problem is, in many areas there is no such thing as a “starter house”. Those have become incredibly expensive too. In my area, a <1000 Sq Ft home will run you 500K+. Mostly, those homes are bought and either immediate torn down to be replaced by a McMansion or greatly expanded. I think the number of homes listed under a million right now is in single digits.
I’d be perfectly happy with an 800sq/ft home, but they are simply unattainable for the average person.
Andrew Yang had a housing expert on his podcast the other day, he was saying the mobility of Americans is now at its lowest point. People used to be relatively free to move around, there was an abundance of housing, and it was the norm to live in a place for a few years, then upgrade to a slightly nicer one, whether it be an apt or home. Now with lack of supply and ever rising costs, people have lost the ability to do that.
This is what is related to what I’ve been telling people the past few years. The “old USA” is sunsetting (loss of mfg, multinational investments/corporations, population decline). We all need to adjust that the USA is becoming an investment and service country – how we navigate that is the part I’m not sure of. I keep wondering if I’m going to see a reckoning in my lifetime.
To keep it relevant to the post, man, Hellcat stuff is getting cheap! 🙂
…except that the bottom 80% of the population really can’t afford to invest or hire people for services. It’s all financed by debt. What happens to this investment/service economy when people can no longer take on more debt due to job loss and/or real wage decline?
I keep watching the prices drop. While not exactly my cup of tea, the power these things can produce and general mayhem they can conjure is enticing enough on is own. I’d rather have that engine and manual transmission in a sub-Miata sized package, but even still…
Yeah, I wanted to keep typing but damn I was getting too bummed out on a Friday. That’s the part that is scary to answer.
I just want a taste….own it for a year, suffer in insurance and gas and then bail out for a C6 vette or something more “normal”
If I were to buy one, I think I’d turn it into a Mad Max art car ride with bulletproof glass and steel plate armor, and converted to run on homebrew ethanol/methanol.
Either that, or keep it all original, rarely drive it, and hope it appreciates someday decades into the future.
If I were to buy a Vette, C5 or C6 would be my pick.
It doesn’t matter, the top 20% of the population has all the money anyway, and the ship of the US being primarily a manufacturing power has long since sailed. In fact, the three richest individual Americans supposedly are as wealthy as the bottom *50%* of the population. Ponder THAT fact for a minute or three. The road back to general prosperity is taxing the Hell out of the rich, but that isn’t happening anytime soon. Or we could take after the French and execute them all. Sorry, my inner bloodthirst is coming out today. Been watching too much political commentary of late.
I just don’t get the fascination with that much power. As I have said on here many times, if I want my organs rearrange by g-forces, a season ticket to Six Flags is a whole lot cheaper and safer. I love cars that drive “properly”, but doesn’t mean they need to be fast, just entertaining. I find fast counter-productive, as fast cars are universally boring as shit at normal speeds. I can have a LOT of fun with very little risk of going to jail in my 75hp Spitfire.
If the fast car happens to be lightweight and aerodynamically efficient, it does open the possibility for hypermiling instead of driving like a jackass to get your fun. Of course, when you want to drive it like a jackass, the power to allow for that is always on tap.
Efficient and fast EVs truly are the best of both worlds. I often see Teslas being driven slowly and carefully, probably for that reason.
This also is why the K-swapped Insight is such a great build. 0-60 mph ~5 seconds when you want it, and 60+ mpg when you’re very careful with the accelerator.
I’d LOVE a car with the Insight’s mass and CdA value with the Hellcat’s engine, but that doesn’t exist. And the Hellcat is such a heavy brick that in the best of circumstances, you might get mid 20s mpg out of it for all your effort, which isn’t all that rewarding. If one could eek out 40+ mpg in a more-efficient car with that same engine, however…
I outgrew driving like a jackass about 30 years ago. I don’t see the point in endangering myself, those around me, my license, and my very low insurance rates. Not so say I am a slow driver, because I am not, but you don’t need a fast car to maintain a rapid average speed, you just need a brain. As MG used to advertise – “Safety Fast”.
I drive a Spitfire, and have for 30 years. I like small, light cars for having a little fun. A *little* fun. For daily driving I want something smooth and quiet that drives properly. The Germans are very, very good at that.
Sure, everyone wants a house to appreciate. Houses have *always* been considered a good investment, really the best investment the middle-class has. But entry-level homebuyers have *ridiculous* wants today. Same as people who think they “need” a big-ass CUV to haul around ONE kid. You may like your tiny house, and I certainly like everything about mine (770sq/ft) but the completely inadequate garage, but we are not the norm, at all. And you are correct that in many places zoning won’t allow truly small houses – but 1000-1200sq/ft is a perfectly adequate size. The norm today is something like 2500sq/ft for new build construction, twice what it was when I was a kid.
Depends on the market and location. They are back to building 1,600 sq ft homes in my area the last two years vs the mini mansions…
It *has* to change, they are running out of people who can afford 3000sq/ft starter castles in many places. But it’s a big fight with the current starter castle owners, and it’s more work to build and sell multiple small houses than one big one.
And as one who is currently building a relatively small custom home, it just doesn’t make financial sense to go all that small. Back when my current house was built, I am sure the permitting costs alone were not $12K+. There are a LOT of fixed costs that don’t really change with increasing size – but the appraised value sure does. My new house is almost certainly NOT going to appraise for what it will cost to build. Thankfully, I am lucky to be in a financial position where that doesn’t matter.
Where do you live? The market has crashed here in lower Alabama the last couple of months.
Yeah, the house I grew up in was a lot like that. Was on a beautiful wooded property, but the house itself was originally little 2 bedroom/1 bath rancher built in 1960. The original owners added a master bedroom suite onto the side in the late ’60s, and my dad bought it in the mid ’70s and added a family room and sunroom, which he, his dad and brothers, and some friends from work built themselves, so it just cost materials expense and beer, then in the late ’80s, my parents added onto the kitchen, so 3 additions spaced out over almost 30 years brought it up to about what most buyers would maybe consider the bare minimum when shopping for a house now, but it didn’t start out that way, and it didn’t get that way by dumping an enormous amount of money into one giant renovation all at once
The first owner that had the place had 4 kids, one of whom apparently slept in an illegal bedroom the guy finished off in part of the basement (illegal because he never put in a proper emergency escape window, so my dad just used that as a workroom when we lived there)
But, imagine a builder putting a 2 bed/1 bath house on a 5 acre suburban lot and trying to sell it today, probably nobody would even look at it.
Go to Levittown, the cheapest model in 1952 was the Rancher, which sold for $8900, equivalent to $107,000 today, but it was 750 sq ft, 2 bedrooms, 1 bath, no basement, no attic, no garage, no a/c (obviously), with a small galley-style kitchen fitted with stamped steel cabinets and Formica counters, floors were asphalt tile, many rooms and closets had sliding wood screens instead of actual doors, and the washer and dryer were in the bathroom to save on plumbing costs, plus the lots were tiny, postage-stamp sized. If you built a house the same size today, with the same features, same materials, on the same size lot, you could almost certainly do it for under $200k, maybe even lower, though land values have gone up as there’s less of it available in places people want to live, but the fact is, a house that small and basic would be a tough sell today, regardless of how cheap.
They sold some 2 story models that didn’t even have a finished second floor, the idea was you’d do that yourself later when you needed the extra space, but leaving it a bare shell kept the initial selling price low. Friend of mine bought one of those in the 2010s, someone in the ’60s or ’70s had finished off 1 bedroom upstairs and done the rough in plumbing for a future second bathroom, but then left it like that, he finally built out the bathroom himself, but the other side of the floor that was meant to be a future 4th bedroom was still unfinished when he sold the place
We have an awful lot of zoning in this country that was put in place to make sure the “haves” stay haves, and it’s making life really hard. Until not too long ago, the minimum lot size in my city in Maine was 1/2 acre. That is kind of ridiculous. And of course, when you end up with a minimum size lot costing $250K+, you can’t build a small cheap house on it, because it won’t be worth enough to get a mortgage. And good luck building multi-family buildings – nobody wants that in their backyard, God forbid. It IS finally changing, it had to. The city reduced lot sizes to 1/4 acre a few years ago, and they are going to have to go smaller. And they made it a lot easier to get multi-family done as well, so those are popping up now. And people still piss and moan about it. There is a big townhouse development going in beside friend’s of mine and they are fit to be tied. ‘I’ve got mine, f’ you” being the real motto of this country.
Where I am in FL most of the time now the minimum/standard lot is 1/10th acre. And guess what? Houses are a LOT more affordable. I paid $50K for a double lot and am building a fairly small house with a not that small garage on it. Still extortionately expensive thanks to having to build for the inevitable storms though. But it would be stupid not to. And I am putting in quite a bit of “sweat equity” on the new place myself. The things car guys do for a decent garage – other than the tiny garage I would be perfectly happy with my current house.
I know my current house would be a lot nicer if I didn’t place such a high premium on the garage, garage money could have gone into adding a nice sunroom or some bathroom and kitchen renovations, but, it’s all priorities
Always for us car dudes. I only bought my house in Maine because of the garage. 2400sq/ft garage, 1200sq/ft house. I took one look at that garage and basically said “I hope the house isn’t falling down, because I am buying this place regardless”. It’s not a great house then or now, but I do love that garage.
The new house is 1300sq/ft with a 1000sq/ft garage. 28×36 garage, so a wide 2-car double deep. But with ceiling height for a 2-post lift, which my ME garage lacks. 4-post and a scissor lift up there.
I wish I could have gone bigger, but I had to keep the cost to something somewhat reasonable – and I am SURE I will have some hindsight regrets. Plenty of space to add a storage building later though. The house actually got bigger than I originally planned because it has two walk-in closets that are almost as big as the spare bedroom in my current house – storage space being a HUGE problem in FL houses where basements and attics are unknown.
My grandmother had a small house in Boothbay Harbor (technically on Barters Island, in the middle of the Damariscotta River) which my grandpa had bought for back taxes long ago. It was a tiny two bedroom. When my grandpa died in 1967, my mom, me, and my 4 sisters went there for the funeral. We all squeezed into the second bedroom, and my youngest sister slept in a dresser drawer.
The closest thing I could find on Zillow is a 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom 1700 ft² house for over $600K. You can bet Lowell Greenleaf or any other lobstermen are living there today.
Good, informative post.
William Levitt borrowed a lot of manufacturing techniques from Henry Ford. I think he was the first to really section the trades into specialties.
Framing was often given out as piece work: one crew just for the first-floor deck, another crew for walls, a third crew for cutting and stacking the roof. He had painting crews broken down by color. I also read that he owned a forest to harvest his own lumber.
When I was framing houses in the early 80s (great, fun times), an old timer told me that he and his partner used to frame a ranch house deck (1″ x 6″ sheathing) for something like $ 45. per unit. This was probably late 50s, early 60s, and this was a day’s work for his mini crew.
They’d finish one deck and move to the next. Right on their heels was the wall-framing crew snapping out lines and plating.
I’m not sure how much care was given to plumb, level, straight, and square, but thousands of home were produced in a short period.
Yeah, Levittown was mass produced assembly line style, crew would run through and do all the foundations in a neighborhood, then the framing crew would come through, then the sheathing crew, etc. Everything was optimized for minimum cost and maximum efficiency, they even designed their own proprietary miniature boiler to provide both heat and hot water, which was cheaper than buying an off the shelf furnace and hot water tank from someone else.
The houses were generally pretty well built, too, for what they were. Roofs were built to hurricane standards even though building codes in Pennsylvania didn’t require it
Other stuff didn’t work out so well, the radiant heating systems were a nice idea, but poorly executed. The pipes cracked with slight shifts in the concrete slab, so everyone had to retrofit baseboards in short order, and the oil tanks were buried in the yard because Levitt thought the above ground ones were unsightly, but they rusted and leaked and became kind of annoying to dig out and clean up. Also, they used a new recycled material for sewer lines that ended up not holding up well.
Also was one of the things that really brought modernism into the mainstream, one of his sons was really interested in the Mid Century modern houses going up in California and was also a big admirer of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Usonian houses, and convinced his father to go that route, with modifications for climate (like gable roofs instead of flat). But, they had giant plate glass windows, open floor plans, modular room configurations, two or 3 sided fireplaces as room dividers, and favored car ports over garages, among other details
I’m in my mid-30s and the recession absolutely fucking nerfed my career start (I graduated from college in 2010). There wasn’t jack shit for entry level jobs available, and the groveling I needed to do for employment throughout the 10’s ensured that paying my student loans back was nearly impossible.
If anyone got fucked, it’s people currently in the 33-38 year old range that either couldn’t get work because the economy tanked, or got canned early in their career because of it.
I was at 33 years old having went through 3 layoffs before getting my student loan paid off. I had to finance my life during each layoff with my hard-won savings, each duration of unemployment lasting a year on average no matter how hard I looked for work, and had only myself to rely on(I didn’t come from rich parents or much of a functional household).
How I did it?
-I lived in the ghetto on the bare minimum with roommates, working as an electrical engineer(which pays more than most people made)
-the most I ever paid for a car was $4,000, cash, and the ones before that, $1,200
-I used bicycles for most of my transportation and commuting, and the car for trips over 20 miles, and the car was a diesel modified to run waste fryer oil to save fuel costs
-no fun vacations, no going out to bars, minimal dating, ect.
-home cooked meals, brown bagged lunches for work
-never bought a home or started a family
I had to sacrifice basically any sort of life at all just to get into a position where I can finally amass capital and have no debt. And I chose the “right” major in college and got a “good” job. I’m 40 now.
Younger generations are SCREWED.
I feel ya. I still unfortunately have plenty of student loans, but I also started a family and have a house (that bleeds every last penny out of me, as we bought a cheap fixer that ended up being a true nightmare).
And yeah, you have to stay pretty damn frugal to make all of that work. I think some people younger than me are actually doing pretty well so far if only because they didn’t start their career by having to beg for work. But I don’t envy their cost of living; I have no idea how anyone is able to afford housing right now. I live in what’s considered a dirt cheap housing market compared to most of the country, and there’s just simply nothing to buy, and rental prices are similar to what you’d find in NYC a mere 6-7 years ago.
I rent a basement for $120/mo while making low six figures. I’ve been homeless before, so I’m grateful for what I have going right now and am making he most of it. I do pay my mother’s mortgage, and kept her from losing the house she inherited from the now-deceased man she married after her and my father divorced, so I will probably inherit that out of sheer luck, even though I had to pay for much of it with my own money. Most people won’t get that opportunity, and those who do, won’t have the money to make use of it.
I designed my first EV conversion starting at age 16, but due to lack of money/workspace/time all happening at once, it first took its maiden drive as an EV when I was 27. I studied electrical engineering wanting to get my foot into the door for what I expected to be a budding EV industry, but upon graduation couldn’t prove to anyone I could build anything back when it mattered, didn’t have the time to wait around to pursue my dreamjob with the student loans coming due, had no money to work on my project car, and missed out while being forced into doing something much more boring and beneath my capabilities multiple states away from the car as the EV industry took off like a rocket without my input. Now what I have experience in is all that anyone wants to hire me for.
That sucks. Pretty much this is the story for anyone from 2000 -> 2012.
I couldn’t find a job either. Shiny degree in Economics with a desire to get my Masters or go to Law School and not a prospect nor the means to pay for it. Roofing career it is.
Eventually, I sold my first car (1967 Chevy Camaro) and went to a 2 year Tech school where I learned about computer networking, basic programming, and system admin work.
I had to keep scrounging for money for years to keep taking night classes until I could get a job that would allow me have any sort of middle class lifestyle.
I was LUCKY. I had saved in my teens to have one asset to sell and had a trade job I could do on the side. Not everyone has the ability to climb a roof.
Ha, I also did some roofing with a cousin back in 2010 when looking for my first civil engineering job. Let’s just say I went to school to be a white collar worker for a reason, lol. I was utter shit at roofing.
Things eventually improved but I guess what I’m saying is, everyone my age very, very, very clearly remembers what it’s like to live through a recession. My peers are very much having PTSD when watching what is going on economically right now. I can’t say that so much for people who I work with that are in their 20’s, they seem to think that the past 6+ years of ultra hot job market is the norm. It is not.
I graduated in 2009 and took the first job offer I got, which was just going to full time status at the same nonprofit I had been working for seasonally/part time all through college. I was just so panicked about not being able to find anything. It paid crap, and was in a high cost of living area, so I couldn’t afford to move out, and had an hour commute the entire time I worked there, with a lot of evenings and weekends, so pretty well no free time or social life. Spent 4 years trying to get a better job, with application after application auto-rejected by various tracking systems, eventually found something, and have moved states and jobs several times since, but it’s only maybe been within the last 6 years or so that I’ve finally started to feel that I’ve maybe just about caught up/stabilized. But, still, I’m 40 next month, and I feel like I spent about a decade just spinning wheels, before slowly starting to move forward, made it through covid OK, and now were on the precipice of another, totally preventable and unnecessary, financial collapse. And this time around, I’ll be too old to be hireable anywhere else, but several decades too young to retire, which is fantastic
WTF are you talking about? I had to drop out of university and spend years in CC, only to lose my transfer spot back because of state budget cuts.
All due to the Great Recession.
I hate to be a data stickler (actually I love it), but has the share of subprime borrowers compared to all borrowers changed over time? If it has, the headline might be misleading.
It’s very possible for more subprime buyers to be in trouble than ever before, but a smaller percentage of overall buyers. Remember, a large number of active loans were written when interest rates were very low.
Exactly, too little data to infer any norms….see my reply a little further down about the graph being misleading. More proof that Xitter is a horrible venue for sharing broad data.
FITCH, PLEASE!
“whole host of cheap cars” seems to be a bit of an exaggeration in that not everyone lives near a mitzu dealership that has the cheap cars.
It has been 5 years since we bought my wife’s minivan and 13 since I bought my Jeep . Is it still cheaper to finance a new car vs a similar priced used car?
Yes, assuming the manufacturer is incentivizing the rates to move inventory.
Yes, but more lenient lenders (like credit unions) are pretty liberal about “New car” and will often go back 2 model years. But in almost every case, the manufacturer’s subsidized acceptance company will win…but you might not get a good deal on the car because Shell Game.
Depends on you and the vehicle I would assume. vehicles under 5 years old with less than 80K miles might not see too much of a loan rate delta. maybe a point or 2 at most. some new cars are seeing 0-1 percent loan options, but not many, and that was in January, so no idea now. I can say that the other issue is the 2024 leftovers that are getting marked down seem to be pretty close tot he same prices many are asking for similar vehicles that are 2020 and up with 30 to 70k miles on them. it is kind of surprising. I think many of those January and February price cuts, are dwindling and of course I am mostly looking at Stellantis stuff. But I can tell you that even a month ago the new car rates for many were still over 7 percent. Prices are still ballooned from previous inflation and the global supply chain system will only make it worse for many Americans when the price is raised 25%. Question really is going to be is will the people schilling for this administration still be gung ho when they can no longer get a Mexico made item for half what it cost to make in the US? It sounds good on paper, but plenty of the pro “Made in the USA” people are very hypocritical about what they actually buy in the end.
Those same pro “Made in the USA” people often vastly underestimate how fast manufacturing can be moved/created in the US to avoid tariffs.
won’t mean much if the unions double or triple the labor costs. it will still result in reduced sales due to inflated prices. leading to more inflation, and to curb inflation? what does the lending system do? Raise rates.
It might be helpful in the long run, hard to crystal ball that really, but in the next few years it will get painful for many.
This union member remembers when unions made America and made American workers strong and well paid.
OK, so then I would pose this question to you. Would you buy a Ford Maverick, Or a Volkswagen Atlas Cross?
Would your union allow the Ford to be parked up front or forced out back? Same for the Volkswagen?
https://aflcio.org/what-unions-do
Unfortunately… Americans are REALLY bad with money. There’s some other stat out there showing that MOSt boomers haven’t saved enough for retirement. Go drive anywhere in middle America and watch the huge lifted brodozer trucks hauling 30 foot 5th wheel campers with built in garages full of more toys. None of those people have saved anything either and will probably either never be able to retire or be dirt poor when they do. So we’re all screwed. Even those of us who saved and invested.
This. We’re going to end up in the Ant and the Grasshopper fable Like you say, all these people who COULD be saving aren’t will eventually run out of money before, most likely, their ability to work far before they stop needing support. It is absolutely astonshing that we don’t teach more fiscal responsibility in schools but I’m sure there would be a lot of lobbying to preserve major corporations future cash cows.
With the minimum wage stagnating for decades and housing skyrocketing. Savings often go towards eating and having a roof for a lot of people.
Absolutely. I may have been too narrow in commenting without considering the wage stagnation issues.
No worries. I am an old but know so many young people working so hard and often with good jobs priced out of decent housing, transportation etc.
I mean that is kind of why Roosevelt made Social Security in the first place. but of course that goal post keeps moving and anyone relying on that at retirement is royally screwed.
My Boomer MAGA uncle died almost 2 years ago and he had some toys but he also had probably 60K in guns stashed around the house. That is also not good retirement plan.
Sadly, this is my brother, too.
I’m not saying this isn’t news but 6.5% of subprime loans doesn’t seem like that big of a deal to me and I honestly expected it to be far far worse.
Personally, Americans have been living a bit too high on the consumerism horse (myself included) and there’s going to be a shift back to what is truly needed vs what is wanted. Prior to me cutting all social media out of my life I spent some time on the personal finance subreddit and the things people were posting as wants was absolutely insane as was the amount of debit many people are carrying. At some point the debt house of cards people have built was going to come crashing down regardless of the person in charge of the country (to be clear I’m NOT saying that the current administration isn’t inflating the problem).
In many ways I think some unforeseen fallout of this could be an overall positive as people look to repair over replace what they have and buy second hand stuff keeping it out of landfills.
Financial literacy in this country is abysmal and we’re going to see the fallout of that soon I think.
I sort of echoed what you were saying below. I agree with you. The amount of people who say they HAVE to have a new large SUV because they have kids and somehow that must mean you have to go off and buy a big ass, $75,000 SUV. And they probably live in a large McMansion somewhere that has them paying out the nose for. I’m only 47 and yet I remember when we were kids growing up in the 80’s that me, my brother, mom and dad would get in our 1985 Camry, back when they were small, and load up all of our bikes on a bike rack, hitch up the rattle popup camper we had and drive 12 hours to the beach. Somehow we all survived. But the economy also sucked back then and most of the people who lived around us were pretty poor.
I’m frustrated by the number of articles on this website (and others) that imply massive car payments are an inevitable fact of life in 2025. I don’t have any objection to people taking out reasonable loans for a vehicle. There are plenty of safe, desirable new cars that can be purchased for under $40k, and many safe, reliable used cars can be purchased for less than $15k. With a trade in and/or a decent down payment, these vehicles won’t require a large, long-term, unaffordable payment.
If people considered their needs and what they could reasonably afford (instead of what payments they can make), most would end up with safe, reliable transportation that is not a financial burden. Some people will always struggle to afford basic transportation, and I have sympathy for those individuals. However, I get frustrated that many people who bought a luxury vehicle they couldn’t afford are framed as victims.
I’m also in my 40s and can remember my family getting by with far less than what is considered acceptable today (i.e. we had one car for a family of 4 and that car was a VW Rabbit with no AC or radio). We survived. I’m not saying we can’t or shouldn’t live better than we did in the ’80s, but there is something between terrible and luxury.
The median price of cars is *wildly* skewed today. But the median wage earner has NEVER really been a new car buyer, other than possibly immediately post-WWII in the raging boom years of the 50s and 60s. My grandparents were solidly middle-class, but didn’t start buying NEW cars until they were well into their 50s with the kids long gone. My parents bought some new cars, but my stepfather kept his first new car for more than 15 years (’77 Grand Prix when he retired from the military).
Today Mom drives a ’23 KIA Soul. It is literally all the car a family of four (or a lady of a certain age) actually needs, and it cost little over $20K two years ago. It is entirely adequate in every way, but not at all exciting.
I’d just like to think that the collapse — like in the stock market — just creates buying opportunities for the patient and prudent people.
I watched way too many people in 08-11 overleverage themselves for material goods. We tried to sell our house, but failed and ended up renting it to a divorced 30yo dad who had just short-sold his 3,000+sf home and had to rent ours (which was half the size). But man, what a nice collection of guitars! He couldn’t even fit them all in the back of his Range Rover.
Yeah, that graph is very misleading. If I’m reading the comment correctly, it’s that 6.5% of subprime borrowers are 60+ DPD. That’s not unusual at all, I personally saw 10% in the Great Recession when I worked in auto risk. Granted, that was one bank and not the industry, but subprime (normally under 620 or 650 depending on who you ask) have about 3x the delinquency rate of the prime or near-prime market. That’s part of why they pay such high rates. Plus their actual defaults — where the payments stop and the car usually disappears — are also a lot higher. That’s when the real pain starts because recoveries on cars are not…um…ideal 🙂
I am wondering how many of these defaults are on used vehicles that never got registered and taxes were never paid . Those risky loans during the covid car price boom made the taxes and the 3 year monthly penalty fees likely result in the “now cost” more than those cars are worth. I am kind of surprised more crackdown on that tax dodging and owed fees are not more of a thing for many of the bigger cities.
I’ve been toying with the idea of buying something new in the next week or two, as my vehicles are 19 and 26 years old, to hedge my bet against what will likely be massive price increases yet again. But my wife and I decided it would be best to stick it out with our old vehicles, and not take on a payment with so much uncertainty.
Personally I think the early 2000s will prove to be the sweet spot of reliability. Simple enough to fix on your own but also right at a time when manufacturers had mastered reliability standards. Pop a double din modern radio in and let them ride!
100% agree, I usually say 2005-2015, depending on the brand/model/complexity. Modern enough to be comfortable and safe, old enough to be proven, and many of them were still built before the widespread planned obsolescence wave.
I want a Lotus Elise from that era sooo bad…
I agree, and that’s what I own (and love, I don’t even want a modern radio), but they’re getting pretty old at this point.
We haven’t seen anything yet. The largest set of job losses since the depression, which is currently underway, hasn’t even begun to have an impact. A few months from now, the current rate of defaults will look like the good old days. The same thing will happen in commercial real estate, which is already near collapse, when huge chunks of office spaces are abandoned.
“I wouldn’t say I’ve been missing them….”
I’ve very glad I don’t have a car payment for the first time in a very long time. I paid off my GTI in 2022, and I’m going to drive it until it disintegrates around me.
The plastics surely will!
LOL, relatable. My ’01 VW would be salvageable if only every single plastic connector (both cosmetic and important) weren’t turning to dust before my eyes. Still gonna drive it til it finishes disintegrating.
An ’01 VW is going to be *25* years old next year. Dear
Dog, how long do you expect a car to last??? When I was a kid, a car was lucky to make it to 10 years old before being swept to the curb in a cloud of rust and oil smoke. The vast majority didn’t make it that long. The first new car my Grandfather ever bought, an ’80 Subaru, didn’t see it’s sixth birthday due to rampant rust.
I’ve put maybe 6,000 miles on it since 2020, when I started working from home. It lives in my garage too, so it’s holding up very well!
The headliner is starting to sag badly, but it’s hot in SC for most of the year. I sort of expected that to happen eventually.
Huh. This is weird news. I thought the billionaires we elected and appointed would have a plan for the proletariat. Maybe it is a long-term chess game that we will win bigly later.
They keep saying 4D chess. All I see is unenlightened self-interest. Enjoy the shitshow I guess…
To paraphrase Jimmy McMillan, “The payment is too damned high!”
If we don’t see massive inflation or even hyperinflation before a massive wave of repossessions, and as long as there is no new cash for clunkers boondoggle, I’m looking forward to buying whatever tickles my fancy, in cash, at a greatly depressed price.
Of course, even with unlimited money, it would be slim pickin’s for me regarding anything modern-ish. A Mazda Miata, Tesla Model 3 Performance, Toyota FRS, or Dodge Charger/Challenger Hellcat is the shortlist for consideration out of anything made for the USA market within the last 5 years.
I don’t expect classic/collector car prices to drop much for anything good, but that is where my main interest is…
Genuine question here: why the Tesla? Based on your posts you’re an excellent DIYer and I can think of few cars less friendly to DIYing than a heavily software-locked, proprietary EV where nearly everything is buried in a touchscreen.
At the right price, I’d strip it for parts for my Triumph GT6 AND have an aerodynamically-efficient rolling chassis I could de-tech and do a diesel swap. A chipped 1.9L TDI engine would be perfect.
Imagine a 300 horsepower sub-3,000 lb car getting 60+ mpg highway as a passenger-hauler, and a 2-seater EV toy that is sub-2,000 lbs and has 300 electric horsepower, as a stable…
How much would the Tesla’s powertrain weigh? Could a sub-2000lb vehicle handle that weight and torque? I imagine you’d have to make the battery a stressed member like Tesla does(?)
The motor is 100 lbs.
I currently have a 500 lb battery pack of CALB LiFePO4 in the GT6 and Prestolite series-DC motor paired with a Soliton 1 controller. IIRC, it currently weighs about 1,850 lbs. With a smaller pack of the Model 3’s 21700s, I could double the kWh capacity and lose more mass. I’d be looking at a 35-40-ish kWh pack and a possible 1700 lb dry weight if I removed the manual transmission and went direct drive. With aerodynamic work, this could yield a 300 mile range at 70 mph.
I will be budgeting in 100 lbs or so for a full roll cage, which should stiffen the chassis up nicely.
Can’t expect the population not to be affected by the failing state.
It’s been a long, slow burn over the last 50 years, which could be reaching a sort of peak in the rate of decay soon. The end of Bretton Woods sealed the long-term fate of the US dollar.
Given the current environment, saying it has been a slow decay for decades seems a bit like suggesting that arguing over whether we should take a right or left at the next turn will get us to our destination is connected to the fact that the current person at the wheel has just accelerated at full throttle as they steered off a cliff. Those might be related, but they are so far apart in intent and impact that it isn’t a connection with much meaning.
Many of the current problems have been in place long before this administration. And the candidates available to vote for at almost all levels of government are so thoroughly controlled by unelected think tanks, multinational corporations, and domestic intelligence agencies, that the entirety of the US political spectrum offers NO SOLUTIONS to what awaits this country, and something more radical than voting will be required to fix this mess.
Well, you got the no more voting part you wished for. The false equivalency thing is simply peak laziness.
You can vote the lesser of two evils all you want. You’ll still get evil in the best case scenario that “your” candidate wins. You were never given an opportunity to choose “not evil”. For many, the current administration WAS the lesser of two evils, and now a significant portion of them have buyer’s remorse!
I’m not saying not to vote, do so if it makes you feel better. What I am saying is that voting has proven ineffective as a means to correct course. Just look at the last half century of this nation’s decline, and you will see that it doesn’t matter which party is in power: the nation still decays, the rich get richer at everyone else’s expense, corporations gain more control over our lives, and we keep losing yet more civil liberties. The pillaging and rampant authoritarianism is a wholly bipartisan effort, and any conflicts between the “two” parties, are mere theatre. No real, functional opposition is actually allowed to enter the halls of power today. The best we get are fakes who talk a good game, but refuse to act when their chance comes, and occasionally some bread and circuses along the way.
What ended the Vietnam War wasn’t by voting, or even going to court. It took pissed-off Americans descending upon DC proper and putting fear into the hearts of the political decision makers and their corporate backers, with the threat of revolution and violence looming if the peoples’ concerns on this issue remained ignored. Consider the “Powell Memo” and “The Crisis of Democracy” echoing the complaints of butthurt elites which decried the “excess of Democracy” that resulted in an end to a favored cash cow(Vietnam War) of the Military-Industrial Complex that Eisenhower warned us about.
Since then, the American people didn’t get to vote on the major decisions or the overall trajectory of this country. Those things were from then on and still are to this day decided for us by unelected billionaires, think tanks, NGOs, bureaucrats, multinational corporations, foreign governments, and domestic intelligence agencies.
Now that military-industrial complex has achieved full-spectrum dominance. And Americans didn’t vote for this outcome, either. If you still think voting will get us out of this mess that we never voted for in the first place, I won’t stop you from doing so, nor is that my intent. But the reality of the situation is that it’s going to take something much more drastic to turn this ship around, if it’s even possible at this point without burning everything to the ground and starting over.
I never said voting was a singular answer. Nobody has. But if you are unwilling or unable to acknowledge the difference between a flawed and stumbling system and full-on fascism, and the difference that makes on the way change happens, you simply aren’t worth engaging. You are too fundamentally lazy to be of value to anyone.
Enjoy your pseudo-detached faux superiority.
We’ve been in full-on fascism since before I was born. It was disguised as Democracy, while the will of the people had near zero influence on power. What we’re seeing today is the velvet glove being removed from the iron fist. An end to the illusion of a “free country” that never was.
Perhaps that is necessary to light a fire under the ass of the American people.
Consider this study:
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-politics/article/testing-theories-of-american-politics-elites-interest-groups-and-average-citizens/62327F513959D0A304D4893B382B992B
In fairness, we’ve been through several economic cycles with lots of subprime (and prime) auto loans in default, and those didn’t have anything to do with a failing government. Failure of governance, perhaps (looking at you, negative amortization mortgages), but not an outright failure of government.
What may distinguish this one from the prior ones is the current regime’s intent to have the government digest itself and eliminate the very tools created for extricating us from these economic downturns (e.g. the Federal Reserve), while at the same time pushing us into an economic downturn if not outright crash.
I guess my point is I agree with you that the population is going to be affected, but it’s a bit premature to blame the government just yet – those 90 day delinquency issues started after the election, but well before the new administration took over.
Purposefully instituting the largest job loss in the history of the country makes them fairly easy to blame. The current numbers are going to be exponentially worse in short order.
Yep.
The Federal Reserve is primarily what is responsible for both the boom and bust cycles that have ruined tens of millions of Americans as well as the constant devaluation of the dollar.
I see your point, but also I shudder to think where things would have gone had the Fed not been there at certain point along the way. For example The Great Recession likely would have turned into a catastrophic depression without quantitative easing.
They’re not perfect, but their medicine is better than the disease, if you will. At least that’s my take on it.
In the short term, yes. In the longer term, we’d have been much better off, IMO. especially if there were NO bank/auto industry bailouts, a moratorium on home foreclosures for individual-owned homes, and banks must ensure depositors’ money is not spent to pay down debt and take whatever losses come from that. Fractional Reserve banking and endless credit availability has destroyed the purchasing power of almost all millennials and anyone younger.
This country has basically eaten its seed corn to bail out the billionaires who caused the mess of 2008, and has no future. The “recovery” mostly existed on paper, and not in practice, and those chickens will come home to roost at some point.
Ironic, then, that in the short term, the absence of those things you mentioned would have ruined tens of millions of people.
From a pure capitalistic approach/theory, the short term pain would eliminate the “inefficiencies in the market” as the economists call it, thus (theoretically) clearing the way for better economic prosperity in the future.
Meanwhile those tens of millions would have been knocked so far down the ladder most of them would miss out on the ensuing rebound.
I don’t know that there really is a right answer to the economic issues – just choices regarding how/where/when to distribute the pain. “Pay me now or pay me later”, I guess.
The pain should have been distributed primarily to the rich capitalists and the think tanks/government agencies/NGOs who caused it. The opposite has happened, and most of it has been further delayed in order to kick the can of inevitable civil unrest down the road as far as possible and promote an illusion of recovery. The younger generations and those lower on the socio-economic hierarchy are bearing the brunt of it.
On that, we completely agree.