1969 C-10 Chevy Pick-up Logn Bed on 2040-cars

Auto blog

Subprime financing on the rise in new car sales, leasing too

We all remember the financial crisis that began several years back. At its core was a splurge of subprime lending for housing loans. The housing bubble burst, triggering a collapse of the mortgage-backed securities market. Apparently, those types of loans still exist in the automotive industry, and the market share for these types of "nonprime, subprime, and deep subprime," loans has grown 13.6 percent compared to the third quarter a year ago.
According to an Automotive News report, high-risk lending expanded to 24.8 percent of total loans in Q3, up from 21.9 percent for this time last year. As this level increased, average credit scores of borrowers dropped to 755, down from 763 a year ago. In that time, the average financing amount increased $90 per vehicle, to $25,963.
At 818, Volvo maintains the highest per-owner credit score, while Mitsubishi has the lowest, at 694. The highest rate of borrowers was at Toyota, with 14 percent of the market, followed by Ford with 13.1 percent and Chevrolet at 11.1.

Old Car or New Car? 1993 Chevy Camaro vs 2015 Honda CR-Z

My daily life revolves around used cars. As a former fast-talking auto auctioneer, it was once my job to inspect, appraise, and liquidate thousands of cars throughout the United States. Since I put down my microphone and became a full-time car dealer, I have gone from auctioning off 150 vehicles an hour – yes, we really do talk that fast – to buying 150 vehicles every two to three months. I see and bid on everything from $300 Volkswagens that belch more black smoke than a diesel truck rolling coal, to $30,000 DeLoreans that hopefully can go at least 88 miles per hour. The auctions never run out of weirdness when it comes to cars because they sell over 10 million every single year. So with that big number in mind, let me tell you about these two cars that have about as much in common as Mel Gibson and Mel Brooks.Option A: 1993 Chevrolet Camaro Indy 500 Pace Car Edition View 24 Photos This 1993 Chevrolet Camaro Indy Pace Car has all of 4,187 miles on it. Neither of those numbers are a misprint and yes, those are multi-colored stripes on the hood. Every week, I find at least two or three museum pieces that have been stored in the private garage of an auto collector. As you can tell, there are some very broad strokes to the definition and tastes of a collector. It could be a guy who has an extreme case of what I call "Automotive Compulsive Disorder" who chucks 20 or 30 old cars into a field and lets the weather and elements have at them. I once knew a guy, a car dealer at that, who "stored" seven 1990s Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme convertibles in the Georgia sun, and within two years those cars turned into complete junk. The fact that he stored them in an open field he didn't actually own and near a public road didn't help either. A few of the local meth heads and kleptocrats decided to strip-mine his collection, from the radiators to the tops themselves. He had a brief time in prison in between the before and the surprise after and trust me, he looked like he had soiled his britches when he saw what happened to his personally prized Cutlasses. Then you have whoever owned this Camaro. Is it a one-of-a-kind? Nope. Just 1 of 125, and an insignificant number at that (#87). But let's open the door to this Camaro and see what we find. Oof! I don't remember this multi-colored silly string design as a '90s must-have. Wasn't this popular back in the 1980s?

Why the Corvette is Chevrolet's billion-dollar baby

Edmunds has worked up a piece that tries to figure out just how much the global Chevrolet Corvette economy is worth, a spitballed guesstimate putting the number at more than $2.5 billion with the proviso that the number is probably low. It starts by taking Corvette's new car sales of 14,132 units last year, which would equate to $714,725,900 (including destination) assuming ever car sold was a base coupe with no options. In the final tally, a little extra padding gets that number up to $750,000,000.
But that's not all. Consider this: Many of the almost 1.4 million Corvettes produced over the model's history are still on the road. There are new parts being produced and aftermarket companies like Mid-America Motorworks deaing business, that single Illinois company doing more than $40 million a year in sales. There are the Corvette events large and small, restorers who do nothing but Corvettes, salvage yards that deal only in used Corvette parts and the Corvette magazines where owners find all this stuff.
And then there are the Corvette-themed tchotchkes, every single one of which provides a tiny contribution to the huge licensing royalties that General Motors collects every year. The article admits there's no way to come to an accurate number, but it just goes to show how valuable one specific model can be to a company.