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Comment by gruez | Hacker News Reader

>IMHO vehicles are huge drivers of debt. There are almost no cars under $30k now, and the average sale price of new cars is pushing up near $50k. This is for bog standard stuff like Hondas and Fords, not luxury cars.

I went on toyota.com and a base level corolla is only selling for $22,795. This includes a "Delivery, Processing & Handling" charge of $1,095. If for whatever reason you think that driving a compact car is beneath you, you can have a mid sized car (toyota camary) for only $27,515.

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Goooooooood luck driving off a dealer lot with a $22k Toyota! Seriously, if you can do it then good on you!

But back in the real world the on the lot availability of cars is abysmal and most makes are sold out for months of backlog. Like if you want a Toyota minivan it's something like a 2 year wait--unless you are willing to buy one on the lot with a $10k dealer markup.

Toyota is the worst make for this, but yeah. The Corolla quote I got all inclusive was $28K and the Camry quote was $37K so I ended up going with a Tesla 3 for $34K after taxes. Much better in every way but it’s still fucking expensive, especially with insurance

In other words, it's actually available for $22k. You just get it right now. That seems... fine? I guess it sucks for the people who need a new car in the past 2 years, but given that the average age of cars on the road is around 12 years, that's a small fraction of people. It certainly doesn't support the original claim that $30k cars are the reason why people getting in debt.

I don't think you understand how new cars are sold in the US. You can't click buttons and order the car from the website, you have to work with a dealer and convince them it's worth their time to order a car for you.

I got some bad news, there is no dealership that thinks a $22k Corolla is worth their time when dozens of other buyers are willing to spend $30-40k or more for other models. The higher the price out the door generally the more money the dealership is making.

Not if you buy used…

> You can't click buttons and order the car from the website, you have to work with a dealer and convince them it's worth their time to order a car for you.

I'm well aware. It's just that toyota.com is an online resource that's easy to find and and verify. Sure, dealer pricing is more "accurate", but it requires much more legwork on my part and even then it turns the whole thread into an anecdote-fest with people saying "well the dealers in my area are charging $9000 market price adjustment (or whatever) so you're wrong!" or "I called around a few dealerships and found one that gave me a $2000 discount!". Doing a quick search on reddit for "dealer markups" in the past 6 months turns up plenty of anecdotes of people being able to secure cars with no or very little dealer markups.

I just checked and my local dealer has a Corolla in stock for $28k. That seems consistent with other people in this thread.

In 2018 I bought a top end accord for $31k. So prices are definitely much worse now.

Minivans are a special case that's not a good example. Minivan's have been drastically dropping in popularity (as defined by market share)for the last 20 years. Many models have been discontinued, and remaining models are being made in much lower quantity. It's basically a very niche product at this point at somewhere around 2% of all new vehicles sold.

Now there are only really 5 models of minivan left, so any small jump in purchasing, or misforecasts by a manufacturer leads to huge backlogs.

Then don’t buy a new car? Buy used.

> Then don’t buy a new car? Buy used.

In 1998 I bought a used 1989 Chevy Corsica for $1,800 all-in out the door. I'll admit I don't remember how many miles it had but it never had any major problems in all the years I drove it. There was a near unlimited sea of options for ~10 year old cars for around $2,000.

In 2023, if you want a similar size 10 year old car (2013) a quick Googling suggests you'll be paying about $10,000 minimum for a car with 100-120k miles on it. Expect to pay $20,000 if you want a low'ish amount of miles (under 25k). Keep in mind this is the price on the website which you know will be more by the time you really purchase it.

Car nowadays are significantly more reliable than back in the 80s so arguable a 10 year old car back in 1989 is the equivalent of a 15+ year one now. But yeah it's still quite a bit more expensive, $2,000 is equivalent to about $5,000 now.

> But yeah it's still quite a bit more expensive, $2,000 is equivalent to about $5,000 now.

It's not quite that much. You calculated inflation off 1989 when the sale happened in 1998.

An inflation calculator puts $1,800 @ 1998 being worth $3,375 @ 2023. It's a massive difference in how much more expensive an inflation adjusted car is nowadays.

I’m seeing cars at Carmax that are ten years old with low 100K miles for around $13K. I could probably get it cheaper. But I’ve gotten four cars from Carmax over the years and the service and the buying process makes it worth the premium.

The only car we had problems with was 10 year old Jeep for my son that we had to keep taking back for various things for the first couple of months.

The manager proactively reached out to me and offered to reimburse one month payment. After those two months, we never had a problem with it.

Paying for rideshare and waiting for delivery is cheaper than paying the $10k markup for the drive-off-the-lot-today option.

>> If for whatever reason you think that driving a compact car is beneath you

Armchair economist-shoppers, I love them. The other day a guy told me housing in NYC was absolutely affordable. Managed to find a bedroom for rent at $2k/mo. Sure bro, let me stuff my family of four into a shared 1br apt and then have my kids share a bathroom with some random guy in the other room.

Sure, i'd do this if I was desperate...but WTF would I want to aspire to this setup if I just spent 6yrs in college and went to a top Engineering CS program. Come on.

I don't get the last part - nobody should have to put up with this.

That's part of the problem - there are still some careers where people can "make it" and mentally say "well if you'd just done what I did, you'd be fine"

I don't think that situation is fine for anyone, and we should reinforce that. It's just not ok. People stay in abusive relationships for housing, all kinds of negative shit. Nobody should be forced to live like that.

We have the materials and the money; the system is broken.

Currently trying to buy a Corolla Hybrid (base). The best out-the-door quote I got so far is $28.5k, the MSRP is $23k. So yes, you are looking at almost $30k for the most basic car.

$30k for the highest quality most basic car.

Other brands surely have cheaper basic options, and although I might not recommend going all the way to a Stellantis/GM car, a Ford/Honda/Mazda might be available for less and still be acceptable for quality.

Ford doesn’t even sell sedans anymore!

Wow, I stand corrected. Cheapest Ford is $30k+. I thought they would still have the Focus/Taurus still available.

Ford's business is selling as many F150's as possible. Due to the way fuel efficiency regulations work in this country it makes sense for them to axe sedans from their lineup and replace them with large cars that can be classified as trucks because their more fuel efficient "trucks" can counteract the fine they would get from selling fuel inefficient F150s.

> Currently trying to buy a Corolla Hybrid (base).

I wanted to buy a Corolla Hybrid, but the wait list was ridiculous, something like 9 months. Toyota has major supply chain issues.

I ended up getting a (non-hybrid) Honda Civic for under $30k. I still had to wait a month though.

Toyota doesn’t sell direct to consumer. Good luck getting it at that price! Have fun hearing from salesmen when you call for the real price.

Having gone through this two years ago at the height of car unavailability, it really was take what was available. You don’t want that $50 first aid kit that comes in a canvas bag and has a few band aids in it? Too bad, you’re buying it. (I offered to sell mine to the sales person, but he wouldn’t bite.) don’t want the rails that could just be unscrewed by literally anyone at the dealership, too bad, $500. Fortunately, those were the only things we were stuck with.

When Scion was around it was supposed to be customer driven, but the sales people were the same Toyota salespeople and couldn’t help themselves. Are treacherous people drawn to (car) sales or does sales make people treacherous?

Nitrogen fill on the tires. Complete bullshit. It's a marketing company

For people who checking air in tires is not a habit, nitrogen will keep them full a bit longer. A bit scammy as sold, sure, but cars are optimized for minimal maintanice these days. For the unaware, common atmospheric air is like 80% nitrogen already.

Here I thought nitrogen filling was to avoid oxygen being pressed through into the rubber, reducing oxidation...

When’s the last time you bought a car? Going to the website literally only works for Teslas

And if you buy that car today and do basic routine maintenance there's a good chance it will still be running great a decade from now.

Cars are dramatically more reliable than they used to be, so you will get more utility than you would for the same (inflation adjusted) expenditure 20 years ago.

My vehicle is 16 years old and I have no intention of replacing it any time soon.

Can you find one a dealer will actually sell you for that price? The lowest priced base models are usually only by special order, and dealers are charging thousands in markup (https://markups.org/search.html?title=toyota+corolla)

I don’t understand why this whole thread is so in the weeds about NEW cars. New cars have never been considered to be financially prudent. Hard to sympathize with someone complaining about the prices when they’re choosing a 30k+ new car over a perfectly fine used model that costs half that.

Now get a dealer to order that base Corolla from factory. Hint: it ain’t happening’.

That is base. How many people buy the base model?

That's moving the goalposts, because the original claim was that "There are almost no cars under $30k now".

The base models don't exist except for fleet sales right now. A regular consumer literally cannot buy one.

The existence of one car under that price doesn't dispove anything. Almost no cars are under 30k.

>The existence of one car under that price doesn't dispove anything

The corolla isn't some niche car. It's the 12th best selling car in america with 222k units sold per year.

https://www.caranddriver.com/news/g39628015/best-selling-car...

But there are models above the base.

Exactly. It’s the SUVs and trucks that are suffering runaway prices. Driving a new Camry or Honda Accord is still doable

I just went to Toyota's site and mid range V6 Camry with a few options like navigation, driving assistance, etc. is over $45k sticker price. If you want a hybrid it's over $50k. For a Camry!

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