Straight Talk and Honest Answers

With less than two weeks of 2025 to go, the countdown to the end of the year is on! If your tradition has always been to wander onto a lot just after Christmas and pick out a new vehicle, this may be the year to break that habit. Start the process now.

Read my end-of-the-year buying advice→

  Incentives Guide

December vehicle rebates, incentives, and lease specials change often, sometimes daily.  A few things have changed since last December. Inventories are better, which means incentives are stronger. Here you'll find a link to every major manufacturer’s incentive page. Enter your zip code to find the current incentives offered in your area. 

Current incentives By Automaker → 

  Tax Code 179, Plus IRS Loan Interest Update 

IMPORTANT MESSAGE TO ALL CARPRO SHOW LISTENERS FROM
JERRY REYNOLDS, THE CAR PRO

Friends, we have been publishing the latest rules and eligible vehicles list for Tax Code 179 for over a decade. I encourage you to reach out to one of our Certified Car Pro Dealers at a CarPro approved dealership. They will help you figure out how to get the eligible vehicle you want.  Note:  Many automobile buyers will now be eligible to write the interest off on car loans, as a result of the “big beautiful bill” signed into law this July.  The details of the rules are at the link below along with the latest on Tax Code 179.

• 2025 Tax Guide and List of Eligible Tax Code 179 Vehicles →
• IRS Temporarily Simplifies Auto Loan Interest Reporting Rules →

  Straight Talk and Honest Answers 

CarPro Advice: Getting Your Car Ready To Trade In 

Have a trade in? Don't head to the dealership this holiday season without reading this.

Read more→

  Ford Retreats From Aggressive EV Plans

  U.S. Auto Market

November New Vehicle Prices Remain Near $50,000 

Read more→

Distressed New 2024 Vehicle Deals 

Read more→

  My Newest Song: Same GMC, Same Puppy

I’ve been perplexed by the GMC holiday pickup commercial.  GMC has run it for five years in a row, a rarity for car companies to do.  I keep wondering, why hasn’t that dog grown any in five years?  How do you get a puppy to be still until you whistle?  How does the puppy slosh through the snow, yet when she picks it up, it doesn’t have any snow on it?  Who is driving the truck?  If this guy gets a new truck every year, wouldn’t you pick a different color? 

You see why this keeps me awake at night?  So, I wrote a song about it and I think it’s pretty darned good!

You can hear it AND see the lyrics (I even worked my precious Schnauzer Sissy into it) here:

Listen →

  Don't Miss Our 2025 Gift Guide & Holiday Articles!  

• CarPro Advice: December is the very best month to buy or lease →
• Chevy’s always terrific 2025 holiday commercial:  Memory Lane →
• Our Holiday Gift Guide →
• The 12 Days of Car Pro Christmas song →
• Holiday shoppers - Be careful parking at the mall →
  
• Kevin’s Famous Holiday recipes →
• How to safely transport your holiday meals →
• How to get your Christmas tree home safely →
• Neiman Marcus Christmas Fantasy Car: Baby Bugatti →
  
• Don’t let a celebration turn into a tragedy →

 Meet Our 2025 Ford Raptor Sweepstakes Winner!  

With Christmas just days away, we couldn't be more excited to share the winner of our recent 2025 Ford Raptor Sweepstakes in partnership with Vehicle For Good! And the winner is... Richard M. from Salisbury, NC! And get this!!! The timing couldn't be better!  Find out why in this YouTube video when he gets the big news!

Watch The Video →

Stay tuned because we announce a brand NEW sweepstakes NEXT WEEK!

  Quick Shifts

Stories you’ll find today:

• Tesla’s Holiday Gift: A Smart Car With Attitude
• Now Hiring: Humans Willing to Pilot a Giant Hot Dog for $35k
• Pink Limo for Sale: Because Someone Finally Asked “What If Barbie Ran a Shuttle Service"?
• Robotaxi Chaos in San Francisco: Waymos Learn the Hard Way That Streets Have Dead Ends 
  

  Weekly Recalls

• Acura **CRASH RISK**→
• Dodge/Alfa Romeo  **CRASH RISK** →
• Ford  (2) **CRASH RISK** →
• Honda  **CRASH RISK** →

• Mercedes-Benz **CRASH RISK** →

• Takata Air Bag Recall → 

  Win A Vintage Electric Bike! Ends Dec. 21! 

We've partnered with Vintage Electric Bikes & Warrior Hippie Apparel to give away a 2025 Vintage Electric Bike Scrambler!  This sweepstakes closes on Dec. 21st!

Proceeds from this campaign benefit Veterans Exploration Therapy (VET)—a nonprofit that empowers veterans and their families to heal through adventure-based therapy. VET uses outdoor exploration, wilderness skills, and community connection to help veterans rediscover purpose, resilience, and belonging.
 
This sweepstakes is proudly sponsored by Warrior Hippie Apparel, a veteran-founded brand dedicated to inspiring mindfulness, strength, and authenticity. Through their apparel and community initiatives, Warrior Hippie encourages warriors from all walks of life to live with intention and serve with heart. 

  Kim Komando Quiz and Interesting Info  

Besides the Car Pro Show and our weekly newsletter, my other favorite radio show and newsletter is Kim Komando’s.  We are on many of the same radio stations across America.  She does for her listeners and newsletter subscribers exactly what I endeavor to do:  Give you useful information to keep you up to date on the latest in cars, only she does it with technology and there is nobody who does it better.  Not sure how she puts out a top-notch newsletter seven days a week, but she does.

Between the carol playlists, awkward office Secret Santas and frantic gift wrapping, we’re in the most wonderful time of the year. But no one feels the crunch quite like Amazon. From Black Friday to Christmas Eve, their shipping volumes turn up faster than Mariah’s royalties.

Here’s the multimillion dollar question: How many packages does Amazon ship globally during the holiday peak? A) 5 million to 10 million, B) 12 million to 18 million, C) 30 million to 40 million or D) Over 100 million.

*Answer below my closing message at the very bottom of this newsletter.

Interesting items I found in this week’s Kim Komando newsletter:

• Claim what’s yours: I told you about this before, and here’s your reminder. If you used AT&T any time in the last decade, you might be owed part of a $177M data breach settlement. Some folks can get up to $5K. Deadline to file is Dec. 18 at telecomdatasettlement.com. They gave your info to hackers, so you might as well get paid for it. 
• Toilet time trap: Have you ever checked just one thing on your phone in the bathroom and ended up taking a short vacation? Researchers found that 66% of people scroll on the toilet, and those folks had a 46% higher risk of hemorrhoids. The reason is brutally simple: Phones make you linger, increasing pressure where you really don’t want it. A Harvard doctor’s advice? Leave the phone outside, or set a five-minute timer. 
• Be amazed: See an octopus learn to play piano and be inspired to learn yourself. You seriously need to watch this. It’s incredible.
• Cart by chatbot: Ever stared into your fridge at 6:12 p.m. wondering if string cheese and mustard counts as dinner? Same. OpenAI and Instacart built full grocery shopping into ChatGPT. You ask what’s for dinner, it builds a list, fills your cart and checks out, all in one chat. It used to be your kid sneaking Lucky Charms in the cart. Now it’s your chatbot upselling truffle salt. And yes, OpenAI gets a cut.
• Is someone else logged into your Google? You can see where your account’s been signed in over the last 28 days. This pageshows the device and location for each session. Find anything weird? Click it, select Sign out, and change your password. You might see duplicates, so don’t panic.
• Clicks, rides, cookies: You know that trip to a friend’s house for wine and takeout? Uber remembers. It’s launching “Uber Intelligence,” a tool letting brands access your travel and food data to sell you stuff. They say it’s anonymous, but it still knows enough to flood you with ads, right in the app or mid-ride. Uber made $44 billion last year, and its ad business already brings in $1.5 billion a year. Now it wants to watch what you eat and sell what you see.

   Check Out Our Newsletter Archive Page!

Go to the Newsletter Archive →

  Classic Car Contest: Win An AutoHeatShield!

  Exclusive Approved Products & Services

  Get Your Car Pro Show Holiday Gifts!

  Subscribe to the free DFW Newsletter 

  Miss the Show? Catch Our Podcast!

  Searching For A New Or Used Vehicle? 

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  Where to Find Us 

  Jerry's Must-Watch Video of the Week! 

  Todd's Video of the Week! 

  Closing Message: Take The Long Way Home

There’s something about Christmas that changes the way we drive. Not just the traffic — though there’s plenty of that — but the mindset. The roads feel heavier this time of year. More packed. More distracted. Everyone seems to be in a hurry, yet somehow also lost.

I’ve always thought the week before Christmas was less about getting where you’re going and more about trying to get back to where you belong.

Every December, cars become more than transportation. They turn into time machines. You drive past the old neighborhoods you grew up in. You pass the school you haven’t thought about in years. You notice the house that still puts lights on the roof the exact same way it did when you were a kid. Even the radio gets in on it, pulling songs out of storage that you only hear once a year, whether you want to or not.

For a lot of people, the drive home for Christmas is the longest one of the year — emotionally if not by miles. Some are excited. Some are nervous. Some are dreading conversations they hope won’t come up. Some are missing a seat at the table that won’t be filled this year. You can feel all of that sitting at a red light.

I’ve said before that a car is often the only place we’re truly alone with our thoughts anymore. No meetings. No notifications you can’t ignore. Just you, the road, and whatever’s been riding around in your head for weeks. Christmas has a way of turning up the volume on that.

You think about the people you love. You think about the ones you don’t see enough. You think about the ones you wish you’d handled things differently with. And sometimes you think about how fast time seems to be moving, whether you want it to or not.

That’s why I always tell folks to slow down this time of year — and I don’t just mean on the highway. Slow down mentally. Slow down emotionally. The presents will get wrapped. The meals will come together. The schedule will work itself out one way or another. What you don’t get back is the moment you blew past because you were already worrying about the next one.

I’ve been around cars my entire adult life. I’ve seen them used for work, for freedom, for escape, and sometimes for healing. I’ve also seen them parked in driveways that suddenly felt very quiet. If Christmas teaches us anything, it’s that the miles matter less than the people waiting at the end of them.

So if you’re traveling this week, give yourself some grace. Leave a little earlier than you think you need to. Let the aggressive driver go. Take the long way if it feels right. And if traffic forces you to crawl, use the time. Look around. Breathe. Think. Remember.

And if you’re not traveling — if home is right where you are — take a moment anyway. Sit in the car before you go inside. Turn off the engine. Listen to the quiet. Christmas isn’t always loud. Sometimes it shows up in stillness, whether we notice it or not.

This season doesn’t need to be perfect. It just needs to be present. The best gifts are rarely the ones that come in boxes, and the most important journeys don’t always show up on a navigation screen.

From the Car Pro family to yours, wherever the road takes you and however you celebrate, I hope you arrive safely — and I hope when you do, you remember what really made the trip worthwhile.

Merry Christmas.

Kim Komando Answer:

C) 30 million to 40 million packages per day. That’s what I call packing heat. Their usual daily shipping volume hovers around 20 million to 25 million packages. I think most of them come to my house. 

Here’s something to think about. When a box is delivered by car, it’s called a SHIPment. When a box is delivered by ship, it’s called CARgo.