Memorial Day Salute, HUGE Car Sales, Jerry's New EV Commentary, Plus 2024 Ford Mustang GT, 2024 Nissan Rogue Platinum and 2024 Lexus IS 500 F Sport Performance Premium Test Drives.

May 23, 2024

Dear CarPro Family,

Memorial weekend is here dear friends, and I hope that means you get some time with family and friends, but I also truly hope you will reflect on what Memorial Day is really all about. Below you will find our Salute To Veterans, and a little history lesson on how Memorial Day came to be. If you are cooking, I give you Kevin’s Famous Holiday Recipes.

Of course, Memorial week through the end of the month means BARGAIN TIME for car shoppers. This year with inventory levels running high and incentives being strong, consider that new set of wheels! Read the article below as I explain WHY this is one of the two best times of the year to buy.

I really try not to get too wrapped up in electric vehicles, but there is so much turmoil surrounding them, it is hard to ignore. I have commentary below questioning whether or not the bubble on EVs has burst. You’ll wonder, too, as you read headlines from this past week. We brought you the story a couple of months ago about the first Tesla Cybertruck that sold at auction. Last week, six more sold at the same auction. How did they do compared to the first one? I have the results for you!

We also have Kim Komando’s Tech Tips of the Week. This week America’s Digital Goddess offers up a lot of great tips; I picked a few I thought might be helpful or interesting. I also encourage you to sign up for her informative and entertaining newsletter, I learned a lot of new things this week, and so will you! The Texas Auto Writers have named the winners of the Texas Auto Roundup, we have the winner’s list for you today.

In a programming note, please join us Saturday at 9:35 AM Central on WBAP, and 11:35 AM Central on the national show, as we welcome David Mills, the father of Kailee Mills, the 16-year old girl killed in Houston whom we’ve been discussing with you for the last six years. She would have turned 23 this coming Monday. You can read her story from last week’s newsletter if you missed it, here.

In reviews this week, I have two very different vehicles! The 2024 Ford Mustang GT 5.0 V8 and the redesigned 2024 Nissan Rogue Platinum SUV. Our Amy Plemons has for you the 2024 Lexus IS 500 F Sport Performance Premium.

In advice today, I have tips on dealing with hail damage on your car AND how to handle bad weather driving, it’s that time of year after all. I have cars the most and least likely to be recalled in the future, details on the VW ID.Buzz microbus, and also pricing on the 2025 Kia Sorento hybrid. AAA says 44 million of you will travel this weekend, and a trade association is mounting a fierce attack against the Biden administration over EPA mandates and fuel economy standards America faces.

We have another True Story from a Former Car Dealer below. This is a series of 40 stories written by me. Some are really funny, some are incredibly sad. I really peel back the curtain on my career highs and lows in the car business, and also share a lot of personal information. I hope you’ll take a minute and read these each week, I truly believe you’ll enjoy them. #21 is titled: Ordering Cars. This is a hard job at a dealership, and I’ve literally ordered thousands of cars for inventory in my lifetime. Things can go wrong and when they do, they go REALLY wrong, and of course, it happened to me. More than once.

Plus, lots of other information you will enjoy, including our videos of the week we talk about on the air all the time! If you have never been to our FAQ page, take a minute and peruse the categories, something there will interest you for sure.

You’ll find the following stories and more info as you scroll down the newsletter:

We so appreciate all of you who take this newsletter and listen to the show every week. We know that without you, there is no CarPro Radio Show. So always let us know when we can help you. If you have not been there lately, take a look at our website, www.carpro.com, it changes all the time!

Have a terrific week. See you on the radio!

I am constantly asked when is the best time to buy? I always say Memorial weekend and the last week of December. With dealers fully stocked or overstocked in new vehicles, and aggressive purchase and lease incentives available, this is stacking up to be the biggest bargain weekend for consumers since before Covid.

I anticipate our dealers will be very busy with Memorial weekend AND the end of the month falling four days later.

Many of our dealers not only have full lots, but they all have a lot more vehicles on the way. The automakers are cranking out new vehicles left and right and pressuring the dealers to buy them to make up for lost production over the past year.

The used market is still very high, but I am seeing signs of the market dropping slightly. We could see a big drop soon if the trend continues. The robust used vehicle pricing cannot continue and I’ve said all along, this would happen when new car inventory became plentiful.

Most automakers are using way below market interest rates to entice buyers, others are using big rebates, some big lease incentives, and some are using a combination of all of these.

Use our dealers from here, email them in advance so they can be ready for you.

Find a CarPro

If you’ve put this off waiting for that right time to pull the trigger, I submit that time is NOW.

The Electric Car Bubble Bursting: Headlines From The News

In the past 10 years, I haven’t reviewed an electric vehicle I didn’t really like, and I think the same is true of our Executive Producer, Amy Plemons. They are fast, they are quiet, and aside from the normal trepidation of range anxiety, upfront costs, the lack of long-term reliability history, and the pain of finding a public charger, slightly more than 7% of vehicles sold in America this year are all-electric. As I have said on the air, there is no doubt I’ll own (likely lease) one someday, likely sooner than later. I already have the Level 2 charger in my garage.

I have been hard on the U.S. Government publicly as well as some automakers for pushing electric vehicles too hard, too fast. The result has been an oversupply of EVs, resulting in massive losses to car companies to the point of fears about the future viability of those automakers that went “all-in” on all-electric. A week ago Saturday I had had strong words for General Motors and pointed out that Ford lost $100,000 in the first quarter of this year on each electric vehicle it sold. Tesla is in a freefall trying to balance sales and stock prices, not an easy task for Mr. Musk. If you missed my on-air comments, it is a short listen, and you can hear them by clicking here or on the photo below:

I monitor many automotive websites to make sure I bring you the most up-to-date information available. I look for trends and directions. So, I wanted to share with you lead automotive stories from just two days in the previous week. There were others, but you’ll get the idea. Is it too soon to say the electric car bubble has burst? Are hybrids the cause? You be the judge.

Read recent headlines →

The Car Pro Show extends its congratulations to this year's 2024 Texas Auto Roundup winners! The annual spring event, hosted by the Texas Auto Writers Association (TAWA), gives attending members the opportunity to evaluate dozens of vehicles and cast their vote for their favorites. The CarPro's Amy Plemons attended the event in April as a voting TAWA member. This year's Title Award winners are pictured above. (Some automotive photography provided by Kevin McCauley / capturingthemachine.)

Vehicle of Texas: Genesis G70
Electric Vehicle of Texas: Kia EV9
CUV of Texas (TIE): Toyota Grand Highlander and Mazda CX-50
Performance Vehicle of Texas: Alfa Romeo Giulia

For the complete list of all the category & feature award winners click the link below.

2024 Texas Auto Roundup Winners and our notable mentions→

It’s not very often you get a chance to help someone and win something special in the process. The CarPro.com | Vehicle For Good “Corvette For Vets” sweepstakes is just such an event, and it is on right now! Roll Call of North Texas and Veterans Freedom Retreat will directly benefit every time you enter! And every $10 entry gets you a chance to win a 2024 Corvette Stingray 3LT Z51 –and you know it’s RED! You’ll also get $10,000 in cash! Enter as many times as you like before July 5th! You will be helping our veterans find healing and community in the process!

DISCLAIMER: No purchase necessary to enter or win. Sweepstakes ends July 5th, 2024. Open to legal residents of the United States, EXCLUDING THE STATE OF NEW YORK OR WHERE PROHIBITED. Must be 18 years of age at the time of entry. See the official rules for more.

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.

I reached out to her and asked if it would be OK to share information with you once a week with a tech tip, and she agreed. I read her daily newsletter from top to bottom, and when I see info I think you could use, I will put it here to try to make life just a little better for you.

Here are some various tips I picked up from Kim’s newsletter this week I hope you find as useful as I did:

You have to be smarter than this: Over 10% of people still use 1234 as their four-digit PIN. Other most-used options include 1111, 0000, 1212 and 7777. If this is you, time for something more complex — and no, your birth year or address won’t cut it. On iPhone, upgrade to six digits. On Android, stick with your fingerprint if your phone has biometrics.
Is this the year AI totally changes music? Take Udio, founded by ex-Google employees and sitting on $10 million in funding. They’re cranking out tracks at insane speeds — 10 songs a second, or roughly 864,000 songs a day. If you want to try it, it’s open to the public, and you can create 1,200 free songs each month.
I told you about this a year ago: The FTC has issued a warning to automakers that sell connected cars. The message is essentially, “Respect data privacy and don’t monetize it.” Oh, like when General Motors sold drivers’ info to insurance companies, causing premiums to rise. News flash: Unless there’s a real penalty, they won’t stop.
Mow problems: Honda is recalling lawnmowers and pressure washers after nearly 5,000 reports of failures and 38 injuries. That means you if you have a model HRN216 or HRX217K6 lawnmower and/or a GCV170 or GCV200 G5B power washer. Stop using it immediately, then call Honda toll-free at 8888883139 for a free inspection and repair.

Kim’s website is www.komando.com and if you want to get her newsletter daily: www.komando.com/subscribe / Photo Credit: Kim Komando.

A few years ago, I started writing a series of True Stories From A Former Car Dealer. Over 40 weeks, I wrote about experiences I had from my days as a dealership owner. Some will make you laugh, others will make you cry. The reaction was beyond my wildest expectations.

For our new subscribers, and for those of you who may have missed one or perhaps simply forgotten the details, we’ll bring these to you in the order they were written.

In this episode, I tell you the headaches associated with the person who orders the vehicle inventory in a car dealership. It is an awful job, but one I had for a lot of years. Mistakes can be costly, and I learned that lesson the hard way.

True Stories From a Former Car Dealer #21→

If you are searching for a particular new or used vehicle, we can help you! The best news is, if you use CarPro to search, when you find the car of your dreams it will be at a CarPro approved dealership.

Best of all, it’s simple to use. Choose new, used, or certified. You can select the make and model, or find a price range you are looking at. Choose the number of miles you are willing to travel and enter your zip code.

From there, you can look through all your matches, knowing you are shopping at a dealership I have handpicked that adheres to the high standards I require.

Start your search on the front page of CarPro.com. If you don't find the car of your dreams, check back regularly.

As the saying goes: “If it’s not your time, it’s not your time.” Certainly, it was not this Oklahoma Trooper’s time. The Trooper stopped an SUV, while the dashcam in his cruiser was rolling from behind. Halfway through this :45 video a car crashes into the SUV. Luckily, the Trooper was on the passenger side, not the driver’s side, or he would not be with us today. Everyone was treated and released with minor injuries, which is hard to believe when you see this.

With all the buzz about the 60th anniversary Mustang, I offer you this video. What do you get if you mix the movie Field of Dreams, Steve McQueen and a vintage Mustang. Take a look.

You have 5 hours to call the show! From 9AM- 2PM Central, 7AM-Noon Pacific, and 10 AM to 3 PM Eastern, the phone numbers are:

DFW Show: 9 AM to 11 AM Central, 1 (800) 288-9227
National Show: 11 AM to 2 PM Central, 1 (800) 926-7777

Add the numbers to your cell phone; you never know when you are going to need straight talk and honest answers about everything automotive.

So, what is the CarPro Radio Show?

Confused about the car buying process? Worried you won’t get a fair deal? Wondering about which vehicle is best for you? Then tune in to the CarPro Radio Show every week where Jerry Reynolds and Kevin McCarthy will guide you through the car-buying process with confidence.

No matter where you listen to the show or which station you listen to, you have five hours to call in and ask your questions. We take calls every Saturday from 9 AM-2 PM Central time, 7 AM to Noon Pacific. The phone number is different the first two hours, then changes, so keep that in mind.

We would love to help you in any way possible! Keep in mind, we don’t take mechanical questions, but everything else is great!

The CarPro Radio Show is heard every weekend all over the United States, and every weekend we deliver straight talk and honest answers about everything automotive. We would greatly appreciate it if you would take a moment and tell a friend about the show.

new-markets-canva-pro-jan-11

We've recently welcomed some new markets to the CarPro Radio Network:

KTLR 890 AM/103.7 FM Oklahoma City: Sunday 4-5pm CT (replay)
The Mountain WSYY 1240 AM/ 102.5 FM Millinocket, ME:

Saturday 9AM- 12PM PT
KUFO: Portland, Oregon: Saturday 9AM- 12PM PT
Nevada Talk Network - THE Rural News Source: KELY 1230am/98.5fm, Ely; KPVM-TV 25.7, Pahrump, KAVB 98.7 FM, Hawthorne, KPKK 101.1 FM, Amargosa Valley, NV, KDJJ 94.1 FM, Fernley-Fallon all three hours live 9AM- 12PM PT
KFIR 720 AM, Sweet Home, Oregon: Sunday 4PM - 7PM PT (replay)
KBAR 1230 AM, Burley, Idaho: Saturday 6PM – 9PM MT (replay)
KACT 1360 AM, Andrews, Texas: Saturdays 7PM – 10PM CT (replay)
WDOC 1310 AM, Prestonsburg, Kentucky: Time TBD
KLXX 1270 AM, Bismarck, North Dakota: Sunday 10PM – Midnight CT (replay)

Other additions to the CarPro Show family in 2023:

B103 WOWS Indy, Indianapolis: Sundays from 7PM-10PM ET (replay)
WCED AM/ConnectFM , Johnston, PA: Saturdays from 2PM-4PM ET (replay)
KFIR 720 AM , Albany, Oregon: Sundays from 4PM -7PM PT (replay)
News Talk 98.9 The Word, Greenville, South Carolina region: Saturdays 12PM-1PM (live), Saturdays 3PM -6PM (replay), and Sundays 11AM -4PM (replay)
WQXL AM/FM 1470 AM and 100.7 FM , Columbia, South Carolina: Saturdays from 12PM-1PM ET
News/Talk 103.7 FM WEEO, Hagerstown, Maryland: 12PM -3PM ET Saturdays WEEO covers parts of Maryland, Pennsylvania, and the Washington D.C. area.
Talk 1370, Austin: Saturdays from 11AM -1PM CT

Most of our listeners tell us that they never thought they would look forward to a show about cars. You may have friends or relatives who feel the same way in the cities below, please make them aware.

Here are the DFW markets the show airs in, times, and stations, and don't forget you can now listen to WBAP on the FM dial at 93.3 FM!

Dallas, TX: WBAP 820 AM/93.3 FM/99.5 HD 2, Saturday 9am to 11am Central
Dallas, TX: KRLD 1080 AM, Saturday 2pm to 4pm Central (replay)
Granbury, TX: KPIR 1420 AM, Saturday 11am to 2pm Central

WBAP DFW Podcast Here →
FOR ALL OTHER MARKETS, CLICK HERE→

Our Salute To Veterans And a History of Memorial Day

HUGE Memorial Day Sales Start Today!

The Car Pro Commentary

The Electric Car Bubble Bursting: Headlines From The News

Follow-Up: Tesla Cybertruck Auction Pricing Update

Straight Talk and Honest Answers

2024 Texas Auto Roundup Awards

Enter To Win This 'Vette And Help Veterans!

Kevin's Famous Holiday Recipes

Kim Komando's Tech Tip of the Week!

On The Road: Test Drives

Performance, handling and cool features galore! The 2024 Ford Mustang GT certainly has Jerry smiling.

The Rogue is already one of the most popular SUVs in America and Jerry couldn't be more impressed with the Platinum's new luxurious interior.

A luxury sports sedan that doesn't disappoint with its V8-powered performance.

Bumper to Bumper: Industry Newse

25 Most & 25 Least Likely Vehicles To Face Future Recalls

Trade Association Campaigns Against Federal EV Mandate

Details On Long-Awaited VW ID. Buzz Read More →

Kia Announces 2025 Sorento Hybrid Pricing

Weekly Recalls

True Stories From A Former Car Dealer

Miss the Show? Catch Our Podcast!

Factory Incentives

Sell Your Car Through GiveMeTheVin!

Exclusive Approved Products & Services

FAQ: Research Your Questions Before You Shop

Our FAQ page offers answers to questions CarPro Show host Jerry Reynolds is asked most frequently.

Searching for a New or Used Vehicle?

Videos of the Week

Subscribe to the Free DFW Newsletter

CarPro Guide To Online Car Buying

Buying a vehicle online has never been easier.Our step-by-step guide will help you buy a car from the comfort of your living room, starting with selecting your CarPro Friend.

On The Air

On the Air

Closing Message From Jerry Reynolds