An Auto Loan Debt Crisis Looks Imminent
Car loan debt has ballooned, delinquencies are still rising, and major lenders are leaving the market. Is an auto loan debt crisis coming soon?
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Toyota is selling a basic (no ABS brakes, no airbags, crank windows) pickup in the rest of the world for $10,000. They could probably sell a version with the optional safety equipment in the US for $15-20k. But they will not sell it here and mess up the $50-100k luxury pickup gravy train.
At least they aren't doing what the big 3 do with their trucks. A mid range XLT F-150 will cost about the same as a fully decked out Tundra, and a fully decked out F-150 will set you back over $100K, but these were sold for $50-$75K just before the pandemic, so what changed? They just decided to charge more due to greed.
I look at it as fleecing the assholes who buy those fucking things for vanity. Keep it up Ford and GM. Make them go fucking broke.
Maverick is okay, if you can find a hybrid.
I'd love a Maverick hybrid, but I just can't find one for sale right now. They're very popular apparently.
And also the chicken tax
They don't sell vehicles without ABS in the US because they are required by law here.
Did you read the rest of the post where they mention a full US spec one would probably be $15-20K?
"Probably"
Yeah there's no way they're ever going to touch the cash cow that is the Tacoma. If they had any desire to, they would have started selling the Hilux here decades ago.
Oh shit, I want one soo bad now
No one would buy that in the US.
I would
Me too. Otherwise, I am clinging to my '99 Silverado with 8 foot bed, single bench seat, and crank windows. (And no, it's not my daily driver. I only use it when I need to move a Big Dumb Object, which is often enough in my line of work that it's worth it.) I'm holding out hope that someone will finally make a usable electric work truck, but that chance was never that great and seems to be getting slimmer with each passing minute.
And before the fuckcars crowd jumps down my throat, my insurance charges me precisely $165 per year on this piece of shit, and it costs me $40 a year to keep it plated. That's less than the cost of renting a U-Haul twice after you add on all their bullshit gotchas and fees.
My truck is a tool. It is not a vanity item or a luxury. Not only do I not need it to have leather seats, power everything, and a moonroof -- I don't want it to, because I will just break all of that stuff and it does not do anything to actually make the vehicle useful as a truck.
dude, where do you get your insurance??
Progressive.
It probably helps that I have 9 vehicles insured with them (7 of which are motorcycles). My truck is also probably worth less than your shirt.
ahh, it could be the multi vehicle discount. are you doing some kind of per-mile or low-driven-miles program? 'cause any beater truck just on liability limits is still almost double a regular car policy for me
Nope. I have the same full coverage as my other vehicles. (I haven't tested just how "full" it is, though.)
Insurers use actuarial tables and byzantine math to calculate your premiums. Possibly their magic chart just shows that my make/model/year is low risk. For grins some time, get an insurance quote on a Dodge Ram (assuming you don't already have a Ram) and a Silverado or Sierra of the same year. I'll bet you a penny the quote you get on your Ram will be significantly higher. Despite it functionally being the same vehicle to you and me, to an insurer the Ram is the one statistically more likely to be owned by a drunk driver and/or a moron.
It's the same thing with my FZ6R. That bike has a detuned R6 engine in it and gets from 0-60 exactly as fast as an R6, but its insurance premium is like a quarter as much. But more dudebros buy and crash R6's, and only silly old men carefully ride FZ6R's. Or something.