2005 Honda Clearance — the Official Honda Web Site

If you're in the market for a new Honda Accord, Honda Pilot or Honda Ridgeline Pickup, you better get over to this site fast! Honda is offering some great deals on these 2006 models.

2005 Honda Clearance — the Official Honda Web Site

Top 10 Things To Never Say To A Dealer

Here's some simple car shopping advice...what NOT to say to a dealer.

Things To Never Say To A Dealer - ForbesAutos.com

[Top Ten] Things To Never Say To A Dealer
by Bengt Halvorson

The dealership experience can be extremely stressful, but it doesn't have to be. You could know everything there is to know about the cars you're considering, but that's only a fraction of the buying process. If you want that seductive new sedan at a good price, you're probably going to need to know what to say — and more importantly, what not to say.

1. "I'm ready to buy …"
2. "I can afford this much … "
3. "Yes, I have a trade-in …"
4. "I'm only buying the …"
5. "I'm not sure … which model …"
6. "Oh, I've wanted one …"
7. "I'll take whatever …"
8. "What's the lowest price …"
9. "Sure, I'll look at the numbers ..."
10. "I think you can do a lot better …"

Pew Internet & American Life Project Report: Online Selling

"25 million people have used the internet to sell something." More proof that you CAN sell it yourself on the Net...yes, even your car.Pew Internet & American Life Project Report: Selling online

Car Shopping Tips for New and Expecting Parents

Expecting a bambino...better go buy a minivan. Just kidding. I know too many couples who found out they were expecting and decided they needed a new Suburban, Expedition or worse, an Excursion to haul around the newest addition to the family. A year later they're wondering why they ever bought a new car (car payment) and would gladly trade in the oversized vehicle (and payment) for something a little more reasonable. Don't make that mistake.Car Shopping Tips for New and Expecting Parents

Rebate wars: Where the deals really are

What the big three are doing with rebates - includes a "gallery of deals."Rebate wars: Where the deals really are - Nov. 22, 2005

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) - They said they'd back off, but the big automakers just can't help themselves.

The incentives war heated up in earlier this month when General Motors lauched the "Red Tag Sale." Ford followed with "Keep it Simple." Chrysler now has "Miles of Freedom."

Are the deals really all that great?

When evaluating such deals, there is one thing you have to keep in mind. You're buying a car, not a sales gimmick. It the car's not good or if it just isn't right for you, it doesn't matter how good the incentive is.

Some car companies almost never put big incentives on their vehicles, and even these "Big 3" programs come multiple exceptions. In addition, know that car companies generally put rebates and "free gas" deals on cars because they aren't selling well.

Finally, always remember that what incentives give they also take away. When the time comes to sell or trade in your car, it will be worth less than it would have been had there been no incentive.

Average cost of new car at 4-year high

Another reason to seriously consider a used car - shop around before you plunk down your hard-earned money on a new car.USATODAY.com - Average cost of new car at 4-year high in quarter

By Sharon Silke Carty, USA TODAY
DETROIT — The average cost of a new car during the third quarter was the highest in four years, according to the Comerica Auto Affordability Index.

The bank says that's because financing costs have been increasing and because consumers have used incentives to upgrade their vehicle choices.

Comerica says it took 26.2 weeks' worth of an average person's salary to buy a new car in the third quarter, up nearly six weeks from the second quarter of 2004, which was the most affordable period in 25 years. The index has been slowly creeping up this year, but the third-quarter jump was the biggest in years.

Understanding Vehicle Financing

What to know about car finance - BEFORE you visit the dealership to buy your next car.

Understanding Vehicle Financing

With prices averaging more than $20,000 for a new vehicle and $9,500 for a four-year-old vehicle, most consumers need financing or leasing to acquire a vehicle. In some cases, buyers use "direct lending:" they obtain a loan directly from a finance company, bank or credit union. In direct lending, a buyer agrees to pay the amount financed, plus an agreed-upon finance charge, over a period of time. Once a buyer and a vehicle dealership enter into a contract and the buyer agrees to a vehicle price, the buyer uses the loan proceeds from the direct lender to pay the dealership for the vehicle. Consumers also may arrange for a vehicle loan over the Internet.

Negotiating With Dealers

Here's more car buying advide how to deal with dealers.
Negotiating With Dealers - ForbesAutos.com

Negotiating With Dealers
by Bengt Halvorson

You've seen the ads. You know exactly what you want and how much you plan to pay. You're going to get that smoking new car that captured your interest two months ago.

How To Do A Proper Test Drive

Straight from Forbes - How to do a "proper" test drive.
How To Do A Proper Test Drive - ForbesAutos.com

Taking a test-drive might seem a lot like speed-dating — or joyriding — but keep in mind that there's a lot more at stake. In just the half-hour behind the wheel, you're going to need to determine whether this car is serious relationship material or not — without so much as a full first date!

Ford rolls out new set of discounts

Keeping up with it's neighbor GM, Ford announced new discounts. I like the name of the program, "Keep It Simple." Discounts end January 3rd and cover most 2005 and 2006 models.

Ford rolls out new set of discounts

Top 5 ways to winterize your car

It's that time again. Get your car ready for winter - just in time for that drive to Grandma's house for Thanksgiving.
Top 5 ways to winterize your car - Nov. 16, 2005

Video Blog of New England Auto Show 2005

Steve Garfield Video Blogs (Vlogs) the New England Auto Show. Steve's favorite car was the Dodge Kahuna with real wood trim. It looks great but I think all that wood might cut down on gas mileage.

Steve Garfield's Video Blog: New England Auto Show 2005

Is a Hybrid Worth It?

If you are considering a hybrid purely for the gas saving, you better read this. This is full of graphs, charts, equations and one simple conclusion.OmniNerd - Articles: Is a Hybrid Worth It?

Conclusion

While no "green" person would ever advocate buying a hybrid for purely economic reasons,49 it is painfully obvious that existing hybrids lack the ability to make up for their steep prices with gas savings. While a hybrid would present significant savings over something like a new Ford Super Duty, you would always save more with any of a number of economy cars.

Hybrid technology is just entering the mainstream, however. As gas prices rise and hybrid technology improves and cheapens, don't be surprised to find hybrid owners in the green.

Honda Offers $1,200 Incentive on Accord Hybrid

If you've been thinking about buying a hybrid, here's a deal for you on the Honda Accord Hybrid
Hybrid Cars and Vehicles - MixedPower.com - Honda Offers $1,200 Incentive on Accord Hybrid

General Motors Red Tag discount pricing

Here we go again. I thought GM was working on a "Value Pricing" strategy for 2006...well, maybe next year.

General Motors gets back in the discount game with "Red Tag" pricing

DETROIT (AP) -- General Motors Corp. is back in the discount game, and U.S. rivals Ford Motor Co. and the Chrysler Group could join in soon.

The world's largest automaker announced Monday it's offering "Red Tag" prices through Jan. 3 on most Buick, Chevrolet, GMC and Pontiac vehicles from the 2005 and 2006 model years. Under the program, dealers will post fixed maximum prices on the vehicles.

Automotive Turkeys 2005 from Forbes

Just in time for Thanksgiving, the cars that didn't do so well in 2005.

Automotive Turkeys 2005 - Forbes.com

Smart car buying tips

More tips for buying a car. My recommendation, read everything you can about how to buy a car...it will be time well spent.

Smart car buying tips

Women influence the purchase of 80 percent of vehicles sold in this country, but most women who actually buy the car themselves end up paying more for their car.

Juli Bacon loves her new car, but dreaded the car-buying process. She says, "Just the whole idea of going into a dealership it just makes me nervous." Bacon was so nervous she hired someone else to do the work for her, a vehicle consultant.

Vehicle consultant Brenda Renrick knows a lot about buying cars and the mistakes women make at dealerships. "I can't tell you how many people come to me and they don't know what type of car they want to buy," Renrick says. According to Cars.com, that's one of the top five car-buying mistakes women make. It's critical to know what you want before you go to the dealership.

The Top 10 Stolen Vehicles In Your State

The National Insurance Crime Bureau has an interactive map that you can use to see what the top ten stolen cars were in your state.

Top 10 stolen vehicles in your state

Based on 1.2 million motor vehicle thefts reported to the National Crime Information Center in 2004 by law enforcement agencies nationwide.

Most stolen cars - which cars are popular with theives

Here is the latest list of the "most stolen cars" from CNN.

Older Hondas and Toyotas still popular with car thieves, but half the top ten are light trucks.

NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - The 1995 Honda Civic was the most-stolen car during 2004, according to statistics from the National Insurance Crime Bureau.

Of the top 10 most-stolen vehicles last year, six were Japanese brands. All four domestic vehicles on the list are light trucks, including one minivan. The NICB statistics are based on data from the FBI Uniform Crime Report.

The large number of Honda Civics on the road probably accounts for its appearance at the top of a list like this, said Chris Naughton, a spokesman for Honda.

Popularity and longevity have a lot to do with a vehicle's popularity as a theft target, agreed Frank Scafidi, a spokesman for the NICB. Not only are there more vehicles available to steal, but as vehicles get older they require parts more frequently, creating demand for parts taken from stolen cars.

Tags Car - Selling - Buying - Shopping - Tip

Best & worst in car reliability - Consumer Reports (free)

Best & worst in car reliability from Consumer Reports. No surprise here that 29 of the top 31 vehicles were from Japanese manufacturers. Many of these cars are built in the U.S.A. so I hesitate to call them Japanese cars...since they aren't.

Based on survey responses on more than 1 million vehicles

Tags Car - Selling - Buying - Shopping - Tip

The least-safe cars of 2006

What are the least-safe cars of 2006. You may be surprised by a few of the names on the list.

The least-safe cars of 2006

Crash results point out two not-so-surprising facts: cheap equals less safe, and you really, really need to order side airbags...

Sequel to Incentives: Return of the Rebates

As Autoblog points out, rebates are back...at least for the next few weeks.

One Consumer's Search For The New Car

David's tale of how they ended up getting the Jeep Grand Cherokee with a "one payment" lease. Good reading including some great advice if you plan to lease your next car.

One Consumer's Search For The New Car

o Realize lease is coming due May 1 on wife’s Honda Odyssey. It’s been a good vehicle for us but she is tired of minivans so time to get something more fun
+ Problems?
Sliding doors sometimes don’t open or close all the way. This can be rather annoying…especially when you need to be someplace. Sure, we could read the owner’s manual…but who does that?
Not so stain resistant carpeting
Paint shouldn’t peel off the dashboard on passenger’s side.
+ Good stuff
Almost 36,000 miles all across the U.S…Yellowstone, Montana, Idaho, Washington, Michigan with bikes on the roof and our dog snoring in back, sleeping on, over and under the luggage, food wrappers, DVDs and CDs.
Awesome engine, pulling power and stable ride at speed
Heated leather seats, Michigan winter, enough said

Small-car interest falls with gas prices

How quickly we forget! USA Today's automotive writer, James Healey has a quick article about the waning interest in small cars as gas prices come down. Come on people...there is only so much oil in the ground and one day we'll be sucking the earth dry, not to mention burning a giant hole in the ozone.

A stock broker friend said many years ago, as he advised us to buy oil stocks, "when they go to pump the last barrel of oil from the ground, I want to own it." That advice has served him and his clients that took it very well.

USATODAY.com - Small-car interest falls with gas prices

Three popular Internet car-shopping sites report notable drops in users seeking information on gas-electric hybrids and other fuel-efficient cars.

Edmunds.com says interest peaked Aug. 29 when Hurricane Katrina hit. That week, 19,500 users went to Edmunds' page on fuel economy. But that's dropped to about 3,000 views a week, the same as it was in early August.

Kelley Blue Book's kbb.com reports that the proportion of site users interested in information about hybrids and economy cars dropped a few percentage points each of the last two months. It wouldn't give details because its survey results aren't final.

Cars.com, partly owned by Gannett, which publishes USA TODAY, says searches for fuel-efficient used cars have fallen, too. The biggest decline is in searches for used Toyota Prius hybrids.

The Flip & Chilly Show - How to pimp mom's ride to make it more fuel efficient

Slightly off topic but very funny. Flip and Chilly pimp mom's ride to make is more fuel efficient. The show is sponsored by the National Resources Defence Council.

Check Scam Hurts Online Car Sellers

More information on car buying scams. This one involves a buyer who paid $4,000 too much for a car from a seller and then asked for a refund of the difference via Western Union.

Beware: Check Scam Hurts Online Car Seller

(CBS) NEW JERSEY It may seem like a great idea to sell your car online: it’s quick, cheap and the information only goes to people looking to buy. But these transactions can be fraught with some serious potholes.

Joe Barbalaco has been trying to sell three cars. He chose to put them up online since it was cheaper and he thought it would reach all the right people. Little did he know his ads would drive in offers from all the wrong kind of buyers.

"This was the first time I've sold a car over the Internet,” Barbalaco said. “I haven't sold a car in more than 25 years.”

Soon enough, he had made a deal, and a cashier’s check quickly followed for $21,000. The problem was, the agreement for his Dodge Stratus was for $17,000. "I thought they just plain made a mistake,” Barbalaco noted.

After several calls and emails, though, the buyers wanted Joe to send them the $4,000 overage from their cashier's check. "They requested that I Western Union the money back to them," he said.

Yahoo! Autos Custom

Fresh Ideas for your ride - courtesy of Yahoo! Yahoo just opened a new site (beta?) for car customizing called Yahoo! Autos Custom with the tag lines, "Get inspired. Get it done."

Not a very original name but gets the point across. They've got message boards and you can upload pictures and details of your own car. This site is very new so the boards are nearly empty but I'm sure they'll fill up quickly.