How things have changed since the Pony.

You are right.

How many months until the “average” vehicle sold in the USA costs $100,000 ?

You can still buy a cheap vehicle in India, and their coal production keeps setting all time monthly records.

I would never own a KIA,and there isn't one made that I would pay 83k for!

A nice one for the thieves to steal. Hyundai is near the top in most stolen cars.

wasn't it not too long ago, the average price of a pickup was in the high 60k price range ?
how the hEll do these people with minimum wage jobs and 8 kids afford these things ?

Buy them or afford them?

84-month notes is how they are able to buy them.

Afford them? Not in most cases.

Unlike the $100K+ Jeep or the $150K Cadillac?

World wide the greatly sought after “budget vehicle” is the Korean made K1 tank,
especially the model with bulldozer blade to expose buried mines, and add on backhoe.

If K1 seems similar to M1 Tank,
that because we gave them permission to copy many past Abrams Tank features - for free.

Damn, I need one of them.

Consumer borrowing & indebtedness hits a new high every year.
Not hard to connect the dots.
Last time I had a car payment was decades ago at about $200/month and the light went on.
No more depreciating assets for me since, unless there's a metaphorical gun to my head.

It's ridiculous. Remember when Hyundai had the cheapest car on the market??? The $9,999.99 Accent hatchback? Oh how times have changed.
I still have my little Tiburon, mostly because it's so worthless that nobody will give me a buck for it - When new in 2004, it was almost a $30,000 car! I suppose that's the reason they didn't sell too many of them.
My Mustang cost me $46k (after taxes) in 2016. It was my first and more than likely LAST brand new car. Not only does NOTHING on the market make my genitals fizz, but the cost of some of them doesn't make it worthwhile.

I'd rather sink a little bit of money into something older, better looking and repairable by me.

Most people driving new cars only are because they're stuck in them. They do these 84 and 96 month finance deals and are instantly thousands under water on them, then they trade in and that negative equity gets added onto the new car and its even worse. Nobody is going to write a check for the difference, isn't like 75% of people only $1000 away from going broke?

The first thing I can remember concerning Korea was veterans saying “It was unbelievably cold.”

Later, I remember slightly older than I Vietnam veteran coal miners would say during lunch talk “Those ROK Marines are tough.”

Later I met Korean graduate students who were both smart, and at work in their labs before 6 AM most days - including Saturday and Sunday.

I have watched Kia and Hyundai autos come into the USA market,
go broke financially,
get bailed out by the South Korean government and combined,
and adopt a sales strategy of longer warranties and a philosophy of improving quality.

DNA analysis tells us now that the Japanese are descended from the Koreans, but that did not prevent the Japanese from turning Korea into a slave colony for 50 years.
Korea hates Japan in a deep way most in the USA do not realize.

To what level will Korean products improve?

It is thought provoking that the USA turned to South Korea to buy 155 mm shells,
then just months later Russia turned to North Korea to buy 152 mm shells.

On the dark side I have seen a South Korea electric generating company sign a contract to buy coal from a small private company in Alaska, then ignore the contract when they could buy cheaper coal from Indonesia.

If that is a Genisis then yea, it's in direct competition with Cadillac, Lincoln, Lexus, Infinity,... V-8 and rear drive they are swinging for the fence.

i agree to the above and will ad they finance almost everybody these days no matter how much they owe.

about 4 years ago i repaired a 2 year old dodge ram quad cab truck. it was fully loaded with every option except diesel power. truck had 50+ miles on it.
truck had bald tires spun out on the freeway in a light snow storm. it was wrecked really bad. it needed everything from the front doors back including a frame. .
i really didn't want to fix it and thought it was a easy total loss. adjuster showed up and 2 days later we were approved for $60K in repairs. the owner had gap insurance and owed $130K on a 2 year old truck.

after the repair truck still had bald tires on it because that is not covered by insurance. . owner didn't have the $$ to buy new 20" truck tires so he drove to a new car dealer traded it in and bought a new truck.

Yup! A funny story I heard when I was working closely with a few Nissan dealers years ago. The used car manager said it was nearly the same case for every Kia / Hyundai that came in to be traded for a new Nissan. They had bought the Hyundai for $0 down over 84 months and came with a really low payment (they offered this deal for years on the sonatas etc). The owner thinking since its been a few years, he must have paid off a decent chunk. The used car manager would be the bearer of bad news that they had barely paid the tax on the thing. All of them would get up and leave in utter shock.

Many people here lease new stuff and get a new one every few years. It looks like they have more money than what they really have as they are driving something new and expensive all the time.

I've known people who trade vehicles frequently in order to have the latest cool car or truck. To own something that is 5-6 years old would be a total embarrassment to them. They just trade-in over and over again so long as the payment fits their monthly budget.

If you look at the pricing history of most Asian cars you will find they started as cheap econo boxes and slowly gained ground. Those like Honda, Toyota etc. slowly raised prices while adding features and maintaining quality.
A few like Mazda Hyundai and Kia had some quality issues that gave them a black eye. They addressed the issues while keeping the prices low to regain customer confidence. Once accomplished the price increases started along with features.
So we now have 80K examples of what used to be an affordable car.
I have seen Mazda in particular starting to slide backwards in the quality area. having worked for canon 35 or so years ago that was not to be tolerated at any cost.
I believe it has to do with the generations changing much as they did in this country. After WWII Japan and others were in shambles. The US was strong and built quality.
As we went into the late 60's early 70's the men that fought and built this country started into retirement. The generation that took over had it a lot easier and the quality maintained.
next generation had it easier yet and we started to slip.
Wouldn't be surprised to see the same thing happen to Japan, as Korea, Taiwan and China take over. their is also India, Vietnam and others fighting for a piece of the pie.

The East got the foot in the door by flooding cheap stuff in the Marketplace here.
Remember the mini trucks sold for 99 bucks?

The average new car is now over $48k.

Hard to believe but that's inflation and rising costs. To each his/her own. I also would NEVER own a Hyundai. You can get a Hellcat for that money. That's how my mind works.

I wouldn't give $83 Dollars for that vehicle. Not even a cold day in Hell. I don't want a Hyundai or Kia or Toyota or honduh in my driveway even for a few minutes. I'd rather find an older American MADE (not just "assembled here") vehicle, have no payment, get it caught up on maintenance and drive the snot out of it.
In fact I have been stirring the water looking for a nice 01-03 Durango like the one we have now. Much prefer a 360 over a 4.7, but realize that I can't go buy a new 01-03 vehicle any more.
No Kia for me. I wasn't around yet for the Korean war but my dad was there. IDK what Korea did back then to piss us off but now we welcome their crap as their dumping grounds To hell with that idea

Educate yourself on the difference between North and South Korea, the Korean War, and Kia and Hyundai. Seriously.

As crazy as the price seems they are a highly rated vehicle. Car and Driver did a one year 40K test on one and had nearly zero trouble with it, that usually isn't the case with any car.

The US performed the learning curve for mass producing quality from he 20s-60s. Japan then took it to the next level in the 70-90s (thanks in large part to Deming). At that point the recipe was there, and it was easy for Kia and Hyundai to follow it and join in the fun. That’s exactly what they did. Harbor Freight did the same thing in the tool world. They started dirt cheap, built a customer base, drove some competition out and now price and quality are rising.

I agree.

I admire Ed Deming “practical advice” to make business better with math.

Before Deming there was the lathe operator

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Winslow_Taylor

I was shocked when I realized Taylor’s ideas also led to “Interval Training” in swimming and track.

India is supplying more Harbor Freight items,
can India follow the Japan, Korea trail ?

Vinfast and Vietnam is in the news about EV’s and current wild stock speculation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VinFast

When I think about Vietnam and autos I cannot but think about “backward sloping” Ram pickup grilles.

And these 2nd and 3rd world countries have the enormous benefit of dirt cheap labor and little to no environmental regulations. It’s NOT a level playing field!

I am 100% with you, I don't give a crap why we were in the Koren war either, those people have done nothing for me and never will, I worked with quite a few of them at Motorola. I have no use for anything that comes out of the Far East, both overseas and in this country...LOL..

Well, Momma's Subaru was assembled in Fort Wayne, Indiana by Bill, and Bob, and Fred. My 2010 Cummins was assembled in Toluca, Mexico by Pablo, Roderigo, and Jesus. I also seem to remember that KIA has a major facility in Georgia building cars. These aren't opinions.

Both Hyundai and KIA have several factories here, all free from the constraints of the UAW. I've owned 4 Hyundais, 2 Elantras and an Accent. All older and purchased for dirt cheap needing engine repairs. I used them as beaters to drive back and forth to work. The fourth was the new Ionic hybrid we bought in 2017. It was a great car, got over 50 MPG on the highway and had 0 issues with it. We didn't keep it long though as after my future wife got attacked by the neighbors pitbull and broke her back, getting in and out of the car became painful for her.
I made really good money working at Hyundai dealerships and both my boys continue to.

Didn't you hear? Jesus quit!

When my son was going to firefighter school he was driving his '98 Olds Intrigue that was given to him by his grandmom when his granddad passed away. He was doing "ride-along" with local city fire departments as part of his training and one day his Intrigue had an issue and he had to borrow his mother's luxury compact SUV for a day to get there on time. Mid-day the fire chief called him in to his office and told him (not asked him) to NOT bring that car to the station again. The chief said he doesn't want to give the impression that fire fighters make too much money and this is hurting the image of all of the firefighters at the station. He came home and I could tell he was upset so I asked him what was wrong, and he told me the story. I asked him what the chief was driving, and he said a new Ford F-150 King Ranch and I asked how many other nice fairly new crew cab pickups were in the parking lot? He said at least a dozen. I said you know the local Ford dealership in town has a dozen or more F-150 King Ranch pickups and not one of them is less than $75,000 and a few of them over $82k which by the way is nearly double the price of you mom's SUV. Do you want me to tell him not to drive his and the other's pickups to the fire station as it is confirming or at the least giving the impression, they are making too much money? Wouldn't have done that and not arguing firefighter pay, just this chief went about it wrong in my opinion as that was an emergency situation for my son to get to the station for one day in his mom's car. His mom got that AWD SUV to get to work in any weather like lake effect snow, as she was an RN and still is. Worst thing that happened from this is now my son wants a pickup truck and will have to spend, at the least, way, way too much for something he will never fully use and still not as good as a smaller AWD vehicle with better fuel economy. LOL.

I would spend $50 to buy a book that was a long list of average total parts replacement cost for every USA sold vehicle over a 200,000 mile life.
I might pay more.

I would not pay $5000 to hear a young female pop singer give a concert, but I am amazed how many will.

I am about to go to a dentist where I am certain it will cost more than it used to, and I am amazed at the waiting list times even to get an appointment.

My wife had a root canal 8 years ago, $1300 out the door. She is scheduled for another at the end of next month. $3200 out the door. Be sitting down when they give you the bill.

Judging the reliability of a car is meaningless when and while it is new and under warranty. Almost EVERYTHING will behave and function properly during the new honeymoon phase. Reality is revealed inches and seconds after the factory warranty has expired. Second owner usually finds out a $70 blend door motor requires 13 hours of labor- or a $65 water pump requires engine to be removed from the car. Even during the factory warranty the owner and car is buffaloed with BS and re flashing by the dealer- hoping both owner and car will not come back to them. Brand loyalty is met with "A quart of oil consumed every 1000 miles is normal" or "We will re flash the computer to fix your......." knowing damn well a re flash will do nothing. I'm not gonna own a points and condenser car for a daily driver- but I will own common reliable platforms that are older- that have a great track record and can be fixed by me or a shop when its too complicated for me. My current Camry is a 2000 with 266,000 miles and still runs great. I am upgrading though. I will be buying a coworkers 2010 Honda Civic with 200,000 miles. I like the GM cars powered by Buick 3.8 V6. I also have great luck with the old 3.1 GM V6 after the intake gaskets were replaced but those cars with that engine were discontinued nearly two decades ago. The clean Buicks listed for sale by seasoned citizens get snatched up by flippers and relisted at a much higher price. In a nutshell- if one must have a brand new car they must set aside a chunk of money every month to pay for eventual repairs after factory warranty. Even if they buy an aftermarket warranty they better be able to pony up big $$ as Car Shield and the others will find a reason to deny repairs.

Hyundai's warranty is probably the best in the business. 5/60 basic warranty and a 10/100 power train warranty.

Do shop around if possible. We had been going to one practitioner for 25+ years and trusted them. She quoted 8K for an implant on the wife. we had it done as we trusted her. After Covid her quality of care seemed to change and the prices of course went up. I was referred to another by a friend. A bit younger but very nice, explains everything, your choices, and their pro and cons. HMM the same as I did with my customers and about 30-40% less. OK so I gave them a try,
Recently the wife cracked a tooth and needed /wanted another implant. Pretty much the same as the first (IE; same type/location of tooth, no major complications etc.) 3200.00 Guess I won't be needing that colonoscopy 🤣. And the kicker is my wife who is not overly fond of having dental work done is more comfortable with the new one