Latest / Money And Wealth With John Hope Bryant / Money & Wealth Replay: The Dangers Of Car Dealerships w/ Tony Marzullo

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Money & Wealth Replay: The Dangers Of Car Dealerships w/ Tony Marzullo · Money And Wealth With John Hope Bryant

0:00
Speaker 1: Welcome to Money and Wealth with John O'Brien, a production
0:03
Speaker 1: of the Black Effect Podcast Network and iHeartRadio. Hey, hey,
0:15
Speaker 1: this is John O'Brien and this is Money and Wealth
0:18
Speaker 1: on the Black Effect Network and we're at iHeart Atlanta
0:23
Speaker 1: headquarters today because today I bring in my first official guest.
0:31
Speaker 1: Now that must mean this dude is pretty special. Could
0:33
Speaker 1: be a lady, by the way. In this particular case,
0:36
Speaker 1: it's a dude. It's my dude. It's my friend, Tony Marzullo.
0:41
Speaker 1: Tony Marzullo, who I've known for about 15 years, is
0:47
Speaker 1: a car aficionado. And we're going to talk about pimping today. No, no,
0:51
Speaker 1: not that kind of pimping. We're talking about those in
0:55
Speaker 1: the automotive industry who buy here, pay here, basically finance here,
1:00
Speaker 1: and then I would say repossess here. I'm getting ahead
1:04
Speaker 1: of myself. This is going to be an on and
1:07
Speaker 1: popping episode. So everybody, I want you to tune in
1:11
Speaker 1: and tell your friends and sit back with a cup
1:14
Speaker 1: of tea and let's have a real conversation about how
1:19
Speaker 1: things work. Now, you know, I would say if I
1:21
Speaker 1: was in front of you, something other than how things work,
1:24
Speaker 1: you can figure the rest of it out. How stuff works,
1:27
Speaker 1: how does this economy work? Like, we're going to unpack
1:29
Speaker 1: all of this. We're going to demystify the economy, demystify
1:34
Speaker 1: free enterprise and capitalism. And I talked in an early
1:38
Speaker 1: episode about, generally speaking, how the automotive industry works at
1:42
Speaker 1: the car dealership level. I talked in general terms about
1:47
Speaker 1: the three businesses within a car dealership, the part that
1:51
Speaker 1: sells the car, the part that finances the car, the
1:55
Speaker 1: part that maintains the car. but I'm not a car guy.
1:58
Speaker 1: I'm not, I mean, I'm a car guy. I don't
2:00
Speaker 1: own a car dealership. I don't own, I'm not in
2:02
Speaker 1: the business. We have credibility walking in front of us.
2:05
Speaker 1: This is one of the good guys. His name is
2:08
Speaker 1: Tony Marzullo. He is the proprietor, the owner of Gas
2:11
Speaker 1: Motorcars in Marietta, Georgia. I have bought and sold more
2:16
Speaker 1: cars with him and through him than I'd like to admit.
2:20
Speaker 1: There's also a really cool story that will tell about
2:23
Speaker 1: a group of cars, a bunch of cars I bought
2:24
Speaker 1: at one time when I just called him out of
2:26
Speaker 1: the blue one day. We'll talk about that. But let's
2:28
Speaker 1: talk about him first. Then we're going to get into
2:29
Speaker 1: something really, really inspiring in the midst of this drama
2:35
Speaker 1: and tragedy that's so bad, even the LA Times wrote
2:38
Speaker 1: a three-part series on this buy here, pay here business. Now,
2:43
Speaker 1: by the way, is everybody in this business bad people?
2:45
Speaker 1: Of course not. Are there good people in this business?
2:47
Speaker 1: Of course there are. There are good people in the
2:49
Speaker 1: check cashing business. There's good people in the payday lending business.
2:52
Speaker 1: There's good people in almost every sector. That's not who
2:56
Speaker 1: we're talking about today. So let's talk about one of
3:01
Speaker 1: the good guys, Tony Marzullo. You've been in the business
3:04
Speaker 1: for 25 years? 25 years. And tell me a little
3:08
Speaker 1: bit about where, I know you think you're honorary black
3:11
Speaker 1: or something, but you're Jewish, right? Half Jewish, half Italian,
3:14
Speaker 1: black by adoption. Who adopted you other than me? You.
3:18
Speaker 2: But I did do the 23andMe and it says I
3:20
Speaker 2: am 1% African. So it's in there somewhere.
3:23
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah. That accounts for your coolness factor. He's my
3:26
Speaker 1: brother from another mother. I love this dude. He's smart
3:29
Speaker 1: as a whip. And funny. I mean, not intentionally funny,
3:34
Speaker 1: like irreverent funny. Like, get out of my face. I'm
3:37
Speaker 1: tired of talking to you kind of funny. Like, was
3:41
Speaker 1: that just disrespectful? Did he just... Was he actually rude? Yeah,
3:45
Speaker 1: not only rude, he's gone. Like, he hung the phone up. Like, look,
3:49
Speaker 1: I have a customer in front of me. Goodbye. Click. So...
3:54
Speaker 1: This is a really good guy. And we're talking about
3:56
Speaker 1: a really bad set of business practices that luckily does
4:00
Speaker 1: not include him. You may not like Tony Marzullo, but
4:03
Speaker 1: you'll never say he tried to screw you. And that's
4:05
Speaker 1: a really important part of life. Now, we're talking about pimping.
4:09
Speaker 1: We're not talking about the pimping that happened when I
4:11
Speaker 1: grew up in South Central LA or Compton. We're not
4:14
Speaker 1: talking about that kind of pimping. We're talking about financial pimping.
4:16
Speaker 1: We're talking about people who are this car industry, the
4:19
Speaker 1: part of the car industry where you buy here, finance here,
4:23
Speaker 1: pay here, and I'll add gets repoed here, get the
4:27
Speaker 1: car back here. And they love it. This is the
4:30
Speaker 1: business model we're going to talk about where these companies
4:32
Speaker 1: actually love when they take back the car. Most lenders
4:35
Speaker 1: don't want to take back the car. That's how they
4:37
Speaker 1: make their money. But this is a whole different situation. Now,
4:39
Speaker 1: let me clarify. We're not talking about everybody in the
4:43
Speaker 1: automobile industry. We're not talking about most people in the
4:46
Speaker 1: automobile industry. We're not talking about most people in the
4:49
Speaker 1: secondary industry. automobile industry. We're talking about a select group
4:54
Speaker 1: of people who prey on folks who are financially illiterate,
4:58
Speaker 1: who have too much month at the end of their money,
5:01
Speaker 1: who have broad, big, deep aspirations, maybe some challenges with
5:05
Speaker 1: self-esteem that gets communicated through their credit card or their
5:10
Speaker 1: car they're buying or whatever because they want to feel
5:12
Speaker 1: good about themselves. Nothing wrong with that. But somebody's taking
5:15
Speaker 1: advantage of that. And that angers me. And it also
5:20
Speaker 1: angers my brother, Tony. And we were just talking about
5:22
Speaker 1: this last week. And I'm like, we got to talk
5:25
Speaker 1: about this on the show. But before we get into that,
5:27
Speaker 1: let's get into you just real quickly. Why do you
5:29
Speaker 1: give a dang? Why do you, by the way, nice watch.
5:33
Speaker 1: Why do you care, man? Like you can always tell,
5:36
Speaker 1: by the way, a really rich dude, he's got on
5:38
Speaker 1: a raggedy t-shirt. You know, a secondary hat. This hat
5:42
Speaker 1: has his logo on it, of course, and he just
5:45
Speaker 1: promoted it. He's got on some raggedy jeans and some
5:49
Speaker 1: not impressive shoes and a great watch. And no jewelry,
5:53
Speaker 1: no nothing else, but you can guarantee the watch is banging, right?
5:57
Speaker 1: That's how you can tell a really, really rich dude, right?
6:00
Speaker 1: And I guarantee this is not Tony's only watch. I'm
6:03
Speaker 1: talking about multiple. Okay, we'll stop picking on. So tell me,
6:06
Speaker 1: how did you become like a decent human being? Your
6:08
Speaker 1: wife is kind and gracious. She's got more ADD than
6:11
Speaker 1: you though. That's hard to do, but she's kind and gracious.
6:14
Speaker 1: Your kids are really respectful and kind. And I was
6:17
Speaker 1: happy to come to, what was the official? I don't
6:20
Speaker 1: want to say it. It wasn't a bar mitzvah. Bar mitzvah.
6:22
Speaker 1: Bar mitzvah. So I got it right with your daughter,
6:26
Speaker 1: which was beautiful. And I haven't met one jerk around
6:29
Speaker 1: you that, that is associated with you. Everybody I've met, your,
6:33
Speaker 1: your village is my village. They're kind of my kind
6:35
Speaker 1: of people just met Craig at Butler Tire, just a
6:38
Speaker 1: really cool guy. Right. So where'd your decency come from?
6:43
Speaker 2: You know, and I think growing up, um, in Atlanta
6:46
Speaker 2: being native Atlanta and then, and then owning and operating
6:49
Speaker 2: a business in Atlanta for 25 years, I'm constantly surrounded
6:53
Speaker 2: by other people in my village. And I kind of
6:56
Speaker 2: lived by, um, a sense of meaning and a code
7:02
Speaker 2: of ethics where I didn't want to ever have a
7:04
Speaker 2: hard time sleeping at night.
7:06
Speaker 1: So I kind of just make the decisions, multiple.
7:10
Speaker 2: Decisions every day, knowing that I'm doing the right thing
7:13
Speaker 2: because I don't want to get woken up in the
7:15
Speaker 2: middle of the night thinking I didn't do the right thing.
7:17
Speaker 2: And I also have family that's here, and the last
7:19
Speaker 2: thing I ever wanted to hear was, hey, I had
7:23
Speaker 2: dinner with this guy last night. He says he bought
7:26
Speaker 2: a car from you a couple weeks ago, and you
7:28
Speaker 2: screwed him. I don't need that coming back to me.
7:31
Speaker 1: Bad juju, bad karma. Bad karma, bad juju. You don't
7:36
Speaker 1: have any bad juju. You want to make sure that
7:39
Speaker 1: your karma is cool. So that's one answer to why
7:43
Speaker 1: you operate. But that really wasn't the question I was
7:44
Speaker 1: asking you. You're giving yourself a lot of credit for
7:48
Speaker 1: running a good business. You're not responsible for you. your
7:53
Speaker 1: parents or somebody, somebody made you a good dude. Like
7:56
Speaker 1: there was somebody who, I'm not giving you that credit.
7:59
Speaker 1: Who in your life made you decent? Definitely my parents. Yeah.
8:03
Speaker 2: My dad was an entrepreneur. He was a pharmacist, independent pharmacist.
8:07
Speaker 2: Also always did the right thing.
8:09
Speaker 1: His name was John. Okay. Always did the right thing.
8:12
Speaker 2: Sometimes people would come in and they didn't have enough
8:15
Speaker 2: money for their copay, for their prescription. And he would
8:17
Speaker 2: just give it to him anyways and say, just pay
8:18
Speaker 2: me back when you have the money. So, and I
8:20
Speaker 2: used to work there as a kid and I kind of,
8:23
Speaker 2: I just picked up on that. And then his father,
8:26
Speaker 2: whose name was Paul, one time we had a religious conversation.
8:31
Speaker 2: I had a Jewish mom, I had a strict Italian
8:33
Speaker 2: Catholic dad, and I had a grandfather who didn't really
8:36
Speaker 2: believe in God. And I asked him one time, I said,
8:38
Speaker 2: what's up with that? And he said, God's not going
8:41
Speaker 2: to tell me how I should or should not live
8:44
Speaker 2: my life. It was just be a good person, do
8:47
Speaker 2: good things, and don't be an a-hole.
8:49
Speaker 1: Don't be a jerk.
8:50
Speaker 2: And don't be, it just stuck. And that's just kind
8:52
Speaker 2: of how I've always done it. And that's kind of
8:55
Speaker 2: what I try to instill in the guys that are
8:56
Speaker 2: working for me at the dealership.
8:58
Speaker 1: I just do the right thing. It's easier. There's plenty.
9:04
Speaker 1: And it's profitable to do the right thing.
9:06
Speaker 2: It's a huge pie with a lot of pieces and
9:09
Speaker 2: everybody can eat, especially in the Atlanta market with the
9:12
Speaker 2: high-end luxury car market. Everybody can eat. There's no reason
9:16
Speaker 2: to cut corners. There's no reason to not just do
9:18
Speaker 2: the right thing to make just that little bit more
9:21
Speaker 2: money because eventually it runs its course and that karma
9:25
Speaker 2: does come back and karma's a bitch. It'll come back
9:28
Speaker 2: and it'll get you. So yeah, we just sleep good
9:31
Speaker 2: at night doing things the right way.
9:33
Speaker 1: So on that point, again, not everybody in this business
9:39
Speaker 1: are bad people, but there are some real pieces of
9:42
Speaker 1: work out here. that are playing folks in this whole
9:45
Speaker 1: buy here, pay here, finance here. I would add repossess
9:49
Speaker 1: here business. Um, again, LA times just did a three
9:53
Speaker 1: part series, not just did, but did a three part
9:54
Speaker 1: series on this, which I'll make sure that, people can
9:59
Speaker 1: get a link on so they can read it. But
10:02
Speaker 1: you had a personal experience that sort of woke you up.
10:06
Speaker 1: You called me last week and told me about this
10:09
Speaker 1: situation with this young lady. I think she's African-American? Correct.
10:13
Speaker 1: And she came into the dealership, is that right? No.
10:17
Speaker 2: So I'm involved with and have been for many years
10:20
Speaker 2: involved with a charity called Giving Grace. And that's exactly
10:23
Speaker 2: what they do is they give grace to people who
10:24
Speaker 2: are just down on their luck and having a hard
10:27
Speaker 2: time getting grace. And it may be something as minuscule
10:34
Speaker 2: as somebody's $ 30.
10:36
Speaker 1: Short on their rent.
10:38
Speaker 2: And if they can't come up with the $ 30 by
10:39
Speaker 2: tomorrow morning, they're going to be homeless. And I've been
10:44
Speaker 2: involved because... you know, a few dollars here and a
10:46
Speaker 2: few dollars there when you have an aggregate and a
10:48
Speaker 2: whole bunch of people giving that $ 30 here, $ 30, it
10:51
Speaker 2: adds up. And it, I think has been impactful. I
10:53
Speaker 2: know it's been impactful and it's helped lots of people.
10:55
Speaker 2: So given the fact that what I do for a
10:57
Speaker 2: living and have been doing for 25 years, I'm kind
11:00
Speaker 2: of the go-to for when these people that need grace
11:04
Speaker 2: and it's, it's the majority are single moms. And if
11:08
Speaker 2: they need help with something automotive, anything automotive that could
11:12
Speaker 2: be We have a mom that needs a set of tires.
11:15
Speaker 2: She can't drive her car to work safely anymore. I've
11:18
Speaker 2: kind of fallen on that sword and said, you know what?
11:19
Speaker 2: When stuff like that comes up automotive, you guys call
11:21
Speaker 2: me and as much as.
11:24
Speaker 1: I can do, I will do.
11:25
Speaker 2: Cause I do feel that giving back is, is, is
11:28
Speaker 2: the best way to live your life. I think everything
11:30
Speaker 2: comes full circle and you pay it forward.
11:33
Speaker 1: So. Specifically to my phone call to you last week.
11:36
Speaker 1: By the way, it's not like you have 9,000 employees
11:39
Speaker 1: in five locations. You have one primary location. How many employees?
11:42
Speaker 1: Small family run operation. We've got a dozen employees. Right.
11:46
Speaker 1: But four or five primary employees that I see around there. Yeah. Yeah.
11:50
Speaker 2: We have in our, in our main office, the kind
11:52
Speaker 2: of the front of the house sales office, we've got
11:54
Speaker 2: three dedicated sales guys, an internet guy and a back
11:57
Speaker 2: office manager.
11:58
Speaker 1: The point of this is you don't have to be
11:59
Speaker 1: a big business to be philanthropic and charitable. You can be,
12:02
Speaker 1: most businesses in America are small businesses and Tony's showing
12:04
Speaker 1: you can do it as a small business. So, all right.
12:06
Speaker 1: So this, this, you run in this, this, uh, situation.
12:10
Speaker 2: I get a phone call from someone involved with the
12:12
Speaker 2: charity that says, we've got a single mom. She's got
12:15
Speaker 2: a vehicle that needs an engine. And we feel that
12:19
Speaker 2: the cost of the engine is, is in excess of
12:21
Speaker 2: the value of the car. Can you step in and
12:24
Speaker 2: try to help this person out? And I said, sure,
12:28
Speaker 2: get the, get her on the phone, get the details
12:29
Speaker 2: of the story. And a short, and there's no way
12:31
Speaker 2: a short version of this story. So here is a
12:34
Speaker 2: lovely young woman who has it together. In my opinion,
12:38
Speaker 2: has a job is doing the best she can.
12:41
Speaker 1: Um, may not be financially literate. Let's just be, let's
12:44
Speaker 1: just say she's, Not financially literate. Like many people.
12:48
Speaker 2: Like many people. And told me a story. And this
12:52
Speaker 2: is how the story goes. In 2018, she needed an automobile.
12:57
Speaker 2: She had a job. She needed a new car. Her
13:00
Speaker 2: credit score did not put her in a position where
13:03
Speaker 2: she could go to a mainstream... tier one type of facility.
13:08
Speaker 1: I don't know why you're being so polite. Her credit score,
13:11
Speaker 1: her credit was toe up from the floor.
13:14
Speaker 2: I didn't get her credit score, honestly, but I'm going
13:16
Speaker 2: to assume it was totally jacked up.
13:17
Speaker 1: This is not how he talks to me, by the way,
13:19
Speaker 1: when he's off camera. He's being very sweet. But anyway,
13:20
Speaker 1: she's a nice lady, sweet lady, but credit was toe up.
13:22
Speaker 1: Sweet lady with bad credit. Which doesn't make her a
13:25
Speaker 1: bad person. Doesn't make her a bad person.
13:27
Speaker 2: Just maybe had a bad financial decision at some point
13:30
Speaker 2: in time in her life. And she bought a vehicle
13:33
Speaker 2: in 2018 she bought a three-year-old automobile from a from
13:38
Speaker 2: a buy here pay here a lot one of the
13:39
Speaker 2: larger ones in the country So not a not a
13:42
Speaker 2: small one Kind of corner a lot.
13:44
Speaker 1: This is a massive.
13:45
Speaker 2: It's an operation massive operation It's all the billions and
13:48
Speaker 2: billions of dollars in revenue and and I'm not saying
13:50
Speaker 2: all people within the organization are bad or The organization
13:53
Speaker 2: as a whole isn't bad. There are bad apples and
13:55
Speaker 2: there are bad players in that game. So she buys
13:58
Speaker 2: a car for $ 21, 000 is what I recall.
14:02
Speaker 1: Now, listeners, I want you to now pay close attention
14:05
Speaker 1: to these numbers. This was 2018. She buys a car.
14:10
Speaker 1: She's a mother, right? She's a mom. She's a mom.
14:12
Speaker 1: She's got a job. She's not doing lazy about her.
14:16
Speaker 1: She's doing her thing. She's being responsible. She's paying her taxes.
14:19
Speaker 1: She's a great American citizen who just needs transportation. She
14:22
Speaker 1: buys this. She goes to the lot. She trusts these people.
14:24
Speaker 1: She spends $ 18, 000 hard-earned. 18,000? I think 21. 21,000 in 2018.
14:29
Speaker 2: It happened in 2018, yeah. And buys a three-year-old Nissan Altima,
14:36
Speaker 2: I believe. And I don't recall what the mileage was.
14:40
Speaker 2: Finances it. I don't even know what the term was.
14:43
Speaker 2: I just know that where we were at as of
14:44
Speaker 2: a week ago was she had been paying $ 500 a
14:47
Speaker 2: month at a 27% interest rate.
14:48
Speaker 1: Wowzers. Wow, wow, wow. 27%. My eyes just watered. Every
14:57
Speaker 1: two weeks. Every two weeks? Every two weeks. No, no, no.
15:00
Speaker 2: It was just $ 250 every two weeks. So she was
15:02
Speaker 2: paying $ 500 a month. So COVID hit. She lost her job,
15:06
Speaker 2: which a lot of people did. She got behind in
15:09
Speaker 2: her payments. Instead of repossessing the vehicle, they just added
15:14
Speaker 2: an exorbitant amount of late fees and penalty fees and
15:18
Speaker 2: put it back into the loan. Therefore, it's accruing interest
15:21
Speaker 2: and compounding on the penalties as well.
15:24
Speaker 1: So let me translate what he just said in English.
15:28
Speaker 1: So she owed $ 2 and then she, on the loan,
15:32
Speaker 1: she owed another 50 cents on unpaid balance because she
15:38
Speaker 1: had lost her job. They charged interest on the 50 cents,
15:43
Speaker 1: compounding on a 27% plus fees and product acceleration fees
15:49
Speaker 1: tied to a default. And they compounded that on top
15:54
Speaker 1: of compounding that on top of compounding that on the
15:57
Speaker 1: original $ 2 that was owned. So you can get rich
16:01
Speaker 1: quick on compounding and you can go broke quick on compounding.
16:04
Speaker 1: Or as you guys have heard me say, you make
16:07
Speaker 1: money during the day, you build wealth in your sleep.
16:11
Speaker 1: And if you hang around nine broke people, you'll be
16:13
Speaker 1: the 10th. And so if you're compounding in the reverse direction,
16:18
Speaker 1: you go broke real quick. Think about sharecropping. Like no
16:22
Speaker 1: matter how hard our ancestors worked back in the day,
16:27
Speaker 1: oddly enough, you just never made enough money to earn
16:30
Speaker 1: a profit beyond what it costs for the supplies on
16:35
Speaker 1: the farm you're on. And you certainly never earn enough
16:38
Speaker 1: to buy, get out of debt with the owner of
16:42
Speaker 1: the farm, let alone try to buy the property, which
16:45
Speaker 1: was the original deal. This is a sort of a
16:47
Speaker 1: modern day version of that. That's just prettied up. So
16:51
Speaker 1: she buys a car in 2018, $ 21, 000. And Jesus, six
16:59
Speaker 1: years later. Six years later, she still owes $ 15, 000 on
17:05
Speaker 1: this car. And she bought it for $ 21, 000. Correct. This
17:08
Speaker 1: is unbelievable.
17:10
Speaker 2: She claimed that her total amount of payments thus far
17:12
Speaker 2: were $ 38, 000. Once you include the penalties and the interest
17:17
Speaker 2: and the late fees.
17:18
Speaker 1: So I, again, Tony, slow roll that for me again. Wait,
17:21
Speaker 1: I need everybody, don't veer off the road when you
17:24
Speaker 1: hear this, pull over and listen. This is crazy. You
17:27
Speaker 1: heard this properly. The principal balance has gone down since
17:31
Speaker 1: 2018 about $ 6, 000. She's paid- $ 38, 000. $ 38, 000. The annual interest
17:32
Speaker 1: rate is 27%. You literally can't get out of this.
17:47
Speaker 2: No, she could have bought a Maserati instead. Literally, for
17:50
Speaker 2: that kind of money, $ 38, 000 already paid, still has a-
17:53
Speaker 2: Brand new with a warranty, by the way. Yeah, still
17:55
Speaker 2: has a balance of 15,000.
17:57
Speaker 1: So do the math. And then the engine fell out.
18:00
Speaker 2: And the engine fell out. So the cost of replacing
18:03
Speaker 2: the engine is about $ 5, 000. The car's fair market value today,
18:07
Speaker 2: just using standard automotive metrics to do fair market values,
18:12
Speaker 2: five grand.
18:13
Speaker 1: So the engine- Cost is the vehicle cost. Correct.
18:17
Speaker 2: Or in excess of, because just the end, the engine
18:19
Speaker 2: was not the only problem. She also told us that
18:22
Speaker 2: the car has just been nothing but a problem since
18:23
Speaker 2: the day she had it, but she was, she's kind
18:26
Speaker 2: of chained to it. She didn't have a lot of
18:28
Speaker 2: options and, and to get this car and to go
18:31
Speaker 2: with this company that would approve her and put her
18:34
Speaker 2: in this share.
18:35
Speaker 1: Cropping style loan, she's tied to him.
18:39
Speaker 2: So she starts getting threatening phone calls and emails that
18:42
Speaker 2: they're going to finally come repossess the car.
18:45
Speaker 1: They immobilize the vehicle. Oh, they can do that remotely.
18:48
Speaker 1: They can do it remotely.
18:49
Speaker 2: I had offered to fix the car. So from a
18:52
Speaker 2: philanthropy point of view, what was I going to do
18:54
Speaker 2: for her to help? I have a network of really,
18:57
Speaker 2: really good mechanics all over the city of Atlanta that
18:59
Speaker 2: are willing to help people that need it and deserve it.
19:03
Speaker 2: And I was just going to have a friend of
19:04
Speaker 2: mine that owns a shop help fix the car. And
19:08
Speaker 2: I was going to pay whatever it costs. So whether
19:11
Speaker 2: it's replacing an engine, fixing the engine, diagnosing what else
19:15
Speaker 2: could be potentially wrong with the car. I was willing
19:16
Speaker 2: to do that to keep her on the road because
19:18
Speaker 2: guess what? If she doesn't have wheels, she can't get
19:20
Speaker 2: to work. She can't get to work, she ain't going
19:22
Speaker 2: to have a job. If she doesn't have a job,
19:23
Speaker 2: she's not going to be able to pay her rent.
19:25
Speaker 2: Then she's going to be homeless again. She did tell
19:27
Speaker 2: me she has been homeless twice in her life.
19:28
Speaker 1: Wow. So I donated a car to her that we had. Whoa, whoa, whoa.
19:34
Speaker 1: Back up. Hold on. Run that by me again? You're
19:40
Speaker 1: a for-profit business, right? I'm a for-profit business. You're a capitalist, right?
19:44
Speaker 1: You're a capitalist. I'm a capitalist, but I felt that
19:47
Speaker 1: it was the right thing to do. You always charge
19:49
Speaker 1: me full. freight. Yeah, but I didn't donate her a Bentley.
19:52
Speaker 2: I donated a car that could get her from A
19:56
Speaker 2: to B.
19:56
Speaker 1: It's not pretty to look at.
19:57
Speaker 2: It's something that we bought years ago to use as
20:00
Speaker 2: an extra vehicle, like a shop vehicle.
20:02
Speaker 1: Right.
20:02
Speaker 2: Because it was more cost-effective. for her and for me,
20:05
Speaker 2: for me to do that, then try to fix her car,
20:07
Speaker 2: which she'll never get out of.
20:09
Speaker 1: It's also very sweet of you, Tony. Never get out
20:11
Speaker 1: of the car. Did you hear what I said, Tony?
20:14
Speaker 1: I appreciate that. I know that people think you're just
20:16
Speaker 1: a hard-nosed business person, but that's actually, let's just take
20:19
Speaker 1: a moment. I'm a softie. That was very sweet.
20:23
Speaker 2: And there's a couple other pieces to this puzzle. So, yeah,
20:25
Speaker 2: I mean, the business model is, and once again, preface,
20:29
Speaker 2: not everybody that's in the subprime, buy here, pay here,
20:34
Speaker 2: arena are all bad. But specific to this one most
20:40
Speaker 2: recent case that I've heard about, I know how the
20:42
Speaker 2: business works. They sold her a car that was not
20:45
Speaker 2: good from the get-go. That car, when it breaks and
20:49
Speaker 2: they know it's going to break, this person, she, or
20:54
Speaker 2: anybody else in a similar situation is faced with some
20:57
Speaker 2: really awful decisions. You're living paycheck to paycheck. Your car
21:01
Speaker 2: needs to be fixed. So what do you do? Do
21:04
Speaker 2: you put the money towards fixing the car so you
21:07
Speaker 2: can still get to work, but then you're not going
21:08
Speaker 2: to be able to make a car payment, at which
21:10
Speaker 2: time they'll repossess the car, charge you storage fees, flatbed fees,
21:14
Speaker 2: repossession fees, and then you got to go get the
21:16
Speaker 2: car back anyways. That's option one. Option two, they repossess
21:20
Speaker 2: the car. You don't ever come up with the fees.
21:23
Speaker 2: the money to get the car back. Then they just
21:25
Speaker 2: sell it to somebody else, do it all over again.
21:26
Speaker 1: And they jam up your credit in the midst of
21:28
Speaker 1: all this. Correct. Which makes a bad situation.
21:30
Speaker 2: Makes it even harder to get another car.
21:32
Speaker 1: You look like a deadbeat. Reality was you were set
21:35
Speaker 1: up to fail from day one. This is modern day sharecropping.
21:39
Speaker 2: Odds are stacked against anyone that gets into these types
21:42
Speaker 2: of equations. And when we're talking, I'm hoping I can
21:46
Speaker 2: give some insight on how to, if you are listening
21:49
Speaker 2: and you are someone that does have terrible credit, You
21:53
Speaker 2: don't have to be scared of going to all buy here,
21:55
Speaker 2: pay here lots. There just is, there is a standard
21:58
Speaker 2: operating procedure when buying any car that should be applied
22:01
Speaker 2: when buying these types of cars. And she did none
22:02
Speaker 2: of those. And I'll get to that in a second.
22:04
Speaker 1: Let's take a sanity break for a minute. So Tony
22:17
Speaker 1: is about to get into the both deeper good and
22:21
Speaker 1: deeper bad on this situation. But what I want, everybody
22:24
Speaker 1: listening to this and watching this to understand is this.
22:27
Speaker 1: In every situation, you have a table, and on the
22:29
Speaker 1: one side you have, let's just call it the capitalist.
22:32
Speaker 1: On the other side, you have the consumer. The capitalist's
22:34
Speaker 1: job is to extract as much money from you as
22:37
Speaker 1: they can, the highest price, while delivering the least value
22:41
Speaker 1: for that thing. That's their job, to make a profit.
22:44
Speaker 1: Your job is to extract the most value from the capitalist,
22:49
Speaker 1: the producer, the entrepreneur, the manufacturer, whatever, the seller, for
22:53
Speaker 1: the least price. You want to get the least price
22:56
Speaker 1: with the most value. They want to get the most,
22:58
Speaker 1: the biggest price with the least value. This is called
23:00
Speaker 1: a negotiation. And it happens all the time. It's just
23:05
Speaker 1: when you go into a store, it's pre-negotiated. The store
23:08
Speaker 1: has come up with, through research, what that price is
23:11
Speaker 1: that they think is the sweet spot that you're going
23:14
Speaker 1: to buy that thing from. But when you're going to
23:17
Speaker 1: do something that is emotional... Oftentimes people play on your
23:22
Speaker 1: emotions and you add on financial illiteracy. So they want
23:26
Speaker 1: to play on your intellectual or financial ignorance, emotions, ignorance,
23:30
Speaker 1: low self-esteem, desperation, whatever. And whenever you make a decision emotionally,
23:35
Speaker 1: it's a bad decision. Now you have an unweighted or
23:39
Speaker 1: a out of balance negotiation because the person on the
23:42
Speaker 1: other side, the capitalist in this example, is practicing bad capitalism.
23:47
Speaker 1: They know they can prey on you. They do. That's
23:51
Speaker 1: what Tony's about to explain. But don't get mad at
23:53
Speaker 1: folks for doing what is their mission to do. It
23:59
Speaker 1: is your mission to get the lowest price and the
24:01
Speaker 1: highest value. It is their mission to get the highest
24:03
Speaker 1: value and extract the lowest... Well, the highest price and
24:08
Speaker 1: the lowest value. And a great negotiation is when both
24:12
Speaker 1: people leave sort of unhappy. Because that's probably a pretty
24:16
Speaker 1: good deal, right? Nobody got... uh, hosed and nobody got rich. Uh,
24:23
Speaker 1: it was, uh, you know, an okay deal. And that's
24:26
Speaker 1: not what he's about to describe, but don't get mad
24:28
Speaker 1: at like how the world works. That's just how the
24:31
Speaker 1: world works. And it, by the way, if it doesn't
24:33
Speaker 1: work that way, if he can't make a profit, then
24:34
Speaker 1: he can't pay his employees. His employees can't pay their rent.
24:37
Speaker 1: They can't pay their car note. They can't go to
24:39
Speaker 1: a restaurant. The restaurant goes broke. The car, the car
24:42
Speaker 1: lot goes broke. The state goes broke. Cause there's no taxes.
24:45
Speaker 1: I mean, we all need the system to work, but,
24:49
Speaker 1: but we don't need the system to be working us, right?
24:51
Speaker 1: So this is a system that was working over this lady.
24:54
Speaker 1: And now you're in the middle of this thing. Back
24:57
Speaker 1: to you. Yeah.
24:58
Speaker 2: So back to what I was saying, I feel so
25:01
Speaker 2: terrible that because of financial literacy, people get in that
25:05
Speaker 2: type of position. So do I make the car payment
25:08
Speaker 2: and keep the car? Do I fix it and can't
25:11
Speaker 2: make the car payment? Do I make the car payment
25:13
Speaker 2: and fix the car and not pay rent? and potentially
25:16
Speaker 2: get kicked out of mass. You're screwed anyway, but.
25:18
Speaker 1: There's no way out of it.
25:19
Speaker 2: And, and, you know, so for this specific individual, we
25:24
Speaker 2: felt it was the best move for her to just
25:26
Speaker 2: give the car back, just give it back and start over.
25:30
Speaker 1: And that's what we did. Gave her a car. Did
25:33
Speaker 1: you try to negotiate with this company?
25:34
Speaker 2: I did not. I, I, I, I coached her on
25:37
Speaker 2: how to try to negotiate once was getting the, also
25:41
Speaker 2: to the point of getting the car, uh, unimmobilized so
25:44
Speaker 2: I could actually get it to a shop and get
25:46
Speaker 2: it diagnosed and see if it's actually fixed.
25:47
Speaker 1: Immobilized means that the car dealer, the car seller can
25:51
Speaker 1: basically turn the car off while you're driving it. Correct.
25:55
Speaker 2: Yeah, that way it makes it easier for them to
25:57
Speaker 2: repossess the car and then sell it to somebody else
25:59
Speaker 2: and do the same thing all over again.
26:01
Speaker 1: So....
26:04
Speaker 2: It's sad because not only did she not understand the
26:07
Speaker 2: contract she was getting into when she bought the car new,
26:10
Speaker 2: she also didn't know what she was buying because she
26:13
Speaker 2: didn't really do any research on who she was buying
26:17
Speaker 2: it from or what she was buying, which has two
26:20
Speaker 2: key parts as to how she got in that position.
26:22
Speaker 2: She bought a car that really wasn't that great out.
26:23
Speaker 1: Of the gate. It was a piece of crap. Yes, they,
26:27
Speaker 1: or it could have been, but what I'm getting.
26:29
Speaker 2: At is a lot of these vehicles that are sold
26:33
Speaker 2: at these types of places are designed to fail. And
26:36
Speaker 2: the sooner they fail, the sooner they get repossessed and
26:38
Speaker 2: sold to somebody else that they will fail on. So
26:40
Speaker 2: from an advisor point of view, what I can do
26:44
Speaker 2: to offer advice to anybody else who's in this position
26:46
Speaker 2: is if you're going to buy a car, no matter
26:48
Speaker 2: where you're buying it from, whether it is a new
26:51
Speaker 2: car franchise Honda store or a buy here, pay here lot,
26:55
Speaker 2: have a third party inspect the car and tell you
26:57
Speaker 2: what you're buying. If you're an automotive mechanic, great, check
27:00
Speaker 2: it out yourself. But most people buying these cars at
27:02
Speaker 2: these types of places are not mechanics.
27:04
Speaker 1: I'm not a mechanic.
27:04
Speaker 2: When I go buy a car, I get it checked out.
27:07
Speaker 2: When I buy cars that we're going to sell at
27:10
Speaker 2: our dealership for profit, I get them checked out before
27:13
Speaker 2: I buy them because you know why? If I get
27:15
Speaker 2: them checked out and they're really good, I'm going to
27:17
Speaker 2: make more profit. If I get them checked out and
27:19
Speaker 2: they're really bad, I buy them for less or I
27:21
Speaker 2: don't buy them at all. Thus, I don't put myself
27:23
Speaker 2: in a position where I'm not profitable.
27:26
Speaker 1: Or somebody says that you sold me a lemon. Correct.
27:29
Speaker 1: So what happened with this lady?
27:31
Speaker 2: I imagine the car has now been officially repossessed and
27:34
Speaker 2: they have or are in the process of selling it
27:36
Speaker 2: to somebody else. I got her a car. But this
27:37
Speaker 2: is another thing about being- You donated a car to her.
27:41
Speaker 1: I gave it to her. Yeah.
27:42
Speaker 2: She didn't lose her job. No strings attached.
27:45
Speaker 1: It's her car.
27:46
Speaker 2: She's driving it to work. Not only did I donate
27:48
Speaker 2: her car to her, when the subject matter of insurance
27:52
Speaker 2: came up, because legally I can't sell a car that
27:54
Speaker 2: doesn't have an insurance. And I sold the car. Theoretically,
27:56
Speaker 2: I sold the car for a dollar.
27:57
Speaker 1: Right.
27:58
Speaker 2: So I informed her the night before she was going
28:01
Speaker 2: to come pick up the car that she would need
28:02
Speaker 2: to have insurance. She has to be legally insured in
28:06
Speaker 2: Georgia to drive a car.
28:07
Speaker 1: There's certain limits. She said, okay, fine. People listen to this.
28:12
Speaker 2: And she showed up the next morning and I said,
28:14
Speaker 2: do you have insurance? She kind of gave me a
28:16
Speaker 2: face and I said, so what's up? She said, I
28:19
Speaker 2: found a company I can get insurance with, but I
28:21
Speaker 2: can't pay for it yet because I don't get my
28:23
Speaker 2: paycheck till the 17th. This is last week. I said,
28:26
Speaker 2: how much is it? She says, it's $ 290 a month.
28:28
Speaker 2: I said, fine, I'll pay for it. So you're legally,
28:31
Speaker 2: because I have some liability. I didn't want her driving
28:34
Speaker 2: around in an uninsured car and you can pay me
28:36
Speaker 2: back when you want. Or no, no, I just said,
28:38
Speaker 2: I'll just pay for it. And then she said, Well,
28:40
Speaker 2: I get paid on the 17th. And on the 17th,
28:42
Speaker 2: I can come give you the money for the insurance.
28:43
Speaker 2: I said, that's up to you. I don't expect you
28:46
Speaker 2: to do it. And I don't want you to do it.
28:47
Speaker 2: But if you feel it's what you need to do,
28:48
Speaker 2: then sure, come back.
28:50
Speaker 1: And by the way, everybody, you have to have at
28:52
Speaker 1: least liability insurance. That's the law. You want to have
28:56
Speaker 1: comp and collision if you can afford it. Because that's
29:01
Speaker 1: the part that gets your car repaired for you. But
29:03
Speaker 1: you have to at least have liability for in the
29:06
Speaker 1: case you have an accident and it's your fault. So yeah.
29:10
Speaker 2: So I asked her who she had gotten the insurance through.
29:13
Speaker 2: She said some company.
29:15
Speaker 1: Blah, blah, blah. It's a blah, blah. It's an app.
29:17
Speaker 2: It's not a company I've ever even heard of. And
29:18
Speaker 2: I've been doing this for 25 years. I get on
29:21
Speaker 2: the app just to call because I wanted to see
29:24
Speaker 2: if I could pay and how I could pay. So
29:28
Speaker 2: there's no phone number on this app. So in my mind,
29:30
Speaker 2: I'm like, well, what if she's on the side of
29:32
Speaker 2: the road and she needs to call her insurance company
29:35
Speaker 2: because she's been in an accident or maybe utilize roadside
29:38
Speaker 2: service or whatever.
29:39
Speaker 1: Right. no freaking phone number.
29:41
Speaker 2: So I told her, let's investigate this.
29:45
Speaker 1: So this is, if you search on the internet for
29:47
Speaker 1: car insurance, you're going to get like this entry come
29:50
Speaker 1: up and you may, you may end up paying for
29:52
Speaker 1: this because everybody's app-atized these days, app-obsessed. And get in
29:57
Speaker 1: a situation where you actually have a situation and you
30:00
Speaker 1: can't call the company. There's no number.
30:02
Speaker 2: No phone number, just a live chat. So I said,
30:05
Speaker 2: let me just stop this. I called a universally known,
30:09
Speaker 2: I'm not going to advertise for them unless they want
30:11
Speaker 2: to send me a hat or a t-shirt, a universally
30:14
Speaker 2: known insurance company, picked up the phone, called their 1-800 number,
30:18
Speaker 2: got a lovely lady on the phone. I explained to
30:20
Speaker 2: her the situation. I said, ma'am, I am donating a car.
30:23
Speaker 2: It's worth about $ 5, 000. This lady needs to get the
30:26
Speaker 2: bare minimum insurance to be legal to drive in Georgia.
30:29
Speaker 2: What is it going to cost? She gets, we conference in,
30:32
Speaker 2: or she's actually at my desk, so we put her
30:34
Speaker 2: on speaker. Gives her her driver's license number, her social
30:38
Speaker 2: security number, her address, the last vehicle she owns, so
30:41
Speaker 2: forth and so on. Within three minutes, she spits out
30:44
Speaker 2: a quote of $ 240 a month.
30:47
Speaker 1: Which is considerably less than what she got off the internet.
30:50
Speaker 1: Less with a more reputable company. Right.
30:52
Speaker 2: With good reviews. And an actual phone number you can call.
30:55
Speaker 2: I then asked, is there a discount for a prepayment?
31:00
Speaker 2: If we were to pay six months in advance, which
31:03
Speaker 2: I knew the answer would be yes, but I wanted
31:05
Speaker 2: to see what that discount was. It was a 10% discount.
31:08
Speaker 2: So then the insurance goes down to like 220.
31:10
Speaker 1: Bucks a month. Maybe even a good driver discount, maybe. Correct.
31:13
Speaker 2: So I got softer and felt more than it was
31:20
Speaker 2: my need after looking at this girl's face. I mean, look,
31:23
Speaker 2: I'm very blessed that I've never been in a position
31:24
Speaker 2: where I didn't know where I was going to get
31:25
Speaker 2: $ 200 for my car insurance. And I decided to just
31:29
Speaker 2: prepay her insurance for six months. Maybe it was the
31:32
Speaker 2: The Jewish in me, I felt better about getting the discount.
31:34
Speaker 2: I don't know what it was.
31:35
Speaker 1: Or maybe you sold six cars that day and you
31:37
Speaker 1: felt guilty because you made so much profit that you
31:39
Speaker 1: wanted to give back. But whatever it is, we are thankful.
31:41
Speaker 2: I went ahead and prepaid her insurance. And that honestly,
31:45
Speaker 2: I think, changed her life or her quality of life
31:46
Speaker 2: for the next six months. So now she's fully insured
31:48
Speaker 2: with a reputable insurance company with nothing to worry about,
31:51
Speaker 2: nor does she have to worry about making payments for
31:53
Speaker 2: this insurance. So- I left work that day feeling good
31:57
Speaker 2: and bad. I felt good that I had done something
31:59
Speaker 2: nice for somebody who, by the way, was hysterical crying
32:02
Speaker 2: in my parking lot because I don't think anybody's ever
32:05
Speaker 2: done anything like this for her.
32:06
Speaker 1: Without any strings attached. No strings attached.
32:09
Speaker 2: I even went into my desk and I even got
32:13
Speaker 2: a little extra gift for her, put it in the
32:15
Speaker 2: center console, didn't tell her about it.
32:17
Speaker 1: Okay, you're going to just walk right past that? Because
32:20
Speaker 1: I know what it is. You're going to walk past that?
32:22
Speaker 2: I felt that it would be in our best interest.
32:28
Speaker 2: And it made me feel I was doing the right
32:30
Speaker 2: thing by giving her a little bit of a cushion.
32:32
Speaker 2: And that cushion means, God forbid, something else goes wrong
32:35
Speaker 2: in her life or with that car or with her
32:38
Speaker 2: rent or her refrigerator stops working next week, that she
32:42
Speaker 2: could just go on a vacation from financial distress. So
32:45
Speaker 2: I gave her $ 1, 000 and I put it in the
32:47
Speaker 2: center console.
32:48
Speaker 1: You did what? Yeah, I gave her a grand. Real money.
32:50
Speaker 1: Put it in the center console. U.S. currency. $ 100 bills.
32:53
Speaker 1: That's beautiful, man. And I didn't tell her about it.
32:56
Speaker 1: You're actually a good guy.
32:57
Speaker 2: I waited a minute for her to get home and
32:59
Speaker 2: I sent her a text saying, because I was like,
33:01
Speaker 2: oh crap, if I forgot, if she doesn't know what's
33:03
Speaker 2: in there, her car could get broken into. The car
33:06
Speaker 2: wash is getting the money. So I texted her. check
33:11
Speaker 2: the center console before you get out of the car.
33:12
Speaker 2: And you know what? I know that I impacted her
33:18
Speaker 2: life and helped her tremendously. And as far as I'm
33:22
Speaker 2: concerned now, it's only been a week, but this is
33:23
Speaker 2: a week that she's probably been sleeping better.
33:27
Speaker 1: She's able to get to work.
33:28
Speaker 2: She doesn't worry about how to put food on the
33:30
Speaker 2: table for her nine-year-old son. And she doesn't have to
33:34
Speaker 2: deal with this predatory buy here, pay here company ever again.
33:38
Speaker 2: So what I told her, I wasn't trying to.
33:39
Speaker 1: Be her daddy. Or her teacher. You'd be my daddy.
33:42
Speaker 1: I did recommend.
33:43
Speaker 2: That she engage with Operation Hope and try to get
33:49
Speaker 2: more financially literate.
33:51
Speaker 1: But I did say, I've.
33:53
Speaker 2: Given you a little bit of a cushion for these
33:56
Speaker 2: next six months of not having to pay insurance. Squirrel
33:59
Speaker 2: money away. Try to save some money for a rainy day.
34:02
Speaker 2: So the next time she needs a car, and let's
34:04
Speaker 2: be honest, the car I gave her is old. It
34:07
Speaker 2: may not last forever. It's probably good for a few
34:10
Speaker 2: more years, but in a few more years, I want
34:11
Speaker 2: her to be in a position where she's able to
34:13
Speaker 2: get her credit score up. She's able to have a
34:16
Speaker 2: lot more longitude and latitude of what to buy and
34:21
Speaker 2: more options. And hopefully I did that. I can't, I
34:24
Speaker 2: don't know. I'll talk to her in a year. We'll
34:26
Speaker 2: see how it goes.
34:27
Speaker 1: So first of all, kudos to you, man. And love you, brother.
34:31
Speaker 1: One of the reasons I like you so much. You
34:34
Speaker 1: do well and do good at the same time. He's
34:35
Speaker 1: a good capitalist. Now- capitalism is what this is. That
34:39
Speaker 1: was a good example of that. Now, you've given her dignity.
34:43
Speaker 1: You've given her hope. What you can't do is give
34:46
Speaker 1: her a lifeline for life. You can't have her calling
34:49
Speaker 1: you every six months saying, you know, hey, remember that
34:52
Speaker 1: good thing you did? I need you to do it again.
34:54
Speaker 1: Which is why it's important you refer her to Operation
34:57
Speaker 1: Hope to get financial literacy counseling. She doesn't want a handout.
35:00
Speaker 1: She wants a handout. But it's what we don't know
35:02
Speaker 1: that we don't know that's killing us. But we think
35:05
Speaker 1: we know. And we think that asking the question of
35:08
Speaker 1: what's the payment is the right question. No, it's what's
35:10
Speaker 1: the interest rate. Anything over $ 1, 000 and you're financing it,
35:14
Speaker 1: you don't ask what the payment is. You don't ask
35:16
Speaker 1: what the payment is an interest rate attached and it's
35:18
Speaker 1: over $ 1, 000. You want to know what's that interest rate.
35:20
Speaker 1: That 27% interest rate was going to destroy her as
35:24
Speaker 1: a time bomb. You go on a lot and you
35:26
Speaker 1: get a Mercedes and it's 18% interest. It's not a Mercedes,
35:30
Speaker 1: it's Mercedes payments. So, Kudos for you doing that. And
35:34
Speaker 1: thanks for referring her to Operation Hope. And let's make
35:36
Speaker 1: sure that we follow up with her and follow through
35:38
Speaker 1: because we got to give her a life of self-sustainability
35:41
Speaker 1: and resilience. And hopefully she pays it forward. Hopefully she
35:44
Speaker 1: gets to a point where she can help somebody else.
35:47
Speaker 1: This example, though, is just so common, unfortunately, right? So
35:52
Speaker 1: let's now talk about this industry, this business. These people
35:59
Speaker 1: aren't going to, they're not getting up in the morning
36:01
Speaker 1: and saying, oh, let me hurt poor people. They're just
36:03
Speaker 1: trying to get paid any way they can, is my sense.
36:07
Speaker 1: Is that right?
36:09
Speaker 2: I think, once again, to what we said a minute ago,
36:12
Speaker 2: not all of them are bad. Yeah, people get up
36:14
Speaker 2: and work. People get up in the morning, get dressed,
36:17
Speaker 2: and go to work to make money. We all can't
36:19
Speaker 2: be non-profits. So we are a for-profit company. My business
36:23
Speaker 2: is a for-profit company, and these buy-here, pay-here types of
36:27
Speaker 2: car dealerships are for-profit. But There has to be a
36:32
Speaker 2: happy median, at least in my objective or naive opinion,
36:35
Speaker 2: because I don't know a tremendous amount of specifically how
36:39
Speaker 2: the back of the house operates with one of these places. Like,
36:42
Speaker 2: do they even take the time to qualify when they're
36:44
Speaker 2: assessing a 27% interest? Is there someone that comes in
36:47
Speaker 2: there that has less lousy credit that gets a 26% interest?
36:50
Speaker 2: And is there somebody that comes in there that has
36:52
Speaker 2: even worse credit than I heard that pays 28%? I
36:55
Speaker 2: don't know what data points they use to come up.
36:59
Speaker 2: with what the interest is going to be.
37:01
Speaker 1: Are you breathing? Do you have a job right now
37:03
Speaker 1: that we can confirm? Is there a bank account? Is
37:06
Speaker 1: your credit score somewhere above 450 or 500? We can't
37:11
Speaker 1: get your finance in place else. We know that we
37:13
Speaker 1: got you held hostage here, financial hostage, and you need
37:17
Speaker 1: a car for transportation. So I really have you, and
37:22
Speaker 1: I've got an immobilizer, which means that I don't have
37:24
Speaker 1: to chase you around and repossess this car. I can
37:27
Speaker 1: just turn it off. And I can turn your life off.
37:29
Speaker 1: I can turn your credit off. I mean, they know
37:32
Speaker 1: exactly what they're doing. And really, they make their money,
37:35
Speaker 1: correct me if I'm wrong, a lot on the maintenance
37:38
Speaker 1: shop because that car is going to break down. They're
37:40
Speaker 1: going to fix it and charge double or triple what
37:43
Speaker 1: it's worth, the repairs. Everything just gets plussed up. The
37:48
Speaker 1: interest rate gets plussed up. The payments get plussed up.
37:50
Speaker 1: The fees get plussed up. The maintenance charges get plussed up.
37:54
Speaker 1: And you get to a point... where you give the
37:56
Speaker 1: car back, which they probably don't mind because they're going
37:58
Speaker 1: to resell it.
38:00
Speaker 2: Over and over and over again. It's like, like dogs
38:02
Speaker 2: in the dog pound. Somebody takes it home. It ain't
38:05
Speaker 2: the right dog. They just bring it back. They give
38:07
Speaker 2: it to somebody else. And it just, it just, it's
38:09
Speaker 2: just over and over and over again. And, you know,
38:12
Speaker 2: as far as like my opinion of the industry or
38:14
Speaker 2: how much I know about the industry, I do remember
38:17
Speaker 2: years ago, 20 plus years ago when I was new
38:20
Speaker 2: in this industry, met a guy who's a good guy. Um,
38:25
Speaker 2: He explained to me, you know, at a very fourth
38:28
Speaker 2: grade level, how he ran his buy here, pay here lot.
38:31
Speaker 2: He said he would go to the auction and he
38:32
Speaker 2: would buy cars, not necessarily bad cars, but he would
38:36
Speaker 2: buy a car for $ 800, $ 1, 200.
38:39
Speaker 1: $ 1, 500.
38:40
Speaker 2: Bring it back to his lot and put it up
38:43
Speaker 2: on the market. It doesn't matter what you're asking for
38:46
Speaker 2: the car. When the person comes in, it's all about
38:48
Speaker 2: the payment. It could be a $ 4, 000 car or it
38:52
Speaker 2: could be a $ 40, 000 car. As long as the payment
38:54
Speaker 2: fits in their budget, they're going to take the car.
38:55
Speaker 1: They don't even ask. It also is important the car
38:57
Speaker 1: looks nice. So they painted it or they've washed it
38:59
Speaker 1: or detailed it. Clean it up, sure. Paint it over
39:03
Speaker 1: the rust. And the crack in the frame because it
39:06
Speaker 1: was in three accidents. But what he explained to me
39:09
Speaker 1: was that the money down that he would get was
39:12
Speaker 1: what he owned the car for. Wow.
39:14
Speaker 2: So if he had bought a car at auction for
39:16
Speaker 2: $ 800 and he was selling it on paper for $ 4, 000.
39:21
Speaker 1: He would get his equity out immediately. Wow.
39:25
Speaker 2: So $ 800 down, and then you can pay it over
39:28
Speaker 2: a certain amount of time.
39:29
Speaker 1: And look. The rest is profit. Yes.
39:32
Speaker 2: A conventional auto term is five years or 60 months.
39:38
Speaker 2: Sometimes people will stretch to 72 to get the payment down.
39:42
Speaker 2: Rarely will they go to 84 to get the payment down.
39:44
Speaker 2: Anything past that is insanity. Because- the payment will outlast
39:49
Speaker 2: the car.
39:50
Speaker 1: These types of cars, they're not going to last seven
39:52
Speaker 1: or eight years.
39:53
Speaker 2: This is, it's, it's, it's, it's like, once again, you're
39:56
Speaker 2: screwed either way. So he kind of explained to me,
39:58
Speaker 2: that's how the business worked. And then, you know, other
40:01
Speaker 2: people I've spoken to over the years and I, and I,
40:03
Speaker 2: and I hear the stories from, from both the consumer
40:05
Speaker 2: and from the dealer of, Yeah, we sold it for X.
40:10
Speaker 2: The person defaulted after the first 90 days.
40:12
Speaker 1: We took it back.
40:13
Speaker 2: We sold it to somebody else again. So they're selling
40:15
Speaker 2: the same car over and over and over again.
40:17
Speaker 1: And I'm not saying all people in the industry, but
40:20
Speaker 1: I know many people in the industry.
40:23
Speaker 2: Purposely sell bad cars. First of all, you can buy
40:27
Speaker 2: a bad car cheap. And then when you sell it,
40:29
Speaker 2: it's going to break. And then once again, it puts
40:31
Speaker 2: that person back in the position of, do I fix
40:34
Speaker 2: the car and not make the payment? Do I make
40:35
Speaker 2: the payment and let the car sit in the driveway?
40:37
Speaker 2: Or do I fix the car and make the payment
40:39
Speaker 2: and then get kicked out.
40:40
Speaker 1: Of my house? It sucks. You said something really powerful
40:44
Speaker 1: here about auction. By the way, you have to also
40:46
Speaker 1: think about why is a car at the auction? It
40:49
Speaker 1: takes a lot of effort for a car to actually
40:51
Speaker 1: get to the auction. It didn't sell to an end user.
40:55
Speaker 1: It didn't sell to another car dealer. It didn't sell
40:58
Speaker 1: to a wholesale company. Surplus. If it got to the auction,
41:03
Speaker 1: I'm not saying it's a bad car. I'm saying it's interesting.
41:07
Speaker 1: It's a cycle.
41:08
Speaker 2: I mean, before COVID, before the pandemic, there was or
41:12
Speaker 2: there were enough cars at auction where they all weren't bad.
41:15
Speaker 1: And I'm not saying they're all bad now.
41:17
Speaker 2: But yeah, the cycle you're talking about is a car
41:20
Speaker 2: comes into a dealership on trade. The used car manager
41:24
Speaker 2: or off-lease, for example, that manager decides if he's going
41:29
Speaker 2: to keep it because it's a nice car. He knows
41:31
Speaker 2: he can turn a profit and sell it. That's good merchandise.
41:34
Speaker 2: If it's a little dodgy, he's going to then give
41:36
Speaker 2: it to a wholesaler. And that wholesaler is going to
41:39
Speaker 2: try to place that car somewhere amongst any other dealership.
41:42
Speaker 2: Let's just say in the Atlanta area, they may even
41:45
Speaker 2: call me and I'll look at it and say, yep,
41:47
Speaker 2: you know what?
41:47
Speaker 1: That's not for me.
41:48
Speaker 2: So after a certain amount of time, that wholesaler will
41:50
Speaker 2: then take the car to auction and it may actually
41:54
Speaker 2: sell at auction to another dealer. Once that dealer is
41:57
Speaker 2: unsuccessful in selling that car after 30 or 60 days,
42:01
Speaker 2: They take it back to the auction again, and then
42:03
Speaker 2: somebody else buys it. A good car is going to
42:05
Speaker 2: sell quick. It's not rocket science. A great house is
42:08
Speaker 2: going to sell quick. So anything that has, there's a
42:12
Speaker 2: supply and demand where you've got more demand than you
42:15
Speaker 2: have supply.
42:16
Speaker 1: And if it's good, it's gone. Is an auction car, again,
42:19
Speaker 1: one of the genius things you said to me today,
42:21
Speaker 1: which I did not know is it oftentimes, if you're
42:24
Speaker 1: buying a car at auction at the lower end level,
42:27
Speaker 1: you're selling the car for what the the down payment
42:30
Speaker 1: is what you paid for that car. So if you're in,
42:33
Speaker 1: so you've made your profit, everything else after that is
42:36
Speaker 1: pure profit. So you make three, four payments. It's all profit.
42:39
Speaker 1: You come back and get the car repaired. It's profit.
42:41
Speaker 1: You know, I chase you and add on at additional fees.
42:44
Speaker 1: You pay that it's profit. I nail you for, I
42:47
Speaker 1: would say I'm a damage your credit. If you don't
42:48
Speaker 1: pay me, you know, three months to settle this, that's
42:52
Speaker 1: also profit, right? So that's fascinating. Does Carfax track a
42:59
Speaker 1: car that's sold at auction? Yeah.
43:02
Speaker 2: Carfax and AutoCheck. Carfax, when a car runs through the auction,
43:08
Speaker 2: will say if it was sold at auction or it'll
43:10
Speaker 2: just say at auction.
43:11
Speaker 1: Does it say whether it was in an accident? Is
43:13
Speaker 1: that history there? Yeah.
43:15
Speaker 2: Carfax is a very valuable tool that we use in
43:19
Speaker 2: our industry. It is just a tool, though, so it
43:21
Speaker 2: may not be infallible.
43:24
Speaker 1: If somebody's lying, then it's only as good as the
43:26
Speaker 1: information is going into.
43:28
Speaker 2: It is still upon the consumer to do their own
43:33
Speaker 2: research and due diligence to make sure that what.
43:36
Speaker 1: They're buying is good. Tons of cars have clean Carfax reports.
43:39
Speaker 1: Carfax only reports.
43:41
Speaker 2: the information that's given to them. So there are occasions
43:44
Speaker 2: where a police agency neglects to report an accident properly,
43:49
Speaker 2: or an insurance company neglects or mistakenly reports A vehicle
43:56
Speaker 2: that may or may not have been in a flood.
43:58
Speaker 1: And we see it every day. May or may not
44:00
Speaker 1: have been in a flood. Yeah.
44:03
Speaker 2: Look, sixes and nines sometimes get transverse. Ones and Ls
44:07
Speaker 2: sometimes get transverse. So sometimes you could be looking at
44:10
Speaker 2: a Carfax of a vehicle that's not actually accurate for
44:13
Speaker 2: that specific vehicle. And then you buy it without getting
44:16
Speaker 2: it checked out by a third party who actually knows
44:18
Speaker 2: what you're looking at. And then you have all kinds
44:20
Speaker 2: of problems a month to three months later.
44:22
Speaker 1: Because the car was in a flood.
44:23
Speaker 2: Because it could have been in a flood, a fire,
44:25
Speaker 2: a theft recovery, a horrific accident.
44:29
Speaker 1: I mean, we've heard it all.
44:30
Speaker 2: We've seen cars with bullet holes in them that were
44:32
Speaker 2: covered up.
44:33
Speaker 1: Wow. Swear to God. Can't even make it up. Yeah.
44:36
Speaker 2: And I mean, I had a Range Rover years ago
44:39
Speaker 2: that was getting serviced at Range Rover because the seat
44:42
Speaker 2: wouldn't move up and down.
44:43
Speaker 1: Right.
44:44
Speaker 2: And the service rider called me and he was very
44:47
Speaker 2: calm and collected. And he just said, hey- We're going
44:50
Speaker 2: to need you to come down here and look at
44:51
Speaker 2: this issue here with the seat. We've diagnosed what the
44:55
Speaker 2: issue is, but we're really not at liberty to discuss
44:57
Speaker 2: it over the phone. And I said, this has got
45:00
Speaker 2: to be good. So I drove down to the Range
45:03
Speaker 2: Rover dealership. They take me back in the shop and
45:04
Speaker 2: they show me a nine millimeter slug. lodged in the
45:08
Speaker 2: seat track.
45:09
Speaker 1: Right. So somebody died in this car. Wow.
45:11
Speaker 2: But the person that bought it didn't know that. So
45:13
Speaker 2: they just brought it to us and said, hey, can
45:15
Speaker 2: you help me get the seat fixed?
45:16
Speaker 1: So the new owner's driving around in a coffin. Yeah.
45:19
Speaker 2: It's like, don't wear a dead man's boots. They were
45:20
Speaker 2: driving a dead man's Rover.
45:21
Speaker 1: So you just... Not to be confused with a dead Rover.
45:25
Speaker 2: It just gets back to what I said, or I
45:27
Speaker 2: keep saying over and over and over. Just do your
45:31
Speaker 2: research and check out what you're buying. Like, I mean,
45:34
Speaker 2: you go on a date With a prospective male or female,
45:37
Speaker 2: you get to figure out if that's something you want
45:39
Speaker 2: to spend some time with.
45:39
Speaker 1: Yeah.
45:40
Speaker 2: Get your car checked out. Figure if it's something. Look,
45:42
Speaker 2: your car is your second biggest investment. And you spend
45:44
Speaker 2: a lot of time in it.
45:45
Speaker 1: And if you're going out on a date with somebody,
45:47
Speaker 1: ask them what their credit score is. Exactly. If you're
45:50
Speaker 1: serious about them. I'm serious. This is your partner for life.
45:53
Speaker 1: I don't see that. Cute goes away.
45:55
Speaker 2: I don't see that going to a second date. But
45:57
Speaker 2: there's this.
45:59
Speaker 1: But, yeah, I mean, just understand. I understand your credit score.
46:03
Speaker 1: She asked me mine, not on the first date. That's
46:06
Speaker 1: a black thing. We don't do that. We don't do that.
46:09
Speaker 2: We ask if you have a nut allergy or a
46:11
Speaker 2: dairy allergy.
46:12
Speaker 1: Are you gluten-free? Well, you got to be smooth about it. Like, oh,
46:17
Speaker 1: you seem like you're really on top of your game.
46:19
Speaker 1: I'm just... fascinated with like, you must have a great
46:21
Speaker 1: credit score. Like what you might tell me what it is.
46:24
Speaker 2: Why don't you, why don't you pay for dinner, sweetheart?
46:25
Speaker 2: So I can see what kind of credit cards you have.
46:27
Speaker 1: Right. Exactly.
46:29
Speaker 2: Equally romantic.
46:30
Speaker 1: Exactly. They put out a black card. So. Yeah. Married. Right. Married.
46:34
Speaker 1: I'm on, I'm on one knee immediately. So, so you've
46:38
Speaker 1: seen some crazy stuff come through, by the way, that
46:41
Speaker 1: you heard that Tony did a great, a great thing. Um,
46:44
Speaker 1: he also does great business and we, and he's referred
46:46
Speaker 1: me to people who also are not bums. Like I,
46:50
Speaker 1: Adam Merlin. Adam Merlin is a decent guy. A man
46:54
Speaker 1: over at Atlanta Motorsport. Is it Motorcars of Atlanta? Brandon.
46:59
Speaker 2: Good friend, good guy. Not all people in our industry
47:04
Speaker 2: are bad dudes. There's plenty of good ones. I like
47:07
Speaker 2: to consider myself one of them and I like to
47:08
Speaker 2: surround myself with the good ones. Something I've been saying
47:13
Speaker 2: for years when I'm looking at a car for a
47:16
Speaker 2: good friend or a client or family member, I always
47:19
Speaker 2: asked a prospective seller, would you or would you not
47:22
Speaker 2: sell this car to your mom? Or would you, would
47:24
Speaker 2: you not sell this car to your next door neighbor?
47:26
Speaker 2: And based on that answer is if I'm going to
47:29
Speaker 2: proceed or not. And a lot of people don't think
47:31
Speaker 2: to ask those types of questions.
47:33
Speaker 1: Let's talk about dreams and dramas. So in your business,
47:37
Speaker 1: one of the dream calls you got was from me.
47:39
Speaker 1: And I want to know, was it any dream call
47:41
Speaker 1: better than mine? I called you one day Normally I
47:43
Speaker 1: call you and I just give you a headache because
47:46
Speaker 1: I want to talk to you infinitum about the details.
47:50
Speaker 1: And that's when I get the click and he says,
47:52
Speaker 1: I'm sorry. You don't even see it. I'm sorry. He
47:54
Speaker 1: just hangs the phone up. I'm a capitalist.
47:56
Speaker 2: I actually have to make money at work.
47:59
Speaker 1: But one day I called you after I had sold
48:01
Speaker 1: one of my companies out of the blue. And I said,
48:04
Speaker 1: I wanted you to find, I think it was Eight
48:07
Speaker 1: or 10 cars for my- 12. 12 cars. For my employees,
48:11
Speaker 1: for my nonprofit, because they didn't get a bonus and
48:14
Speaker 1: they didn't get stock and all that stuff. So they'd
48:16
Speaker 1: been working hard and I wanted to buy them all
48:18
Speaker 1: a car. And you found them all for me within
48:21
Speaker 1: a week to 10 days or some crazy thing.
48:24
Speaker 2: We typically need a 30-day lead time when someone comes
48:28
Speaker 2: to us- For one car. For a car, unless it's you.
48:32
Speaker 1: Right.
48:32
Speaker 2: And then it was, I need a dozen cars and
48:34
Speaker 2: I need them yesterday.
48:35
Speaker 1: Right. Oh, and by the way, here are the specific colors, options, types. Yeah. Yeah. But, um, we,
48:44
Speaker 1: my team did it. We, we, we made it our priority.
48:47
Speaker 2: We knew it was a good thing to do because
48:49
Speaker 2: you were doing a good thing by giving these cars
48:52
Speaker 2: to these people that, that forgive me for saying it
48:55
Speaker 2: this way, put you where you are. They, they, they
48:58
Speaker 2: supported you every step of the way and you rewarded
49:00
Speaker 2: them for it. And we were really happy and blessed
49:02
Speaker 2: to be a part of it. And yeah, it was,
49:04
Speaker 2: it was fun. It was, uh, It was a good
49:07
Speaker 2: day delivering, you know, some brand new cars, some were older,
49:11
Speaker 2: kind of bucket list dream cars for some people. You know,
49:14
Speaker 2: everybody kind of had their everybody had their own personal
49:17
Speaker 2: spin on or their own personal taste of what they
49:19
Speaker 2: wanted and you know you had a couple people that
49:21
Speaker 2: were just straight up practical like I just want an
49:24
Speaker 2: Acura MDX that's all I really want okay so we
49:26
Speaker 2: got an Acura MDX conservative practical reliable good car.
49:30
Speaker 1: Holds its value then you get other guys like well
49:32
Speaker 1: I've always wanted a Porsche 911 Cabriolet right get him
49:35
Speaker 1: his car and then one girl's like well I'm I'm
49:38
Speaker 1: a little bit of a hippie, so I want an
49:39
Speaker 1: electric car. So then we get the electric car. It
49:42
Speaker 1: was a lot of fun. So any other dream situations
49:45
Speaker 1: that happened like that at your place? And I want
49:47
Speaker 1: to get to the horrors, the dramas. So those are
49:50
Speaker 1: the teaching moments for people.
49:52
Speaker 2: I mean, we love, or I have managed to turn
49:56
Speaker 2: a hobby into a career.
49:58
Speaker 1: And that's the dream right there. I mean, I get
50:01
Speaker 1: excited to go to work every day.
50:03
Speaker 2: And that is a dream as far as Anything exponentially
50:08
Speaker 2: more impactful than you gifting all those cars to people?
50:11
Speaker 2: We've been involved in a lot of happy moments, a
50:16
Speaker 2: lot of the second generation givebacks where you have a
50:24
Speaker 2: blue collar mom and dad that supported their son who's
50:28
Speaker 2: become monumentally successful. And then he was finally at a
50:32
Speaker 2: certain age in a position to buy his dad his
50:34
Speaker 2: dream car. So we've been able to do that and
50:37
Speaker 2: we've been able to, uh, get involved with some wonderful
50:41
Speaker 2: charities as well. So I mean, you know, donating this car, I,
50:44
Speaker 2: I've done this more than once. This was just the
50:46
Speaker 2: most recent time I've done it. And there's other times
50:48
Speaker 2: where we've been able to utilize, you know, our connections and,
50:53
Speaker 2: and our access to these neat cars to, to give
50:56
Speaker 2: them up for whether it's a raffle or, or any
50:59
Speaker 2: sort of philanthropy that raises money or just some bling
51:02
Speaker 2: to park in front of an event or, um, People
51:06
Speaker 2: that need rides, people that need to borrow a car
51:07
Speaker 2: for something, whether it's some sort of medical need or whatever.
51:12
Speaker 1: We do this stuff all the time.
51:14
Speaker 2: And we love it.
51:15
Speaker 1: You sold me a car that went into a movie.
51:16
Speaker 1: What was it? The Fast and the Furious.
51:18
Speaker 2: You had a car that was in Fast and the Furious.
51:20
Speaker 2: We've had a bunch of cars that we've rented out
51:22
Speaker 2: to the movie studios over the years.
51:25
Speaker 1: And that's fun. That's just cool.
51:26
Speaker 2: I mean, I don't know if that, I don't know
51:27
Speaker 2: if that's giving back cause we get paid for that, but,
51:30
Speaker 2: but it's just cool.
51:32
Speaker 1: Like we've, we've met a lot of cool people.
51:34
Speaker 2: We've met a lot of really important, um, figures in
51:38
Speaker 2: history and, and celebrities, whether it be an athlete or
51:41
Speaker 2: somebody in the music business or a musician, people in TV, film, theater, whatever.
51:47
Speaker 1: I mean, it's, it's cool.
51:49
Speaker 2: Like every day is exciting at the shop and you know,
51:51
Speaker 2: you just, you don't know, but yeah, but, you know,
51:53
Speaker 2: where you're going with this is the, the nightmares that
51:55
Speaker 2: every day, every day is a nightmare too.
51:58
Speaker 1: So people walk in, people, people walk in to, to
52:01
Speaker 1: gas motor cars with a dream and, and that dream
52:05
Speaker 1: may not match their financial propriety, their financial situation. Give
52:09
Speaker 1: me a couple of examples of the thing that just,
52:11
Speaker 1: that just tears your heart up. It frustrates the bejeebers
52:14
Speaker 1: out of you that you see all the time coming
52:18
Speaker 1: into your high end, mostly high end shop with, folks
52:22
Speaker 1: who may not have a balance sheet, an income statement,
52:25
Speaker 1: a credit report, or a financial resource to match. Give
52:29
Speaker 1: our listeners a few examples. I have people come in
52:30
Speaker 1: and don't know what a balance sheet is.
52:32
Speaker 2: They'll think balance sheet is like a piece of paper
52:35
Speaker 2: that you're trying to put on top of a soda
52:36
Speaker 2: can so it doesn't fall to the left or the right.
52:38
Speaker 1: Like they don't know what a balance sheet is. Not all,
52:40
Speaker 1: but a lot.
52:41
Speaker 2: And yeah, I mean, it's a pretty common occurrence that
52:45
Speaker 2: somebody comes in and we do not, just for the record,
52:48
Speaker 2: we do not judge.
52:49
Speaker 1: Books by his or her covers. So we do not pre-qualify.
52:53
Speaker 1: Everybody's a potential buyer. Translation. They get rappers walking in there.
52:57
Speaker 1: You never know if you're not following rap, who they are.
53:00
Speaker 1: But he's like, hey, you never know who that is.
53:02
Speaker 1: Be nice to them. You might come in with overalls,
53:06
Speaker 1: white from the country. You never know. You never know.
53:08
Speaker 1: That person may own the dealership down the street. You
53:10
Speaker 1: never know. So don't judge anybody.
53:23
Speaker 2: Yeah, so we get people that come in on a
53:25
Speaker 2: daily basis and they have the intent.
53:29
Speaker 1: They want to buy.
53:30
Speaker 2: They want to, yeah, fulfill that dream, but they've not
53:34
Speaker 2: taken the time to figure out how he or she
53:36
Speaker 2: may be able to pay for that dream.
53:38
Speaker 1: So we'll spend time with them. Hours. Hours, yes.
53:42
Speaker 2: Showing them whatever car they're interested in, explaining to them,
53:48
Speaker 2: the ownership experience, what they need to look forward to.
53:52
Speaker 2: If they're buying a certain type of car, it may
53:53
Speaker 2: have a higher maintenance expense that they need to be
53:55
Speaker 2: financially prepared for. And we've gone times where we've had
54:01
Speaker 2: people with good credit, or let's just call it good
54:04
Speaker 2: enough credit, approved for a 70, 80, $ 100, 000 automobile. However, banks,
54:12
Speaker 2: they want you to have some skin in the game.
54:13
Speaker 2: So they'll ask for a down payment, maybe a thousand bucks,
54:15
Speaker 2: maybe 5,000 bucks. And I'm not joking. I've had, as
54:19
Speaker 2: recent as last week, a gentleman got approved for a Tesla,
54:23
Speaker 2: an $ 83, 000 Tesla. The bank wanted $ 1, 500 as a down payment.
54:28
Speaker 2: He did not have the $ 1, 500. Could not even put
54:30
Speaker 2: it on a credit card. But he's about to sign
54:32
Speaker 2: up for close to a $ 2, 000 a month car payment.
54:35
Speaker 1: Let's run this one more time. $ 83, 000 car purchase. $ 2, 000
54:40
Speaker 1: a month payment. Haven't even gotten to the insurance. Or
54:45
Speaker 1: whether there's a warranty, which will be without the warranty,
54:47
Speaker 1: there's going to be maintenance coming up. Having gotten to that,
54:50
Speaker 1: $ 2, 000 a month car payment on this car, and this
54:53
Speaker 1: person did not have $ 1, 500 for the down payment.
54:57
Speaker 2: You can't say this person. These people, it happens every day.
55:01
Speaker 2: And I am not their financial advisor. Once again, reiterating,
55:04
Speaker 2: I'm a for-profit business. I want to sell cars. That's
55:07
Speaker 2: how I feed my family, how my employees feed their families.
55:12
Speaker 2: We do do it in a very fair way. And
55:15
Speaker 2: I have, at certain points in time, become a financial
55:18
Speaker 2: advisor to some of these people. They're not going to
55:21
Speaker 2: be able to afford the ownership expenses. So when you're buying,
55:24
Speaker 2: your dream car may be a certain year Jaguar, Mercedes-Benz, Porsche,
55:29
Speaker 2: anything European when it's 10, 12 years old is expensive
55:32
Speaker 2: to maintain.
55:32
Speaker 1: It goes with the territory. You got to pay to play. Right.
55:35
Speaker 2: You want to drive a Jaguar, you want to drive
55:36
Speaker 2: a Mercedes, you want to drive a Bentley, a Rolls Royce,
55:39
Speaker 2: a Lamborghini, you have to be willing to put forth
55:42
Speaker 2: the maintenance expense. Because if you don't maintain them properly,
55:45
Speaker 2: then they will die.
55:46
Speaker 1: Right.
55:46
Speaker 2: And then you're stuck with a $ 2, 000 plus, you know,
55:50
Speaker 2: more than that monthly payment for a car you can't
55:52
Speaker 2: even enjoy.
55:53
Speaker 1: That to me is just foolish. Right. So when you
55:55
Speaker 1: tell somebody, you go on from car salesman to financial advisor,
56:00
Speaker 1: you know, from car, you know, compassion counselor, do they
56:07
Speaker 1: get upset with you? Do they, do they like, Hey man,
56:09
Speaker 1: I want to buy this car. Don't be, you know,
56:11
Speaker 1: do they think you're discriminating against them by the way,
56:13
Speaker 1: or somehow denying them? I've never picked up on discrimination.
56:18
Speaker 1: I've kind of picked up on the, I don't care
56:21
Speaker 1: or mind your own business. But you know, I feel
56:26
Speaker 1: good about it when I talk somebody out of buying
56:28
Speaker 1: a car that I know they can't afford to own.
56:30
Speaker 1: And then I, I objectively counsel them into the right car.
56:33
Speaker 1: I feel a lot better about doing that. They still look,
56:35
Speaker 1: they look, the basis of sales, in my opinion is trust.
56:39
Speaker 1: If someone trusts you, you can sell them any, you
56:41
Speaker 1: could sell ice to an Eskimo if they trust you.
56:44
Speaker 1: So why not just make that the, the, the genesis
56:47
Speaker 1: of the relationship is trust. And I think you're going
56:50
Speaker 1: to have a, a longstanding relationship. This is my entrepreneurial advice.
56:54
Speaker 1: Let your client base trust you and you'll keep them forever.
56:57
Speaker 1: Relationships over transactions. If they don't trust you, they're not
57:00
Speaker 1: coming back. I've called Tony dead set on buying X.
57:05
Speaker 1: I want to get X. No, John. You're not buying that.
57:10
Speaker 1: I'm not selling it to you and you shouldn't buy it.
57:12
Speaker 1: It's stupid. Here's the reason it's stupid. It'll give me
57:15
Speaker 1: all the reasons why it's stupid. Or I'll call him
57:18
Speaker 1: because I've got a car that's 15 years old or whatever.
57:22
Speaker 1: And he's like, well, what were you expecting? It's 15
57:26
Speaker 1: years old. Of course, he's going to have a maintenance issue.
57:28
Speaker 1: If it's not one now, it's going to be in
57:29
Speaker 1: the future. Like, it's not a flying carpet. It's a car, right? So,
57:33
Speaker 1: you know, he's very, he's very, if there's an end
57:36
Speaker 1: to this story, can we please start there? It's sort
57:39
Speaker 1: of Tony Marzullo, which is beautiful. So, you often will
57:44
Speaker 1: run into people who get approved, but don't have the stroke,
57:49
Speaker 1: the down payment. Or who spend a lot of time
57:52
Speaker 1: talking about a very high-end vehicle who can't get approved.
57:55
Speaker 1: Every day. Every day. Dressed nicely, good jobs. But jacked
58:01
Speaker 1: up credit. And, you know, it's funny how many of them,
58:03
Speaker 1: you know, they're full of it. I'm not saying all, but, oh,
58:07
Speaker 1: my God, I thought my credit was great. I did
58:09
Speaker 1: forget about that car that was repossessed last year and
58:13
Speaker 1: those two credit cards I haven't made a payment on
58:14
Speaker 1: in six months and the house that was foreclosed on.
58:16
Speaker 1: But other than that- Other than that, I'm doing fine.
58:18
Speaker 2: Other than that, I pay my Macy's card every month.
58:22
Speaker 2: So yeah, I mean, once.
58:25
Speaker 1: Again, I understand it. I get it. I was raised differently.
58:30
Speaker 2: I mean, I had, look, when I, the first Not
58:34
Speaker 2: first car. One of the first cars I bought when I,
58:37
Speaker 2: in my mind, was successful was I went to BMW
58:40
Speaker 2: and I leased a brand new BMW.
58:43
Speaker 1: And I was so excited.
58:44
Speaker 2: I was in my mid-20s and I was so excited.
58:46
Speaker 2: The payment was like nothing back then. It was like
58:50
Speaker 2: $ 225 a month. And I drove, I wanted to, I
58:52
Speaker 2: was so excited. I wanted to go home and show,
58:54
Speaker 2: I wanted to go, not home. I wanted to go
58:55
Speaker 2: show my dad. So I drove to my dad's house
58:57
Speaker 2: and he said, that's a nice car.
58:58
Speaker 1: Where'd you get that?
58:58
Speaker 2: I said, I bought it at the BMW dealership. He said,
59:00
Speaker 2: how much was it? I said, $ 225 a month. He
59:03
Speaker 2: slapped me in the face. I said, you don't have
59:05
Speaker 2: the money in your pocket, don't buy the car. So,
59:08
Speaker 2: you know, I get it. You're seen in your car.
59:11
Speaker 2: Your car to a lot of people is their identity.
59:14
Speaker 2: And it is their way of proving that.
59:15
Speaker 1: They've made it.
59:16
Speaker 2: Like you could spend that money on an amazing house.
59:19
Speaker 2: But if you're a single dude, you can't pick up
59:21
Speaker 2: a girl in the house.
59:21
Speaker 1: Yeah. the car, or as a buddy of mine used
59:24
Speaker 1: to always, he's from LA.
59:25
Speaker 2: He said, man, it doesn't matter where you live. Cause
59:27
Speaker 2: in LA, it's all about the stoplights. People don't see
59:29
Speaker 2: you in your apartment. They see you in your, in
59:32
Speaker 2: your car. So I understand the, the, the drive to
59:38
Speaker 2: have the flashy car or, or, or, or the, you know,
59:42
Speaker 2: just the nicer car because you're seen in it. However, I, I,
59:46
Speaker 2: you know, I always rely on you to educate me.
59:51
Speaker 2: on how some people do get to such a point
59:53
Speaker 2: where they're so financially illiterate. And they do get themselves
59:57
Speaker 2: in these ferociously high car payments that they can never pay.
1:00:01
Speaker 1: And then they just get to a point where they
1:00:02
Speaker 1: can't pay it. Then they have to give the car back.
1:00:04
Speaker 1: That destroys their credit. Then it makes it impossible for
1:00:06
Speaker 1: them to get another car. That's right.
1:00:07
Speaker 2: And not get preyed upon or ever buy a house.
1:00:10
Speaker 2: I mean, another horror story we're seeing right now is
1:00:12
Speaker 2: the market is going back to normal for the first
1:00:15
Speaker 2: time in four years. You know, the economy has been
1:00:17
Speaker 2: on cocaine and steroids for four years. Everybody had to
1:00:20
Speaker 2: have a Mercedes during COVID. And it was, all it
1:00:24
Speaker 2: took was three months of being locked in your house
1:00:27
Speaker 2: and not being able to go out and shop and
1:00:30
Speaker 2: eat and travel. Everybody had a down, by July of 2020,
1:00:33
Speaker 2: everybody had the down payment that they never had before.
1:00:37
Speaker 1: And they all wanted to go out and get cars. Well,
1:00:39
Speaker 1: guess what?
1:00:39
Speaker 2: Manufacturers weren't building cars for a period of time either.
1:00:42
Speaker 2: So you had six X amount of time, amount of
1:00:45
Speaker 2: people that wanted to buy cars with no cars to buy.
1:00:48
Speaker 1: So what happened?
1:00:49
Speaker 2: The manufacturers or the dealerships started selling new vehicles at
1:00:55
Speaker 2: above MSRP.
1:00:56
Speaker 1: Yeah, the premium. Massive premium.
1:00:59
Speaker 2: So specific to the high-end luxury market, something, let's just
1:01:02
Speaker 2: go acute specific, a Mercedes G63 with an MSRP of
1:01:06
Speaker 2: $ 200, 000 at its peak was.
1:01:08
Speaker 1: MSRP is a manufactured recommended price.
1:01:10
Speaker 2: Suggested retail price, correct, was selling for $ 300, 000.
1:01:12
Speaker 1: Wow.
1:01:16
Speaker 2: To a lot of people that didn't have.
1:01:18
Speaker 1: $ 300, 000 or 200 or 100. So now fast forward to
1:01:22
Speaker 1: where we are right now. You've got somebody with a
1:01:26
Speaker 1: $ 6, 000 a month car payment and maybe his or her visit. Yeah.
1:01:29
Speaker 2: That's not uncommon in the high end luxury car. Uh,
1:01:33
Speaker 2: not even remotely uncommon now. They're in that car, and
1:01:38
Speaker 2: maybe they woke up yesterday and decided that $ 6, 000 payment
1:01:41
Speaker 2: was a little aggressive. Maybe we should dial it back
1:01:43
Speaker 2: a little bit. So they've been paying on that car
1:01:45
Speaker 2: two years, three years, whatever. They may owe $ 225, 000.
1:01:50
Speaker 1: Well, guess what?
1:01:51
Speaker 2: Now that the used car market has gone, or not
1:01:55
Speaker 2: totally back to normal, but is normalizing, going back to
1:01:58
Speaker 2: what things were like before the pandemic, that car is
1:02:01
Speaker 2: only worth $ 125, 000. And they may owe $ 225, 000. So they're trapped.
1:02:05
Speaker 1: Negative amortization.
1:02:07
Speaker 2: There was negative equity pre pandemic thousand, 2000, maybe 5,000 bucks.
1:02:12
Speaker 2: Maybe the most, I think we, the worst we'd ever
1:02:14
Speaker 2: seen was $ 20, 000 negative equity. We've seen multiple transactions or
1:02:17
Speaker 2: multiple potential transactions in the last six months where they're 50, 60, 75,000,
1:02:22
Speaker 2: a hundred thousand dollars negative. Oh, a hundred thousand dollars
1:02:26
Speaker 2: more than what your car is worth. I remember you're
1:02:28
Speaker 2: in it forever.
1:02:28
Speaker 1: I remember you told me this guy, uh, did really
1:02:31
Speaker 1: doing really well, bought a, G-Wagon or something, you know,
1:02:35
Speaker 1: at a premium, didn't care. I'm going to buy it.
1:02:37
Speaker 1: And he brought it back to you a year later
1:02:41
Speaker 1: to try to sell it back to you to buy
1:02:42
Speaker 1: something else. And you're like, well, here's the price. And
1:02:45
Speaker 1: he got upset with you, but you told him from
1:02:48
Speaker 1: day one, this is overpaying for the car, but he never,
1:02:52
Speaker 1: he didn't understand the market had shifted and still thought
1:02:55
Speaker 1: that everything was selling at a premium. You're getting a
1:02:57
Speaker 1: lot of that. This was a highly successful, highly sophisticated car.
1:03:01
Speaker 1: seemingly financially illiterate individuals. By the way, when we talk
1:03:06
Speaker 1: about financially illiterate here, people need to understand, if you're
1:03:08
Speaker 1: making $ 100, 000 a year, half of those people are living
1:03:12
Speaker 1: from paycheck to paycheck. You're making $ 250, 000 a year today.
1:03:17
Speaker 1: A third of those are living from paycheck to paycheck. 70%
1:03:21
Speaker 1: of this country is living from paycheck to paycheck. So
1:03:24
Speaker 1: whether you're white, black, red, brown, or yellow, you want
1:03:27
Speaker 1: to see some more green. you got too much month
1:03:29
Speaker 1: at the end of your money, and you're living through
1:03:31
Speaker 1: this situation of not having a budget, but having a
1:03:34
Speaker 1: payment schedule. And you're basically asking, can I make these payments,
1:03:39
Speaker 1: which is the wrong way to go about this. And
1:03:41
Speaker 1: Tony is being forced to negotiate your budget for you
1:03:47
Speaker 1: in reverse when he can. Sometimes he's running so fast,
1:03:50
Speaker 1: he can't. And his job, by the way, is to
1:03:54
Speaker 1: make a profit. So at some point, if you're dead
1:03:57
Speaker 1: set on running yourself into a wall, it's a free country. Uh, and,
1:04:02
Speaker 1: and so during the pandemic, all these prices inflated, a
1:04:05
Speaker 1: lot of demand, not a lot of supply. The price
1:04:08
Speaker 1: goes up. Now, lots of supply, lower demand prices have
1:04:13
Speaker 1: come down for not just average cars, but for luxury vehicles. Yeah.
1:04:17
Speaker 1: So all cars, especially the luxury market.
1:04:21
Speaker 2: Um, and even it's actually now touching what we'd call
1:04:23
Speaker 2: the collector car market as well. And it, Here's the
1:04:27
Speaker 2: funny thing is, is it happened forever since, you know, automotive,
1:04:31
Speaker 2: let's just call the automotive retail market started with Henry Ford,
1:04:36
Speaker 2: you know, where you could go to the dealerships and
1:04:37
Speaker 2: buy a car.
1:04:38
Speaker 1: Right.
1:04:38
Speaker 2: And Mercedes-Benz technically invented the car, but, but Henry Ford
1:04:41
Speaker 2: would kind of put what we still to this day called,
1:04:45
Speaker 2: you know, just the conventional auto market.
1:04:47
Speaker 1: And. It also created the middle class. Correct. And so.
1:04:51
Speaker 2: You know, in 2015, if you would go buy a
1:04:54
Speaker 2: brand new anything, let's not even go to ultra luxury,
1:04:58
Speaker 2: a brand new Honda Accord for $ 34, 000, before you got home,
1:05:04
Speaker 2: forget next year, before you got in your driveway, you
1:05:06
Speaker 2: had lost 10, 15, 20%. Right. That's how it always was.
1:05:09
Speaker 2: And no one ever seemed to care.
1:05:10
Speaker 1: Right.
1:05:11
Speaker 2: Then during the pandemic, the used car values went up,
1:05:14
Speaker 2: meaning you could go buy a car, drive it home
1:05:17
Speaker 2: and sell it for $ 5, 000 more than you paid for it.
1:05:19
Speaker 1: Right.
1:05:19
Speaker 2: Because there was somebody... foolish enough to do that or
1:05:22
Speaker 2: just had to have it.
1:05:24
Speaker 1: And it's- Everybody, if you want to know why inflation
1:05:26
Speaker 1: went crazy- That's it. You combine the stimulus payments. We
1:05:31
Speaker 1: never had stimulus with a T in front of it
1:05:32
Speaker 1: in the history of this country. Trillion. We had nine Ts,
1:05:36
Speaker 1: nine trillion. Now you've got supply demand issues. You got
1:05:39
Speaker 1: cars you can sell for more than you paid for.
1:05:41
Speaker 1: You got, I mean, it's just nuts. Watches were at
1:05:45
Speaker 1: a premium. Art was at a premium. Real estate was
1:05:48
Speaker 1: at a premium. Everything. And so the Federal Reserve really
1:05:52
Speaker 1: had no choice but to raise interest rates to take
1:05:55
Speaker 1: the froth off of this market or it would have imploded.
1:05:57
Speaker 1: It would have pumped the brakes. It would have pumped
1:05:59
Speaker 1: the brakes. Why wouldn't you go buy a $ 400, 000 car
1:06:02
Speaker 1: if you could get it at 0% interest or 0.9%?
1:06:05
Speaker 2: It's almost free money.
1:06:07
Speaker 1: Yeah. Why not? Yeah. But it's correcting- The party's over.
1:06:12
Speaker 1: It's over. I mean, it is- Now you got to
1:06:14
Speaker 1: actually work at- Work at doing something right.
1:06:18
Speaker 2: We are working harder than we've ever worked because not
1:06:20
Speaker 2: only are we having to still try to do our
1:06:22
Speaker 2: normal day job, which is buy and sell cars and
1:06:24
Speaker 2: try to make people happy, we are also having to
1:06:27
Speaker 2: explain to them reality. And we also have to explain
1:06:32
Speaker 2: and convince them that a couple things. I didn't create
1:06:36
Speaker 2: this market. I also didn't build the car. So I
1:06:41
Speaker 2: may be Italian, but if you bought a Maserati and
1:06:44
Speaker 2: it's broken, it's not my fault.
1:06:46
Speaker 1: Right.
1:06:46
Speaker 2: And I'm certainly not German. So if you bought a
1:06:48
Speaker 2: BMW five years ago and you can't afford to put
1:06:50
Speaker 2: a transmission in it, don't call and yell at me
1:06:52
Speaker 2: because I sold it to you seven years ago or
1:06:54
Speaker 2: five years ago because I didn't build the car.
1:06:56
Speaker 1: Right. And that's what we do every day now.
1:06:59
Speaker 2: So that's another thing that we're seeing, um, is, you know,
1:07:02
Speaker 2: a lot of people that bought vehicles they cannot afford.
1:07:05
Speaker 1: Yes.
1:07:06
Speaker 2: Um, are letting them go into disrepair. Then they get
1:07:10
Speaker 2: to a point where they're unsellable. So then they're just
1:07:13
Speaker 2: trapped in the car. They don't have the 5, 10,
1:07:16
Speaker 2: or even sometimes 15, $ 20, 000 to get the car back
1:07:18
Speaker 2: on the road, but they still are making a payment
1:07:21
Speaker 2: on it. So it's a vicious cycle and it's, I
1:07:28
Speaker 2: don't know how to fix it.
1:07:29
Speaker 1: That's your job. Right. And Tony and I have great,
1:07:32
Speaker 1: this has been a great conversation. We have lots of
1:07:34
Speaker 1: great conversations. We're wrapping this one up. We've covered so
1:07:36
Speaker 1: much beautiful ground. And hopefully you guys have been educated
1:07:40
Speaker 1: and inspired and shocked and dismayed, but also you're smarter
1:07:46
Speaker 1: than you were when you first started listening to this
1:07:47
Speaker 1: about the automotive space. And you know there's an honest
1:07:50
Speaker 1: broker here that actually wants to do well and do good,
1:07:52
Speaker 1: but he also still needs to make a profit. And
1:07:54
Speaker 1: you want him to make a profit no different than
1:07:57
Speaker 1: you want to make a profit for your home. Even
1:08:00
Speaker 1: if you want to distribute money like a socialist, you
1:08:02
Speaker 1: got to first collect it like a capitalist. It's funny
1:08:07
Speaker 1: how that works. So we've had a fabulous conversation here
1:08:12
Speaker 1: in public. I need you to know this is the
1:08:14
Speaker 1: nice version of Tony. Tony will call and lovingly curse
1:08:17
Speaker 1: me out about some decision I made, going to make,
1:08:20
Speaker 1: didn't make, taking too long to make, about a car.
1:08:24
Speaker 1: I will tell you, I'm really good in many areas, but...
1:08:29
Speaker 1: Making money with cars is not one of them. The
1:08:31
Speaker 1: only time I ever made money with a car was
1:08:33
Speaker 1: Tony Marzullo. And it was only because I listened to
1:08:36
Speaker 1: his advice. And it was a very complicated series of transactions.
1:08:39
Speaker 1: It involved multiple vehicles. But timing was really important. And
1:08:43
Speaker 1: he's like, John, you've got to pull this trigger right now.
1:08:46
Speaker 1: The market is changing. This is a great car, but
1:08:49
Speaker 1: I don't control market values. And it's going to change
1:08:52
Speaker 1: in six months. And he was right. It did change.
1:08:55
Speaker 1: Nothing changed with the car. Nothing changed. The car, the
1:08:58
Speaker 1: same beautiful car. the same roads, the same environment, but
1:09:03
Speaker 1: the price shifted because the market shifted. And luckily I
1:09:06
Speaker 1: listened to him. So look, you don't have to be
1:09:11
Speaker 1: trapped in your world. You can create the world that
1:09:14
Speaker 1: sets you free, but you got to live within your means.
1:09:17
Speaker 1: And you've got to deal with reality. And you have
1:09:20
Speaker 1: to understand that there's somebody out there trying to separate
1:09:23
Speaker 1: you from your wallet. And that's most businesses. That's not
1:09:26
Speaker 1: just this one. That's most businesses. And you've got to
1:09:29
Speaker 1: be your own family defender. And when you have questions
1:09:34
Speaker 1: about whether something's a good deal or not, and this
1:09:36
Speaker 1: cannot be the whole nation's counseling line, but when you
1:09:40
Speaker 1: have questions about whether it's a good deal or not,
1:09:43
Speaker 1: Give Tony a call. Give his people a call. They
1:09:45
Speaker 1: really do care over at Gas Motorcars. And if you're
1:09:49
Speaker 1: in a city where gas is, you know, you're not
1:09:52
Speaker 1: in Atlanta or you're not trying to do a transaction
1:09:54
Speaker 1: for a unique vehicle, he'll refer you to somebody that
1:09:57
Speaker 1: he trusts in a local area. He'll tell me all
1:09:59
Speaker 1: the time, nope, don't do business with that. I know
1:10:01
Speaker 1: those people, they're bums. No, don't. Turn around and walk back.
1:10:07
Speaker 1: Don't walk out of the dealership. Back out of dealership
1:10:09
Speaker 1: because you turn around. They'll have their hands in your
1:10:12
Speaker 1: back wallet, like back out of that dealership right now.
1:10:16
Speaker 1: And then click. Then he hangs the phone up. Any
1:10:20
Speaker 1: final words, Tony?
1:10:21
Speaker 2: No, I mean, thank you for having me on the show.
1:10:23
Speaker 2: This was a lot of fun. I truly, truly hope
1:10:27
Speaker 2: that I'm going to be impactful and help somebody with
1:10:31
Speaker 2: what I just, you know, vomited all over this microphone.
1:10:36
Speaker 2: You know, it's not useless information because somebody can use it.
1:10:39
Speaker 2: So therefore it's useless. And, you know, John has been
1:10:43
Speaker 2: roasting himself a lot, but it's one thing he does
1:10:46
Speaker 2: well is he knows how to get what he wants.
1:10:51
Speaker 2: You know, and it's something that I call selective hearing.
1:10:53
Speaker 2: So I'll tell him the same thing over and over
1:10:56
Speaker 2: and over again. And about the 10th or 15th time,
1:10:58
Speaker 2: sometimes he'll agree with me and say, yeah, you got it.
1:11:01
Speaker 2: So yeah, anybody else that needs help, call me. I'm
1:11:03
Speaker 2: not going to give you 15 chances to convince you.
1:11:05
Speaker 1: I'm going to give you one.
1:11:07
Speaker 2: But I do truly, you know, come from a good
1:11:12
Speaker 2: place where I want to help people. And this is,
1:11:14
Speaker 2: if this is what I can help people with, this
1:11:15
Speaker 2: is my skillset. Then that's, you know, that's why God
1:11:18
Speaker 2: put me here. I mean, you know, I can help
1:11:19
Speaker 2: people with their car needs.
1:11:21
Speaker 1: Yeah. And evidently, he's also an underground philanthropist because he
1:11:27
Speaker 1: also helped somebody with their heart needs, their dignity needs,
1:11:31
Speaker 1: their their compassion needs, which was the young lady who
1:11:34
Speaker 1: walked into his life through a charity he was involved with,
1:11:39
Speaker 1: who just needed a hand up, not a handout. She
1:11:41
Speaker 1: just needed a break. She just needed a moment where
1:11:45
Speaker 1: she could believe that all the world was not set
1:11:48
Speaker 1: up against her. Thank you, Tony, for being a blessing
1:11:52
Speaker 1: and for being a good guy, even though we don't
1:11:55
Speaker 1: want anybody to know it. And you're not completely a
1:11:59
Speaker 1: hard nose. You actually have a heart underneath that. hard
1:12:02
Speaker 1: head of yours. Thank you for all you do. And
1:12:05
Speaker 1: this is John O'Brien. This is Money and Wealth on
1:12:08
Speaker 1: the Black Effect Network podcast series on iHeart. This is
1:12:12
Speaker 1: where we make it plain and help you understand how
1:12:16
Speaker 1: stuff works. John O'Brien, let's go change the world. Go
1:12:21
Speaker 1: to Operation Hope and get your financial literacy coaching and counseling.
1:12:24
Speaker 1: Tell your friends to sign up to this podcast. And
1:12:26
Speaker 1: get your copy of Financial Literacy for All. It is
1:12:29
Speaker 1: the number one bestselling book in economics and business management
1:12:32
Speaker 1: in the world today. Yay. And pay it forward. Give
1:12:37
Speaker 1: it to someone else. Put it into a library. Put
1:12:39
Speaker 1: it into a school. Have a weekly conversation about money
1:12:43
Speaker 1: at your kitchen table. Number one cause of divorce in America,
1:12:47
Speaker 1: money and stress. And it can also be a stress
1:12:50
Speaker 1: reliever when you decide to work it, not letting it
1:12:52
Speaker 1: work you. Love and light. I'm out. Money and Wealth
1:12:57
Speaker 1: with John O'Brien is a production of the Black Effect
1:13:00
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1:13:09
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