03/11/2010 01:50 PM
GMAC May Never Repay Part of Government Aid
At least $6.3 billion of the $17.2 billion in taxpayer support to GMAC will likely never be repaid, according to the congressional panel overseeing federal bailout money. The panel criticized the Treasury Department for not attaching more conditions to the money as it did with Chrysler and GM.
Treasury wiped out the shareholders of those automakers and demanded detailed plans for how the companies would return to profitability; that was not the case for GMAC. Treasury also did not require an increase in consumer lending.
Chairwoman Elizabeth Warren of Harvard Law School said the Treasury Department should have taken GMAC into Chapter 11 bankruptcy to increase accountability and protect taxpayer investment.
GMAC and Treasury both insist the company is solvent and that GMAC will continue to lend money to auto dealers and consumers while paying back taxpayer dollars.
GMAC lost $8 billion in 2009 when its mortgage lending subsidiary ResCap imploded after pursuing a high degree of subprime mortgages and selling them in bundled securities.
Panel: Some Aid to GMAC Will Never Be Repaid (Detroit Free Press)
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03/11/2010 11:15 AM
Send a Tweet, Win a Jeep
Normally we don’t cover promotional giveaways, but when you introduce Twitter into the equation, it becomes part of the “social media is the new plutonium” story. Thus, we report to you that Chrysler is offering to give away a brand-new 2010 Jeep Wrangler Islander through its Tweet-to-Win Contest.
Starting Monday, March 15, through Friday, March 19, you need to have a computer or smartphone handy. Follow Jeep on Twitter, and each day Jeep will tweet a new Jeep-branded trivia question to followers. The first person to answer the question correctly will win a trip for two to the 2010 New York International Auto Show next month.
Then, on Thursday, April 1, all five winning contestants will have the opportunity to win the new Wrangler Islander by digging through a massive sandbox constructed specifically for the show. They’ll barrel through the sand until they find the “Golden Tiki,” which wins the new Islander.
To take part in the competition, start following @Jeep at www.twitter.com/Jeep.
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03/11/2010 10:33 AM
Toyota Recalls: Where They Stand
This week’s news of two Toyota Prius hybrids experiencing alleged sudden acceleration has reminded us that Toyota hasn’t tackled every car it has recalled. To date, Toyota says of the 5.7 million vehicles included in the various recalls, more than 1 million have been repaired.
The 5.7 million figure is the total vehicles affected by the recalls and not the total number of recalls issued; nearly 1.7 million vehicles overlap between the two accelerator-related recalls. It also includes the nearly 150,000 Prius and Lexus HS 250h hybrid recalls due to faulty brakes. Toyota was not able to provide a breakdown of each recall's repair rate.
Toyota spokesman Bryan Lyons says that while the first recall over floormat entrapment was issued in early November, the company only started to implement fixes in January, and it views completing more than a million recall-related repairs in the past two months as “phenomenal numbers.”
Lyons did say that the fixes for the Prius and the other models in the first floormat recall will be developed and implemented throughout 2010.
So far, only the 2007-10 Toyota Camry, the 2005-10 Toyota Avalon and the 2007-10 Lexus ES 350 have a solution devised and are being worked on at dealerships. Lyons says that makes up 50% of owners involved in the floormat recall, which was for 5.3 million vehicles. Meaning, even if every repair to date were for just those three specific models that would leave roughly 1.5 million owners, who are able to receive repairs, without them. Obviously, the number is much more than that. The other 50% of owners, which would be 2.6 million, still waiting on a fix to be even developed include:
- 2004-09 Prius
- 2005-10 Tacoma
- 2007-10 Tundra
- 2008-10 Highlander
- 2009-10 Corolla
- 2009-10 Venza
- 2009-10 Matrix
- 2009-10 Pontiac Vibe
- 2006-10 Lexus IS 250 and IS 350
The more recent recall over sticky accelerator pedals included 2.3 million vehicles and does have a fix. However, even if the more than 1 million repairs made were for this specific recall that leaves more than half of the recalled vehicles without the new shim. If you’re one of the owners of the vehicles below, you should contact your Toyota dealer immediately to schedule service.
- 2009-10 RAV4
- 2009-10 Corolla
- 2009-10 Matrix
- 2005-10 Avalon
- Certain 2007-10 Camry models
- 2010 Highlander
- 2007-10 Tundra
- 2008-10 Sequoia
- 2009-10 Pontiac Vibe
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03/10/2010 04:34 PM
Thief Tsk-Tsks Car Owner
Talk about adding insult to injury.
After a thief broke into a car in Aurora, Ill., during the early morning hours, the crook left behind a note just rubbing it in.
“I could have taken your vehicle, too,” it said.
The thief only took a Garmin GPS unit and a Bluetooth earpiece from the car, but after finding the keys sitting on the console unguarded, the thief apparently put them in the ignition just to make a point, police said.
In this case, we’re going to have to side with the thief: The console is a pretty awful place to leave your keys.
Thief Leaves Warning Note for Car Owner (Suburban Chicago News)
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03/10/2010 04:13 PM
Today's News From the Cars.com Family
A reader wants to know if a towing package can be added to a 2010 Town & Country minivan after the sale, and Ask.car.com finds out. Then, check out PickupTrucks.com’s coverage of the 2010 Work Truck Show in St. Louis. Finally, MotherProof.com reports on driving academies helping to fund after-school programs.
Can a Towing Package Be Added to a 2010 Town & Country Van After the Sale? (Ask.cars.com)
Coverage of the 2010 NTEA Work Truck Show (PickupTrucks.com)
Driving Academy Helps Fund After-School Programs (MotherProof.com)
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03/10/2010 03:14 PM
Police Warn About California's 'Cool Cars' Rule
The California Air Resources Board is facing new resistance to its “cool cars” rules, which require cars to have reflective glazing on their windows to reduce solar energy and keep car interiors cooler. Law enforcement is objecting to the rule on the grounds that it will interfere with ankle monitoring bracelets worn by released felons.
Research has shown that the glazing can degrade signals from devices such as cell phones, especially in rural or mountain areas (of which California has both). Ankle bracelets use a similar signal. Police are also concerned that vehicle occupants will have trouble dialing 911 in an emergency.
Toll collectors fear the glazing will make the EZ pass system more troublesome with a poor signal, causing delays or unwarranted tickets.
The new rules are to be finalized May 7, but the growing chorus of objections has put the Air Resources Board in a tough spot. The rule will supposedly save 700,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide by 2020 — the equivalent of taking 140,000 cars off the road for a year.
The rules will be amended in the coming weeks, but the board has not indicated how it will address the types of concerns mentioned, a board spokesman said.
California to Amend ‘Cool Cars’ Rule (Detroit News)
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03/10/2010 01:41 PM
Building a Better Pothole
With spring around the corner, roads and freeways everywhere are sure to be littered with winter’s potholes, but what if those potholes were easier to avoid?
That’s the idea behind the Safe Street Initiative, dreamed up by students at Milan Polytechnic University in Italy. Their plan is to start at the manufacturing stage and make the lower layer of road asphalt a bright color, such as yellow or orange, so that when the surface breaks, the potholes become easily spotted wounds in the road surface.
The team will test the idea later this year in the small Italian town of Rho, just outside Milan, to see if “the project is viable and cost effective,” according to one of the students. This would likely mean if the cost and trouble of coloring the lower asphalt actually prevents damage to cars on the road (or perhaps allows municipalities to skimp on repairs a bit longer).
British pothole experts — yes, there is such a thing — are skeptical, saying the solution is to prevent potholes in the first place, not just make them more visible.
Designer Potholes (Wheels)
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03/10/2010 01:49 PM
Americans Use GPS to Find Wal-Marts
You probably couldn’t dream up a more stereotypical image of Americans than what GPS provider TeleNav found in its data. The company’s 13 million GPS subscribers used the navigation applications and search functions to find, in order, Wal-Marts, Starbucks, pizza and cheap gas.
TeleNav anonymously collects records of information and search requests sent from mobile devices to computers that answer the questions. This is supposed to help TeleNav figure out how to better serve customers, but in the meantime it gets to find out where its customers are headed most often.
While Wal-Mart and Starbucks were the most popular destinations by far, food became a more regional issue. For instance, in KickingTires' hometown of Chicago, we apparently have a non-stop jonesing for pizza, while in New York, GPS users are more often looking for Chinese food.
When it comes to cheap gas, Phoenix, San Antonio and Cleveland residents are the most interested in saving every last penny.
Our conclusion based on this data is that there has got to be some European sketch comedy show just having a blast with that report.
Wal-Mart is Top GPS Destination, Says One Report (Wheels)
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03/10/2010 12:36 PM
How to Donate Your Car
If you’re looking to donate your car or truck to charity, Cars.com can help you every step of the way with the Cars.com Vehicle Donation Program. It can help you find the right charity for the cause that most interests you through the Vehicle Donation to Any Charity program (V-DAC).
Even better, it can take you through the donation process step by step and help you find the necessary tax info. Check out the complete page for an easy guide through the details.
Donate a Car (Cars.com)
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03/10/2010 10:56 AM
Cash for Clunkers Sold More Cars Than Previously Thought
The Cash for Clunkers program sold far more cars than even the government thought at first, according to an analysis conducted by the automotive market research company Maritz Research.
Martiz says Clunkers was responsible for 765,000 new vehicles sold. Some skeptics of the program said it simply robbed car sales from future months, but Maritz maintains that this prediction has not materialized and the cars sold never would have left dealer lots without the program.
This goes well beyond previous estimates: The Department of Transportation said the program was responsible for 346,000 vehicles that otherwise wouldn’t have been sold, while Edmunds.com put the number at 125,000.
About 542,000 of the 677,000 vehicles sold under the program were purchased by people who hadn’t planned on buying a new car. An additional 223,000 people who went to dealerships to check out the incentive bought a car even after finding out they didn’t qualify.
Martiz arrived at these figures based on a survey of 36,000 people who bought a new car or truck between July and August 2009, when Cash for Clunkers was under way. The survey points to data that showed nearly 80% of Clunkers customers were long-term car owners trading in vehicles with more than 100,000 miles on them, and half of the trade-ins were more than 10 years old.
In other words, these were people lured strictly by the well-publicized incentive and not those looking for the typical summer cash-back rebate from the automaker.
Cash for Clunkers: Better Than We Thought (CNNMoney)
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