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The Clark Howard Podcast
05.29.26 Clark Answers His Critics on Clark Stinks / Driving To Your Future
00:41:06
Clark Stinks! & How Changing Your Car-Buying Habits Could Add $250,000 to Retirement
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June 30th terms at aka mscollegepc. It's great to have you here on the Clark Howard show. You know, our mission is to serve you with advice and information that empowers you so you make better financial decisions in your life. And today is my favorite day of the week because it's Clark Stinks. And this is the first time ever that my wife Lane gets to lay out how I stink in her opinion.
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C
Wait, where am I? I'm not on this.
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A
But anyway, my wife Lane is here being Krista today. And if you missed Wednesday's podcast, you don't know Krista and I couldn't coordinate vacation this time. So she will be here next Friday with next Friday's Clark stinks. Lane will be here today and be on Monday and Wednesday's podcast. Thank you for doing it.
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C
Of course.
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A
And coming up later, the second biggest purchase most of us make is when we buy a car. I got some stats that show what a difference when and what you buy can make in your financial future. But now it's time for the Lane edition of Clark stinks. I should have never encouraged you to speak. You almost think I'm pretty stupid.
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C
You should be ashamed of yourself. Well, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm wrong.
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A
Maybe you're right, pal. All right, Lane, you're up. Do you want to. Do you want to start with.
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C
Yeah, I'm looking for mine on here. I'm not seeing.
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A
You want to do.
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C
No, not today. Not for public consumption. Oh. Oh, boy. Just kidding. Just kidding.
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Okay.
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All right. So we have a first. Clark stinks from Kelly in Wisconsin. And she says, Clark, Mr. Clark, I know you know you're in trouble. I am disappointed in you. You're missing out on three more ways to save money. The first is to watch household auctions. And for estate sales, I. I scored a couch at one with brand new tags for $11 because no one wanted it. The second one is to watch for citywide cleanup. Boy, have I gotten some nice things from curb for free. Just watch the weather for chances of rain while you're hunting. And the last is to hit up farmer's markets. If you time it right before they close, you can get some really great discounts. She says she loves the show and the information you give or.
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Right. So, Kelly, thank you for what you said. Remember when I came home with a piece of furniture? Yes. I was driving down the road and there was an estate sale and pulled up, parked the car, went inside, saw something that I didn't even call you and ask. You bought a piece of furniture.
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C
It was big, too.
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Yeah. Somebody, another nice person at the estate sale, helped me put it in the vehicle and brought it home.
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Actually, I really liked it. It was. It was nice looking.
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Really?
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C
Yeah.
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Said that about any furniture I've ever. Anyway, so. Great suggestion. Absolutely. The. You mentioned the farmers markets, as they come to the end of a day is a way to save money. Thank you for mentioning that. A lot of supermarkets now are doing that kind of variable pricing, particularly in their bakery departments, where late in the day items are cut in price that are going to have to be thrown out anyway. And I love that. And you doing the equivalent of dumpster diving at the curb, that is a great thing. I don't know if you know this. Ever since COVID when New York City went on strict lockdown, it's become a thing that on Sundays, people who are trying to get rid of furniture put it out on the curb. And it is the most perfect recycling because I'd say 80, 90% of that stuff is gone before Monday morning. With people who have a chair or a dresser or whatever, they don't need anymore one anymore, and they put it out and somebody comes along and just grabs it and Were you with me or was Grant with me the day that these two women were picking up an item in a Honda Accord that they had seen on the curb?
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C
That must have been Grant.
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A
We were trying to help them get it into the Honda Accord and it wouldn't fit. And we kept trying different ways. And so this was on one of the side streets in New York. Finally I said, you know, you're going to have to rent a truck to do it. And they said, well, it's not worth that. So we. We take it back out of the back of the Honda Accord, put it back for somebody else, and they drove on their merry way.
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C
Oh, they couldn't make it work.
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Couldn't make it work.
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C
How many blocks away did they live? It's New York. You can put it on the subway. We tried to put a piece of furniture on the subway.
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A
We did. That didn't work.
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That didn't work. No, didn't work. All right, onto other things, we've got Paul from Virginia, who? Oh, wow. He says, clark Pepe Le Pew has nothing on you. Your answer to the guy who asked if it was okay to buy a boat was less than fragrant. First, I've known several people who live on their boats, meaning that they can enjoy the water while avoiding the expense of buying or renting traditional housing. This doesn't work in all climates, but for some people, it's perfect. Second, I have a friend who owned a beautiful sailboat and put it in a leaseback program with a marina. The company chartered the boat, handling all the rental arrangements, while guaranteeing my friend use of the boat when he wanted it to and provided him with a percentage of the rental revenues. The marina also handled the slip fees, maintenance, and insurance. There are certainly issues to consider with this arrangement, but in the time that he owned the boat, he got to enjoy it and broke even financially.
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Really?
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And finally, you might remove your green eye shades on occasion. Can family memories that revolve around a boat be measured financially? Perhaps not.
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All right. I appreciate the suggestion about the marina, and your last statement makes me feel like a terrible heel, and you're right.
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Oh, okay. All right, now we have Mike from utah. He says Mr. Man from Roth. Although not putrid, your HSA advice smells suboptimal. While retaining medical expense receipts for future reimbursement is a great strategy, it makes no sense unless all Roth IRA and 401k space is being maxed out. What is the only thing better than a triple tax advantage? Effectively moving triple tax advantage money into Roth tax free. Instead of retaining receipts, retail, reimburse your medical expenses every year and use that money to increase your Roth IRA money into Roth, which eventually could be spent tax free on anything, not just for those medical expenses. For those already maxing all tax advantaged retirement accounts, holding onto receipts makes sense for most of us. Reimbursing as you go while raising your Roth contributions makes more sense. Thanks for all you do.
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All right, Mike. This is why we do Clark stinks. Do you know no one has ever made that suggestion ever. And what you're doing is beyond brilliant because you're getting the triple tax benefit of the hsa. And at the same time, you freed up money that can get you to the point where you're maxing out your Roth ira. That's brilliant. Thank you.
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C
Yeah, good suggestion. All right, so now we have Tom from Texas, and he says Clark doesn't stink, but he neglected to highlight a negative about Loans taken out from a 401k plan. I worked in the 401k plan record keeping and investment industry for 33 years. When a participant takes employee or employer pre tax money out of a 401k for a loan, the repayments, principal and interest are paid back with after tax dollars. Then when the participant finally withdraws the money from the 401k as a distribution, the total of the loan payments will once again be taxable dollars. Thus, money paid back to a 401k loan is taxed twice by the federal government.
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A
So Tom, I love the intention here, which is to throw up yet one more roadblock about why people shouldn't borrow from a 401k. And I respectfully would point out that the bills that somebody is doing that loan for are things that they would have had to use after tax dollars for anyway. But the overriding issue is that people who take out one 401k loan tend to take out another and another another. It's like once they break the ice mentally, they start to think of the 401k is their mad money account. And when you keep taking those loans out, there's an enormous opportunity cost and how much money you end up with down the road because that money is no longer working for you. If you figure two out of three years, the market goes up instead of down, you're having a two thirds chance that you're going to erode future financial security with that 401k loan. And so 401k loans are best used only for a catastrophe, a catastrophic circumstance that there's no other way to pay for, not a temporary cash flow problem.
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C
All right, now we have Kirkland from the state of Washington.
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I wonder if the middle name is signature. That's where Costco started.
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I bet it is. Okay, so he Sundays. I've heard two different people ask Clark about energy saving questions related to heating and cooling their homes. I don't know about your utility company, but my former and current electric cooperatives have resources available to their customers on saving energy. They have rebate information for insulation and energy saving appliances and the like. Wouldn't you say that they would be a better resource than Clark Howard to advise them on how to conserve energy and save money on their power bill? The Inland Northwest enjoys some of the lowest power rates, but we still like to reduce our energy costs. I'm surprised that in both instances you didn't refer to them as your utility company.
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Refer them to.
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C
Yeah, to their utility company. And it says bless your heart.
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Well, Kirkland of Kirkland Signature. I want to tell you, I love this suggestion. I've actually used rebates available from a power company. I should have mentioned that as a resource and hopefully in this brain full of holes I have, I will remember to do that next time.
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C
Good. All right, so we also have Kiara from Michigan and she says, clark, you may not stink, but you made me wrinkle my nose. Many public libraries offer patrons access to Consumer Reports, so your listeners may not have to pay to check it out. After all, if they have a library card. Thanks for all you do. My dad and I love listening to your show.
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Well, Kiara, thank you very much. And with so many library systems now, the access to Consumer Reports is digital. You don't have to go look at the physical edition. You can actually for free. Well, your tax is paid for the library system. But you can see Consumer Reports. I know that a lot of people that are really under about age 45 look at consumer Reports as their grandparents source of information and prefer to go online to find things. Who knows where? Consumer Reports does the absolutely best job of anybody I know in their product searches and reviews because they take no money from anybody other than their donors and people who subscribe to it. And the research they do is so thorough. In my TV work, I've been to the Consumer Reports facilities in the Northeast three different times, including being on the auto test track and seeing how they do the auto tests. And when I tell you they're thorough, they are thorough.
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C
I bet that was fun, especially when
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we spun out and the vehicle had to be towed back.
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C
I didn't know about that.
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I was on with, on the track racing in a car that was called the brz, a Subaru sports car. It had been a lot of snow and the track was wet and all that. And we went spinning off the track, going round, round, round like you'd see in special effects in a movie. And we went into a snow bank in the vehicle. And the poor head of the testing program, Jake, he runs the whole Consumer Reports testing program, Jake Fisher, he was covered in mud when we got out. I mean, it was just a mess. But the BRZ was fun. I don't know that car is made anymore.
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C
I don't know what that is. Is this like True Confessions? Because I've never heard this story.
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Why would I tell you? Okay, just saying. Why was that information I should have shared with you at the time?
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Was that a decade ago? When was this? I'm glad I didn't know.
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Anyway, I think it was about Eight years ago. What's next?
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All right, we have got Michael from Michigan. He says, clark, you don't stink. But I do have an idea for the listener who doesn't want their credit card info lingering on websites. Most cards allow a card to be locked through their website or app. Having a dedicated lock card could be a good way to protect yourself from leaked credit card info.
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A
Thank you, Michael. This is even more important for you if you have a debit card. Now, you may have heard me talk about how the only reason I have a piece of trash, fake visa or fake MasterCard is to be able to withdraw money from an ATM. I never use it shopping and I'm able to go on the app of Navy Federal Credit Union and I can lock it or unlock it. And so when I click lock, even if somebody's stolen the information, they can't do anything with it. And as Michael pointed out, this is common with credit cards as well, where you can simply on the app shut them down cold until you need them. And this is especially valuable with what I call back of the wallet cards, where you occasionally use a card and just keep it active in your credit score and mix, but you don't routinely use it. You lock that card and you're going to be able to prevent the thief who somehow gets a hold of your information and tries to use that card is not going to work. And that is a great suggestion, Michael.
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C
All right. And we have Yemi from Florida. Clark, I heard your response to a caller on a recent podcast. It was regarding a listener joining a gym having to use their debit card or checking account to pay for their membership. You had mentioned joining a no frills gym or opening up a separate bank account to pay for gym membership. I have a gym membership at a certain gym name Planet Fitness and I was grandfathered in for so many years to use my credit card. One day they stated I would have to have given them a debit or checking account to pay. Moving forward, I did some research and I opened a debit card bank card account through an app. Go ahead and you name it Cash app. I keep a decent balance on the card to pay for the gym membership and when it gets low, I transfer additional funds to it. It works great. And the gym does not have my direct banking or debit card information. I just wanted to give listeners some alternatives to paying for these types of memberships which can be difficult to deal with when you cancel the service or the provider goes out of business. Hope this helps. Thanks for all you do. Longtime Clarky.
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Well, thank you very much. And Planet Fitness I was a member of for years. Now it's not close to me and it was so cheap and the place was amazingly clean and they had all the equipment well maintained that I needed to use. But they look the Planet Fitness places are very, very basic. There's no wood accents anywhere. There's no fancy locker rooms, no spas or anything like that. All it's about is working out really cheaply. And if you're like most people that you join a gym and then you don't go, at least you're only wasting $15 a month instead of 50 or 99 or 149 or whatever. So it worked well for me. And they are not doing that well right now. Planet Fitness.
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C
Because you're not going anymore.
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I don't think it's because of me. I don't know why the company's not doing as well because I don't have any firsthand knowledge in recent years.
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I think you went a lot though, when you had.
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I did.
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You were dedicated.
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I was. And there are not just. Although they're the biggest, there are a bunch of these no frills gems around the country. I strongly recommend the no frills gems because they are so inexpensive and the focus is so heavily on working out. I mean, there's nothing else there other than working out. There's no juice bar or you know.
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C
Juice bar?
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Yeah, juice bar, fancy swimming pools or anything like that. It's just about being fit. And that's for me, that's the goal. That is the goal. And if I don't work out, you're gonna make me go work out now, is that right? Speaking of Clark stinks, literally, when I go out for a walk and run and I come back, what's the first thing you tell me to do if I'm within 20 yards of you?
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C
Go take a shower.
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That's right. So that's like the dating game. That's your personal Clark stinks about me.
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C
Yes, that's true.
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All right, coming up ahead, we're going to talk about the opposite of being careful with your money. When impulse and emotion gets you financially
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Jobs we gotta have a talk because overwhelmingly Americans in polling talking about how stressed they are financially don't know your personal situation. Only you can know that. But if you know, even if you're not that stressed right now, but you've been living a little too much for today. 1 tell you, I read an item in USA Today that survey says 81% of us, 81% of us say that we routinely make impulse buys. And a lot of times those impulse buys are things that, well, they end up gathering dust. I'm as guilty as anybody else. I'll see something and I'll think, oh wow, that's great and buy it. That's why when I go to Costco or Sam's or BJ's wholesale, I don't get a cart and I walk around and, and I put things in my arms that I think I want and then I get to the point pretty quickly I can't carry anything else. And I have to say, okay, do I really need another pair of cargo shorts? Probably not. And they go back. I don't just drop them anywhere, by the way, I take them back to where they go because as a member, I want to hold down the cost for all of us. Don't just leave stuff anywhere. By the way, do not leave refrigerator, frozen stuff just abandoned somewhere in the store. Because ultimately that does cost all of us anyway. I digress. The impulse thing is just so crazy normal. Do you know one of the things people are really impulsive about? I can't even tell you how many times over my career I've had somebody call me with the regrets about buying a car, suv, pickup truck, whatever. And I was just driving by and I wanted to see the new whatever. And they pull in and wow, they end up going home with it. All right, we ran the numbers, we did this research@clark.com just changing how you buy vehicles over a working lifetime. That change alone when you hit retirement will put around a quarter million dollars conservatively in your pocket. Quarter million bucks. How you buy a vehicle, what you buy, how often you buy the change that that one thing in your life can make. That one change can pile hundreds of thousands of dollars into your financial future. You know, there's an expression in the carpet business that people tire out before the carpet does, that people replace carpet routinely, well before its lifespan because they get tired of the color or the style or they decide to put in hardwoods or whatever. We tire out of vehicles. So although the average age of a vehicle in the United States is the oldest it's ever been, because we used to be even more manic in the US about cycling through vehicles. But automakers took care of that by deciding they weren't going to make cheaper vehicles. And so with the average cost of a vehicle now a whisker above or below 50 grand, $50,000. Is that nuts? People are out of financial necessity not cycling through vehicles as quickly. But I want you to look at the math we have@clark.com and you can click on it in our notes and you can see the numbers just staring at you right in the face. And for you to think through, second biggest purchase most of us ever make is transportation vehicles. And it's a stunner. This is all personal preference. This is not a guilt trip. I'm not trying to do a guilt trip. I'm trying to create power in your life. The less you owe, the less obligations you have. You have to pay every month, the more financial security you can build and the less anxiety you have about money over time. If you're a longtime listener or viewer, you've heard me talk from time to time over the years about mpc, the marginal propensity to consume. And it's something that pointy headed economists talk about, that the United States, that we are wired differently than people almost anywhere else in the world. And in most of the world. As income rises, your spending may go up, but not in tandem with the income rise in the United States. MPC actually shows the two of them going up almost together until you get to an ultra high income. We are consumers. We love to consume, we, we love to spend, we love to borrow, we love to buy. And the more you can remember that we're just wired that way in our culture and you step back from that, the better for you. Lane, what you got?
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C
Well, I was just thinking that maybe you don't need an extra pair of cargo shorts. I think you might have about 30.
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A
I don't have 30.
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C
I'm just saying it as possible.
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A
You are such an exaggerator. You know, I never exaggerate. You're such an embellisher and exaggerate.
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C
Sure. Okay. We've got Mark in Georgia and he says recently Clark extolled the virtues of Carvana and mentioned how successful they've become. They've become very profitable as well. According to many industry sources, they now make about $6,800 in profit on average for every vehicle sold. While I don't hold it against a company to make a profit, it makes me wonder what happened to the old days when individuals bought and sold cars directly between themselves. Using a third party like Carvana cost the seller approximately $3,400 and the buyer another $3,400 over a person to person sale. Is there any way to go back to the old way of buying a car and saving a ton of money in doing so?
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A
Mark, what a great question. And the nature of the country has changed so historically. First of all, we didn't have all the technology we have now. Carvana doesn't exist in a non Internet era. And people used to live much more heavily in smaller towns and rural areas. They knew their neighbors or knew of their neighbors or knew of somebody in the next town or next county. And these sales were highly personal in that people were selling or buying from, selling to or buying from someone they knew or knew of. And it wasn't a stranger on stranger transaction. Today we live overwhelmingly in big urban areas. We have an open marketplace with the Internet. That's led to a lot of scams that have affected buyers and sellers of different products, but particularly automobiles. And so the market doesn't have the built in level of trust that it used to have for buying and selling vehicles. So buying a vehicle from a stranger or selling one to a stranger is so rare now, it's unreal. So it's really how the US changed and how Technology changed and let's face it, what Carvana has had that. I was just reading a story that was. I forgot which industry publication it was. It was geared towards automobile dealers. That was a hating on Carvana article about how much the traditional vehicle dealers hate, hate, hate them because of the market share they're taking and how quickly they're growing. And they've really hurt carmax too. That was a hybrid of online and in person. And so people are looking for as frictionless a way of buying a used vehicle. Or now Carvana sells new or selling their own vehicle that they're getting rid of and they've made it ultra easy and they make a lot of money doing it. So your point is well made. Whether you buy from Carvana or anybody else, there's the buy, sell, spread. It's not like buying or selling a stock or index fund or ETF or mutual fund where you buy them at virtually no cost. There's a whole different thing. It's like think about houses, think about how much it costs in commissions and fees and all that. Roughly 10% and 10% out on a house. And vehicles are that same kind of. There's a lot of people involvement in it, a lot of process, a lot of rehabbing and marketing and all that. So yeah, it is a very expensive part of the process.
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C
I hate going to a dealership. I really do.
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A
Well, and I've talked in the past about why that slide to the growth of the new ways of buying a vehicle new or used that are no haggle clean environments. But old habits do die hard.
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C
Okay, we have Kitty in California. She says we own a 2004 Toyota Matrix which runs just fine. But my husband, 22 years old, yeah, I love that. But she says her husband is feeling more vulnerable on the road because of the lack of safety features that are built in. She says, I'd like to get a RAV4 hybrid. But he wants his own personal Waymo, particularly because his night vision is not so great. How many years before such a vehicle might be available to the public? You keep talking about never having to drive in LA traffic again.
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A
Okay, so Kitty living in California, all around you, everywhere you turn. It looks like the only vehicle being sold in America right now, at least in California, is a Tesla. And the advantage of Tesla for your husband is that the FSD, the full self drive, that's $99 a month, does do roughly 95% of the driving for you. You just put in your destination, you hit a button and it does drive for you. It Takes a bit of getting used to and some people are terrified of the lack of control. But you can always take control by grabbing the steering or pressing the brake and then take over and drive it like cars used to drive or most cars still do. Toyota does though, as a very helpful thing to your husband has on all their vehicles a safety suite. And if you were to get a RAV4 Hybrid, it has the ability to drive for you on freeways on the 110 or the 5 or the whatever because it's all the. In California before you give the freeway number. And it will do a lot of that driving for you and has great safety features on it. So if something like the equivalent of an almost Waymo, which is where Tesla is now with the fsd, that would be. It's a one horse race right now for that from Tesla. But if just having an enormous suite of safety features that greatly reduce the chances of being in an accident, any Toyota will have those. Our oldest just went from 14 or 15 year old Prius to a RAV4 hybrid and she can't believe it because her Prius didn't even have a backup camera. And now the, the RAV4 Hybrid has every kind of safety feature known to humankind except for one thing. She was parked in a parking lot and somebody in a pickup truck backed into her. Nearly new.
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C
Yeah. And didn't. He didn't even notice he was in a huge truck.
- [37:21]
A
He was such a big pickup truck, he didn't know he had damaged his truck and hit her and she had to jump out and say, you know, you just hit me. He said, no, I didn't.
- [37:31]
C
But he was nice.
- [37:32]
A
He was nice. He just didn't even realize. You think about the size differential between one of these giant dual cab pickup trucks and even a RAV4. Imagine her old Prius. Oh yeah, it would have crumpled.
- [37:48]
C
It would have been totaled. Okay, so we have Adeline. Is that how you pronounce it? I think her name. That's a pretty name. Adeline in North Carolina. Hi Clark. I've heard you talk about low cost prescription options for humans, but do you have any recommendations for pets? I recently adopted a 2 year old cat that the shelter said was perfectly healthy. But soon after his adoption I found out he has feline asthma and will need a daily inhaler for life.
- [38:18]
A
I've never heard of that.
- [38:19]
C
Yeah, I've heard of that. I have his inhaler cost $250 a month as prescribed by his vet. Thankfully I have a Good job and I can afford it, but this really hurts. Do you have any recommendations on how I might be able to get this medication cheaper or be willing to share what you have used for your dogs? Oh boy. I read it might be possible to order the medicine from Canada or the UK at a discount, but I don't know much about this. Thank you so much for your advice. And by the way, he has been the sweetest, most perfect cat outside of this one issue.
- [38:55]
A
I am so glad that in spite of the asthma problem, you're thrilled with the adoption. Okay, so this is really low hanging fruit for me. Your question, where do we fill our dog Kirkland signatures meds and our other dog Winston Churchill's meds at the Costco wholesale pharmacy counter. The warehouse clubs sell a huge percent of pet meds now in the US because they do a similar markup or maybe the same for the pet meds as they do for human meds. And the warehouse clubs all have these tight systems on how they price scripts. So I would compare the cost of the feline asthma medicine at whatever the warehouse clubs you're a member of. And if you're not a member of one, there are now several online sellers that specialize in discounted meds for pets. As for buying them from Canada, there are so many people who humans who are buying medicine from Canada. One of my brothers buys medicine that's really expensive in the United States from a pharmacy in Canada and has cut his cost about 70% buying the medicine from Canada instead of the US and we have the world's highest prescription drug prices by far. And this is one of the tools that people do. You mentioned the UK buying medicines outside the US People in Southern California and in Tucson, Arizona very heavily cross into Mexico to fill prescription drugs. I will say that there are more problems when people fill prescriptions in Mexico because the regulation of the pharmaceutical industry is not up to standards that you can really feel comfortable. You got to know who you're buying them from if you do cross the border into Mexico to fill prescriptions. But the idea is you just don't have to sit and take that $3,000 a year cost. You should be able to shop around and find a better deal. And I want to tell you how much I enjoyed being with you today on our Clark Stinks podcast.
- [41:35]
C
I really enjoyed that Clark Stinks part. Yeah.
- [41:38]
A
How come you didn't do any? I mean, you can't.
- [41:42]
C
I'm holding back.
- [41:43]
A
Longtime listeners and viewers would want to hear from you.
- [41:47]
C
No, I, I have very few complaints, honestly. But thanks for having me.
- [41:53]
A
Absolutely.
- [41:53]
C
Krista will be back for the next
- [41:55]
A
Clerks things, but you'll be with us next Monday and Wednesday and I'm jealous. We're working. She's playing.
- [42:02]
C
I know. What's up with that?
- [42:04]
A
I know. Anyway, have an absolutely wonderful weekend. No. We serve you all weekend long. One of the things that is something people look forward to from us are our newsletters that are free. We have the Clark Newsletter, Clark Deals Newsletter, and our Clark investment newsletter. These are all free if you ever subscribe to them. And later you're like, I don't see why Clark thinks they're so good. I'm wasting my time with this. Or you're going to really love it and you're going to tell other people about them and especially the price. And you're not going to get spammed by us. You're only going to get what you asked for. All you do is go to clark.com newsletters. And it's all part of what we do. Empowering you with knowledge so you can save more, spend less, and avoid getting ripped off. And here's your assignment for the weekend. Go have fun.