Guest Post by Eric Peters
There actually is a Corona – not the virus, the car.
Toyota sold it as recently in as 2001, in Japan – and before Corona acquired other connotations. It was slightly larger and nicer than the more well-known Corolla, which Toyota still sells everywhere. You have probably seen third-gen Coronas (1964-1970) in ’60s Godzilla movies. Well, models of Coronas being stomped on by a guy wearing a rubber Godzilla suit.
Anyhow, now might be a great time to go shopping for a new Corona car. Not a refurbished Corona. A whatever-you’re-interested-in new car.
Because of Corona.
Unlike toilet paper – which is becoming scarce and expensive – new cars are stacking up and so becoming less expensive, because people – who are staying home – aren’t buying them. Per Warren Buffet’s advice about investing in a bear market, this presents what could prove to be an unprecedented opportunity.
Because you have unprecedented leverage – if you’re not paralyzed by fear about Corona and willing to go car shopping while most people stay home, trying to avoid being sneezed on by the Corona-afflicted. You will likely be welcomed at the dealership like Cortez by Montezuma, assuming the dealership isn’t closed because of fear about Corona.
You will also want to line up your financing ASAP – before the banks close because of fear about Corona. This may happen soon, too – so better hurry.
If you can get your money – or your loan – lined up and the dealer’s doors are still open, the odds actually will be forever in your favor for once. Or at least, for long enough to drive home a Corona car for much less than you would have probably had to spend on the same thing pre-Corona, just a week or two ago.
Because it’s not just dealers who are getting edgy about the situation – and it’s not just because of Corona. Ford’s profits are down an almost unbelievable 99 percent vs. 2018. GM’s earnings are down about 18 percent over the same time period and – an ominous harbinger about GM’s future – it is losing ground in the critical-to-profitability truck market. For the first time in memory, the Chevy Silverado 1500 is not the country’s second-best-selling pickup. A controversial (read, ugly) restyle (and the decision to put a four-cylinder engine in a full-size truck) helped the previously and perennially number-three Dodge Ram sail past the misfiring Chevy and become the new number two.
But FCA – parent company of Ram – has its own troubles, some of them Corona-related but also predating Corona. It recently got bought up by French car combine Peugot, which will have to figure out what to about the Fiat Flop (in the U.S.) and whether to commit any resources to updating the ancient model lineup of the Dodge and Chrysler brands, most of which haven’t been updated significantly since circa 2007.
Nissan is in freefall after the finance fiasco surrounding the exit-stage-left of former CEO Carlos Ghosn, who took Nissan’s reputation along for the ride, in addition to a Brinks truck full of Nissan’s money.
The bottom line is the car industry isn’t healthy, either – and that means it’s a very good time to buy a new car. There are incentives from the manufacturers – both published and not – as well as incentive for dealers to do whatever it takes to get you into one of their cars and thereby get it off their books.
The longer a car sits, the more it costs. Put another way, it may costs the dealer less money to sell you a car for under-sticker than it costs him to pay the interest/carrying costs for another month – or several, if no one else comes to buy the car after you leave.
Keep in mind, also, that “under sticker” doesn’t necessarily mean the dealership is giving away the car at a loss. In fact, he will still probably make money on the deal – because of things like holdbacks, money paid by the manufacturer to the dealer that you don’t know about but which makes the deal viable for the dealership. The salesman may put on a bravura performance – and you may believe you got your new Corona Special for less than it cost to build it.
You probably didn’t.
But that doesn’t mean you didn’t get a deal.
Of course, it also doesn’t mean you’ll be able to drive your new Corona car – if the fear continues to take hold and restrictions on driving take hold. But at least you’ll have something new and pretty to look at in your garage.
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Wait a little longer until they start paying you to buy one. Banks will be paying you to take loans. And, then you’ll be able to pay all the taxes, surcharges and fees happily ever after.
About 1984 I bought a used 1967 2 door red Corona. A very rare car at time because in 67 toyota imported about 12,000 a year into the country. A little 60 hp. engine.
I drove it for a couple of years, but, because I needed a truck I sold it. I under stood that I should have saved it, but that requires a garage ( dedicated to just storage ) that I didn’t have. 35 years on I wish I had that car. Rare, simple and neat.
Bought my last new car in 2009 under the same circumstances. Sticker was $21K got it for like $13.5K. Still have it. GM employee pricing and the GM credit card helped get it lower….
My wife and I bought our 2005 Camry on December 29th of that year (one of the 5 supposedly best days to buy a car). We paid $5000 more for it than we did for our brand new Corolla (no, not Corona) 10 years earlier. Not only that, but it was a stickshift Camry, assembled in Japan, that never was impacted by a single recall as were all the other American-assembled ones of the same time period. We even showed up with a coupon for the car that the dealership was running in a newspaper ad. 165,000 miles so far and still going strong.
One of my ex girlfriends had one like this. Not a bad looking car.
Girlfriend had a red 4-speed station wagon in 73-74. Pulled an 18 foot runabout to the lake with it.
Don’t ever remember it breaking.
I lived in Calif during grammar school ’65 thru ’69. My dad hated VW Beetles and vans (Hippies drove them), but he bought a Toyota Corona. We called it the putt-putt car, barely made it up the hills outside of Oakland!
This article got me remembering those days – great time to be a kid in the foot hills.
My friend in high school let me have way more driving experience in his Corona than my mom did in her car. I even did my first freeway trip in that car. One of the most boring looking cars you could imagine, but it always got him from point A to B reliably….but it was a Toyota, so of course it did.
Insane advice advocating purchasing a new car at ANY price. Never ever buy a car with the new computers onboard. That old Corona is a better bet.
(40 yr German car tech)