What do real car buyers say about the Costco Auto program? I'm Kevin Hunter, the homeward guy here today with amazing Elizabeth, the homeward gal. Back on April 4th of 2020, we did a show on the Costco Auto program. After I did an interview with one of the Costco Auto program reps named Scott, we published our video titled Costco Auto program. Does it really save you money on your car? Our assessment was that it didn't actually do very much to save the car buyer money, and it really wasn't any more convenient for a car buyer to use Costco than it was for anyone just deciding to go visit a dealer. As you can imagine, Costco didn't like our video very much. In fact, they emailed us asking us to consider taking it down and redoing it according to their specs. We just laughed because we are reporters and consumer advisors in the automotive space, not an advertising arm for someone like Costco. We posted their email in the comment section on the former video. We never agreed to take content down, and we wouldn't have taken that video down even if Costco bribed us to. It currently ranks as the top view getter on YouTube made about the Costco Auto program. At 450,000 views, it's had more traction than all the other videos combined on YouTube about the Costco Auto program. Now why did Costco want us to take it down? Well, first they said it had some factual errors, saying the program didn't actually cover a car's trucks SUVs, motorcycles, power sports and RVs. Despite the fact, we just read that information off their website and clearly said they do. The video we did also exposed the weakness in the program and that it turned over the customer to the wolves in the finance office without any real protections in place. And often the price is quite frankly more nothing special despite the Costco rep and fatically telling us that about 94% of the time, the Costco price for a car is as good or better than you can get with any other buying program. The truth is there is so much chaos in a typical dealership having a so-called highly trained Costco sales rep that just deals with Costco customers is pretty unrealistic. You'll hear the reality of this situation in some of the car buyer comments that we've received. But all of that was three years ago and we received a ton of viewer feedback from buyers who actually attempted to use the Costco Auto program. So we thought today we'd share their thoughts with you. You know, in case you were thinking of maybe using Costco. Here's Nanobitch who writes a scathing report. We joined Costco to access the car buying option. In New Jersey, we visited seven dealerships, none had a Costco trained sales rep available. I believe this is just a referral program for Costco to make some money. I wrote to Costco to explain what happened to us and the many, many hours we sat in a dealership asking to buy a car using the Costco price while they were in the back trying to decide on a price. Like as if there was a predetermined price sheet. Yeah. What we found is that the dealerships just load up on the required and mandated accessories to jack up the price. It was not a savings for us at all. The pre-arranged price should be an AltheDora price. It turns out to be a starting price and you end up paying what you would have to without Costco. This is a disgraceful program for Costco to be involved in. Ouch. Living the life rights years ago, I went to a Costco-approved car dealership. They told me not to bother with that service and I left. What's interesting about this comment is that the sales staff was actually speaking the truth for a change. What else, rare occasions? Yes. Okay. Andrea Olgelmore writes, great info. Thank you. I'm currently looking into using the program. I decided to ask my sister about her experience since she and her husband used the Costco program to purchase two cars. On the second purchase with the same dealer, they tacked on $3,000 for extras she didn't want. She was not happy. The experience became a nightmare and she became a thorn in their side and she went back three times until they made it right and took out the extra $3,000 they charged. Good for her being a thorn in the side and getting her money back. That's her money. Not what you expect from what is being sold as a user-friendly service by Costco. With a super timely comment, Ibiza writes, since dealers now have no reason to discount, I doubt this is much of a deal in 2022. Bingo, pretty much every car discount program died during the pandemic and the subsequent automotive shortages. Got it. A non-130 writes, Costco isn't doing anything. It seems like finance can add whatever they want and not much. If I have this right, this basically means Costco can sell the car for a rock bottom price of $1 and finance can add $30,000 paint protection and not reduce the price at all. So you're still stuck in negotiation. That's an exaggerated example but we get the point. Here's another viewer Ken Evans who exposes another weakness. He writes, how do you get a fair price in your trade-in and what do you do when they lowball you? Thanks. Love your channel. Thank you, Ken, for your compliment. But you also bring up an important point. Costco does nothing to help customers with their trade-in in this auto program. You're right back to the dealer games, even if you did come in on what you thought was a decent price. Here's GMC Acadia who writes, in 2018, I used the Costco program to purchase a Silverado 2500 HD in California. Don't think I got any better of a deal on the truck compared to doing it on my own. Not sure at this moment that the salesman was actually trained to do a Costco transaction. No one at Costco advised me of that. Another weakness also pointed out by the first viewer we mentioned. Costco says a given dealer has trained staff in the Costco auto program but for how little money Costco actually generates in this, they certainly aren't going to be sending trainers to dealers all around the country. Oh no. At best, they just do a chat over a Zoom call. And the moment the well runs dry in the dealership, the Costco assigned sales rep in the dealership will be busy with all kinds of other customers and the excitement of a few extra customers from Costco just wears off and very quickly they see no value in it. True. Larry Hopper writes, Costco is an outstanding company. They treat their employees well who then treat the Costco members well. Larry you have a good point. Who is regularly rated as one of the best companies to work for. But Larry, we're actually not talking about working for Costco. The company we're talking about trying to buy a car through a program that operates outside of Costco's control and buyers are hoping against hope that it will be a Costco type nice shopping experience. The Costco auto program is well outside the control of Costco and largely because of that, it just all falls apart. Here's MJD Edge who says, you should offer a service to a company buyers through the dealership directing that at us. I'm sure people would be willing to pay a flat fee to save much old denario. We'll close it off. Well Edge, you're a lot because this is a breakout year for us, a year in which we are on board with a group of investors to help launch a new carbine process that takes it a step further than us simply accompanying you in an old broken down system. We're going to help launch a carbine process that offers you an entirely new path and takes the dealer out of the price negotiations, putting you squarely in the driver's seat. What's equally outstanding is that you will be able to trade your car in with the benefit of having multiple fair market offers and you'll never have to be insulted with another low-ball offer for your trade again. Think about it friends, the FTC rules implementation date for compliance is looming over the automotive business. There's a chink in the dam in both new and used car prices starting to follow now. Definitely. And it's perfect timing for a huge disruption in this business. Yep. It's been due for a long time and as soon as the muzzle of our NDA is removed, we will spill the beans to the world. If you're new here and you missed this recent show, three major reasons to wait until after June 2023 to buy a new car. Make sure you check it out right away. We presented three excellent reasons in that show to wait this market out and it only adds importance to the reason that you should subscribe and hit the notification bell and stay up to date on future THG car buying announcements. Speaking of our upcoming new car buying process, if you'd like to join the thousands of other viewers and get on an early notification list, email us at the contact email listed here or text to this number 7-01-441-3399. We are putting a database together with the thousands of positive responses from interested viewers and it's not too late for you to get on the list too. Please include in your email or text your first name, the state you're in for strategic geographic reasons and the brand and model of car that you're interested in. For our newest viewers besides email and text, you can also connect with the Homework Guy team on Facebook. If you want more in-depth information on car buying and want to be aware of when you're out car shopping, please visit our website, HomeworkGuide.com. A lot of frequently asked questions can be answered on our website. When you get there, scroll down that main page to find tons of free downloads designed to help you get through the process of buying a car without being ripped off. Lastly, if you'd like to show us some love, you can do so with even a small tip at any of the links you can find in the description box below. You'll also see that super thanks button just below the video. Thanks everyone, we appreciate everything you do for us. Alright, if you're new here at the Homework Guy channel, as Elizabeth just reminded you don't forget to subscribe and ring that bell so you don't miss out on future announcements. Join our fast growing group of subscribers and become a part of our YouTube family. If you're one of our newest subscribers, welcome. Also thanks to our many faithful followers for coming back and to all of our long time subscribers out there, you guys rock. God bless you all. I'm Kevin Hunter, the Homework Guy signing out for the amazing Elizabeth, the Homework Gal. The Homework Guy team is serving truth and justice in the car business. We gotta go. Just not to cause.