Wake up, Buy Here, Pay Here people. It's a beautiful day. Go grab yourself another cup of joe and say hello to Jim and Michelle Rhodes on the Buy Here, Pay Here morning show. Take it away, you two. morning everybody hey happy friday yay it's friday greetings from uh utah yeah about to hit the highway headed for a little uh family time yeah okay so here's the thing you know you know everyone knows that jim grew up in a small town called guyman oklahoma I don't think everybody knows well okay jim grew up in the in the panhandle of oklahoma um and his parents uh had a farm and and grandpa pablo who is one of the um the uh influencers inspirators of white hat way um uh actually ran one of the biggest cattle ranches around there um when when jim was little well his mom is celebrating her 40th work anniversary for a law firm there and um I mean who works for the same company for 40 years anymore well she does yeah and um she's like she's 80 and keep my attention for 40 minutes right yeah but I mean she's 80 and still just rocking her she she she uh she tires me out just watching her just she's amazing she really is she's I'm in lots mad respect and for jim's mom I really really appreciate her during the holidays whenever I'm there we we do like a lot of uh hallmark christmas movies it's one after another after another and jim jim's like I'm just glad that you don't do that when you're home it's like I'm going pheasant hunting you guys do your movies so yeah so we're we're heading um heading out there it's uh Yeah, but we're going to drive, so it's going to be a little bit of a flight, but there's no airports around there. There's many little regional ones, but the closest airport is in Amarillo. Should we be letting people know that we're not going to be home? I mean, is that safe? I mean, people now know they can break in here and steal our Costco-sized bag of oatmeal. Right? I mean, we're so vulnerable now, so... Yeah, all the computers will be with us. I mean, you make those kind of investments at Costco in those kind of quantities. There are people that need rice. Yeah. My gosh. Quick announcements. Again, there's on, well, on March 20th, That's going to be the Rick Reeves tribute. We're calling it Tip of the Hat with Rick. The DCF program from years ago, we have several dealers who were part of those enrollment back in the 90s. I know many of them and they're going to come and just do a Tip of the Hat to to Rick and his white hat way, you know, his contributions to what we call white hat way. Rick is retired from the industry. And, um, and so it was, it's just, it's going to be a really cool for, for those of you want to know a little bit more about how he was another influencer, Jim's, but he was an influencer, a lot of the big dealers. So the ones that have been around for a long time and that, um, not all of them are big, but they're well established. They've stood the test of time. Gordy Tormullen, um, uh, Tommy Brandes. Yeah. On and on. Long list. A lot of dealers are going to be there, so we're excited to do that. The day after, too, on Thursday is when we're doing the White Hat webinar, and it's going to be on how to retain and engage talented team members. Right. So we've had some emails go out with some coupon codes for people that have supported us in different facets, different ways. So if you have worked with us in the past, too, especially, just be looking for something in your email. So let's get down to our stuff, shall we? Yes. It's Friday, and we're talking numbers. Yeah, we're going to talk kind of a recap from the results coming in from February. And we did a poll out in – the BHP Success Group and the Boardroom Group. And we asked dealers to kind of let us, there were just like three or four simple questions. And so I think the results are, while limited, they're still pretty telling. And so I think it's an interesting thing to begin to share. So let's talk about what it is that we were, the poll and what the, because the subject is a continuation from last Friday where we were talking about February numbers. To hear all the stuff people talk about, it has been a pretty good-sized month for a lot of people. We've looked at a few dealers that we work with closely and looked at theirs. We're going to do some breaking down of a couple of things. To me, more than anything, it's good news. And I'm going to show you some good news when we get to some of the numbers. But yeah, I just really tried to graph out some of the stuff. So our poll was real simple. It was just like, what was your volume? And was that volume the one on the right? The one on the right. So now the one that we want to cover first, the poll just asked, what was your volume? And was that up or down? from the previous year. So this is an actual, I think we're on the wrong one. Let me get this in the right order. Let's go back over to. Yeah. Don't pay any attention to the graphs on the thing. Okay. Right there. Okay. Well, I mean, you're the one that got it set up, so I had no idea. So this is a big green disc. Yeah. For those who might be catching later on. There's some good news right there. Yeah, I mean, this is a very small sample. We had 23 dealers respond to the poll, and so it's a very small sample. It's a limit to what you can conclude, but that's pretty overwhelming right there. 22 out of 23 said that this year's February volume was higher. Then last year, that's all we asked was a simple question. We did ask their volume too. And we'll get to what those volume numbers tell us, um, you know, about what's happening in the buy here, pay your business. But wow, people had a really active February. And so that's, um, that's an indication. And it was again, I'll, I'll, um, We spoke last Friday about this, that it was it was interesting to watch social media during, you know, as as people are waiting for tax return money to come in. And it's like, have you seen it yet? Have you seen it yet? Well, I've heard it's on this day. I've heard it's on this date. And, you know, I a lot of times the government, which it goes in different phases of different locations or whatever. but I mean everyone for the most part it's like is it coming as it come yet and and so that's for most everybody it's an interesting thing that they got hit like mid-month right yeah it wasn't so much the beginning of the month yeah because for most dealers irs dollars they release those on certain dates typically in waves and so that's part of what happened there but uh yeah we go to the next slide so the next one is the volume breakdown of these 23 dealers. This is basically, and it's a little difficult to read on your side, I'm sure, as a viewer, but you can see that that red section is usually the largest. Yeah, and that volume fell in the range of 25 to 50. Units sold in the month of February. You know, some people talk about dealers, you know, average dealer probably does around 30 a month. You know, there's a whole lot of dealers out there that do five to 10. And then there's dealers out there that do hundreds. So, you know, the average comes in, they say around 30. One of the things about this, Michelle, is that, you know, throughout the years I've been a part of this industry, it's one of the things that's pretty clear. We're so fiercely independent as buy here, pay here dealers that we don't have very... connected numbers we don't have real good data it's all kind of you know a bit here and a bit there and and so that's one of the challenges with this but I just think you know what we're trying to do is just show you you know the real information we have unfortunately our v8 groups we just barely have like six or seven dealers that have submitted their data so far for february so we didn't have enough data to go go on there but basically just uh trying to get to a place where whatever data we have we can share it in the most you know, valuable way and most transparent way. We want to share with people, you know, exactly what's happening behind the scenes. Well, one of the things I see here is it's about 26%, which is more than a quarter of the dealers sold 75 plus. Yeah. And I know that when we were talking about the numbers this morning, someone said something around 600, right? yeah um so we don't know if it was a typo but that was kind of like left out of of the um of the numbers because it would skew like you know you know how when you do numbers you throw out the top ones and you throw out them the bottom ones and you're somewhere in between this is this is I know you knew how to do numbers maybe you can help me with some of those I try I i speak um like I'm a lot less educated on that because that's that is a rabbit hole just like me in the vacuum cleaner story yeah which was made up by the way the vacuum cleaner story I just we don't okay back there yeah but bottom line is um this is uh just kind of a a representation of volume and people were doing some volume you can go the next slide okay So the next one is a Northeast dealer. Yeah. So this is a dealer that's been in business for, um, they've been in business for some time, but they added buy here, pay here. And I just wanted to illustrate like what happened with them. There's a lot more to tell in this story. Um, I think that we're going to be talking about this more too, aren't we? Yeah. I mean, just look at what happened with this dealer. Last February, they did two buy here, pay here deals. And then you can see in the second half of the year, their volume was getting up into the teens, certainly above 10, you know, but then to jump to February to 28, they were hustling, worried about running out of cars. Yeah, I remember the phone call. Yeah. Yeah. And so this is just wow. When you see it on the graph, you can see just how sharply, you know, the data jumped for them and the volume jumped right there for this year. And most everybody we're talking to their March is still on pace. They're still doing, you know, a pretty good clip for the month of March. But for today, we're looking only at February. So this is another dealer. Another Northeast dealer. This is a single location. The other one was a single location as well. And this is just by February where they've been. Right, just looking at February. So 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24. Yeah, and you can see they did 40 back in, what is that, 2020? 2020. So they did 40 back there. But then you can see in recent years, their volume was down in the 20s. And then this year they did 44. Now, I didn't go back far enough to find out if that is a record for them. But certainly- Compared to the last three years, it's a substantial increase. Pretty good numbers. And this is another one that we likely will be kind of breaking down some of what this kind of this trend looks like and why they're having that trend. Go ahead. The next one is. She's trying to load. It's right there. Oh, it already shifted. It just looks very similar. Okay. So this one is also a dealer with a single location, been in business for more than 10 years. And so I was able to get to the data going back to, what is that, 2019 or 18? 2019. Okay. So the... You can see that their volume had been under 20, uh, each of the last five February's and then this year was 31. So while it's just one dealer's case study, it still is, you know, w we've now shown you three dealers. Well, and we do probably should, these dealers, when we're looking at just specific dealers, these are dealers that we work with. And so we are able to see the numbers in a lot deeper way than just other dealers that are saying, hey, this is how much we did, like 600 and something. Right. Yeah. So it's also validated. All of these numbers are validated. Yeah, several. They listed their numbers above 100. But you don't know. I didn't ask them how many locations. I didn't think to ask that question. So obviously that can happen when you have more locations. But I have one more thing to share about that. And I think before you show it, we can... I can explain, you know, when I look at those numbers and I see dealers stepping forward, what is it? It wasn't very long ago that we were hearing that, you know, buy here, pay here. You're seeing dealers, you know, fold up. But, you know, the bigger operations were tucking tail and closing up shop. And you're hearing, you know, lenders withdrawing from the space and this and that. And then I see these dealers out here doing this. And I just think about what it really represents to me. These dealers are providing a solution like in the, in the credit sector, especially in the automotive finance sector, you know, you just have to look at this whole segment and ask yourself, If dealers weren't there to provide this solution for folks, because we know there's a large segment of the industry of the credit spectrum across the U.S. that is in a poor credit segment. And so who would provide this solution? Like, I think dealers deserve some recognition for just... being willing to take that risk yeah and there there's some very real risks associated with what they're doing right so this takes a lot of dollars and they're providing a solution I just think it's something that we want to acknowledge from time to time these dealers are you know providing an outstanding solution I want to show you some of the numbers yeah to help you something that just like occurred to me so if if we weren't there and they weren't and and our customers were not able to find a place that would finance then the only ones that would really be able to have transportation are those that lived in the city because they could get on the Metro, they could get on a bus and all of that. All of those that live in the outlaying areas would not have that. They don't have the buses. And so it's an interesting thing in my mind as I look at we are providing a service that actually helps support businesses in small communities. Because people that are customers who are on that end of the spectrum a lot of times are the workers, the laborers, the people that are keeping the machine of all of the things that keep a small town or a small community running. They're the ones that are doing it. And so, you know, and the only way that they can get to work that, you know, there's no buses. And so they need a vehicle to be able to get to their, their car. And so it's from my perspective, newbie married in is that we're really are it's, it's beyond just helping folks. It's helping communities be able to just keep people engaged in, in, in keeping the machine moving. Right. And I think somebody commented that lenders also are taking a risk, which is absolutely true, right? I mean, they're sometimes the lender behind the dealer who is a creditor of sorts. And so it's, yeah, that's absolutely true that the lenders are taking a risk, but we've seen lenders pull out. And I guess what I'm saying, and just in general way, when we look at that, because, you know, people have heard me say, I'm not a prognosticator here. I'm not trying to predict what the industry is going to do. Over the years, I've said, and this is somewhat indication that But I'd say that, you know, the buyer-payer industry is probably not going to change much. You know, yes, lenders pull out. Yes, Wall Street has, you know, kind of fading interest sometimes. And so this is why money moves in and out of the buyer-payer sector. But dealers who can get to the capital are probably going to have funding opportunities. And the month of February, at least, was a good indication through all the turmoil we've been through in this country and economically. to see dealers doing these kind of numbers is significant. And it just shows me that customer in that segment is still gonna have to have transportation and dealers are stepping up and providing that funding. And so I'm just saying that's something that we need to just acknowledge from time to time. And I, again, another, not really a tangent, but, and it's, I'm just, we really have this beautiful opportunity to help people that are in kind of a pressure cooker situation. And, you know, we were talking, Jim was talking to a dealer the other day that's like, I think I want to get out. This is, you know, it's like... that our customers have changed and um and and you know it's an interesting thing because we talk to a lot of dealers and as they say well our customer is different here um the customer from what we see with all the different dealers that we work with across the country the customer is the same in every single market Their pressure cooker of stresses might be different, but it's across the whole nation. So it's, you know, everybody. And so what a beautiful opportunity we have when we see our customers struggling or reacting to in a way that is very reactionary from a pressure cooker situation, all of that. And the beautiful opportunity we have to show some kindness and kind of help be sitting on the same side of the table. It's like we're a team now. It's not you and sitting across the table as much as it's like we're a team. And what a beautiful opportunity we have because everyone's kind of feeling that with the economy and everything, the pressure cooker. So I'm just saying a little more kindness too. So now let's look at the numbers I've loaded on the screen because this is just kind of a way to further express. We touched on something like this once before, but now having fresh volume numbers coming in, I wanted to just kind of do an update and kind of reaffirm the piece that I'm talking about. So what I've done is I took the average volume. And we can reduce that. But the average volume came in at, what does that say, 78.5 across all the dealers that submitted data. Now, that's, again, a lot of people would say that's too high. That's more than the average dealer does. So I put a factor in there. Let's adjust it. I made this yellow cell where we can adjust that to whatever volume we think is more representative of the typical dealer. So you adjusted it down to 20? To 20 sales a month. But at 20 sales a month, if the average note is was ten thousand dollars so let's just say across this let's get february first that's what the section is this top if the average note was ten thousand dollars then that means the average dealer originated about two hundred thousand dollars and if there are fourteen thousand buy here payer dealers as we hear I mean we hear higher numbers than that but yes and that means those dealers originated almost three billion dollars in the month of february alone Just that month. Yeah. So now I've scaled it way back. If I come up here and say, you know, that number could be a little higher. If that's 30%, you know, of the volume and they do more like 23. And I can make the case that the note size is probably more like 12,000. That almost is 4 billion. Now you're approaching 4 billion just in the month of February. And so now if I say, okay, Just in the month of February. Knowing that the other 11 months of the year are a fraction of the volume that February is. But still. Because I always heard, Michelle, that I heard years ago that it's said that it's believed that that buy here, pay your dealers originate about $10 billion annually. Okay. Well, car prices are up, right? So that note is bigger. So they're probably originating more paper just based on that alone. But if I cut the volume, if I say the rest of the year, the volume is 60%, but I can cut it back. You want to say 50%? Yeah. Cut it back if the volume in the other months is half of what it is in February on average. You're still at $25 billion in originations. And what I see in that, and that's, you know, I don't remember what it was that we were, why we were looking at. Oh, it was a deck that we put together, a pitch deck for... For some of the things that we're working on in White Hat Way and just kind of to give people that we were talking to that were not familiar with Buy Here, Pay Here an idea about the scale of this industry. And it was interesting because the outfit that did it for us It was like they were very unaware of all of the things. And so they were extremely impressed with the sheer numbers that come from this industry. And when I look at that and I think that's a pretty substantial industry. I mean, it's a pretty substantial industry that just this one industry is creating, you know, $30 billion a year of money exchanging. Yeah. Well, they're providing funding. Uh-huh. So that's the amount of loans that are originated annually. Is that include interest or is that just principal? No, that's just the principal. That's the amount of the note. So, I mean, and you know what it does when we start to add interest to that and how much bigger it is. What I hear too is because we are in an industry that serves such a need and such a big, I mean, the dollar amounts are huge. that the more we can get on the same page and, and, and like in a way, standardize certain things and get on the same page with our, our state and national associations. It's like the, the, that we really are a loud voice. Yeah, we are. And definitely joining that state association is a big step in the right direction. I'm, I'm a, I'm not naive. I don't really expect this industry to get super congealed in my lifetime. I just think it's one of those things that the industry is just kind of, you know, they're independent for a reason. They're always going to have and there's so many different DMS systems and it's, you know, so many different ways to do business in different states that I just think you're never going to really get all the people together. And, you know, heck, 14,000 dealers, and we only got 23 of them to send in a poll. So it's like, I have reasonable expectations. Well, we probably only reached a few thousand. Yeah, I have reasonable expectations about what you're going to achieve in terms of getting them all together. But for those who will participate, we can certainly... uh start to collect out and that's what today was about it's like you know when you supply data to us we can turn around information that I think is going to be useful and I just want to take a moment to speak to all the people that are on the perimeter of this industry and recognize you know it doesn't matter if it's somebody's listening from experian or somebody's listening from the cfpb or all these people that are on the perimeter of this industry and many of them are you know complaining obviously we had uh attorney allison harrison on wednesday and we're talking about these unfair practices and yes we we certainly you know it's part of what wednesday is about for us we're trying to showcase a way to do that and not be unfair and mistreat the consumer who's at a disadvantage I mean that's all part of the thing having said all that It's it's a solution that somebody has to provide. And I'm just saying dealers are showing that in the month of February, they stepped up and provided that solution to folks who were in a tough spot. Bravo. Right. Yeah. So, yeah. It's all the pent up. Buying is interesting. It's like those customers surely needed a car in December and January, but they had to wait to buy a car in February because of the down payment factor, right? That's what drives that. They're waiting on the tax refund. That's why we see those numbers jump so high. So one of the things we look forward to doing is figuring out how can we help more folks outside of February, you know, because they need a car in May and they need one in October. And so, you know, that's, that's really one of the, one of the great things about being able to do special payments to, um, you know, however it is that that works and, and, you know, uh, in your DMS, uh, You need a good DMS that will accommodate and a contract that will accommodate. And, you know, there's a, you know, I'm using that word a lot. Sorry. Hey, we should wrap up. We should. Oh my gosh, we've got to get on the road. But thanks for tuning in. This is just an example of what we want to try to do. When you supply us data, we want to be able to turn it around and kind of show you what's happening in the industry. So we appreciate those who took time to complete the survey. And we'll be coming back with more information of similar nature in the future. But just know that, you know, Jill and Michelle are on your side. We're pleased to be associated with a segment that does a lot of really important work out there providing solutions. I'm proud of what it is that we're able to do. And I think that this is the time of year that it's kind of easy for everyone to just kind of go like, yeah, we did a good thing. It's good for business and it's good for our consumers and we did a good thing. And so I just say congratulations. Now, let's hope all of those customers you financed in February are showing up and making those payments in March and April and May. So we know that's only part of it. Now the work starts. All right. Well, I think that's about it. Yeah. Let's wrap up. Everybody, thank you so much for tuning in. Happy Friday. We really appreciate you guys participating and being a part of our experience, our journey, too. Yeah. If you guys have a topic out there that you think, hey, I would really like to learn a little bit more about this, please let us know. There's a ton of ways to get in touch with us. You can put my phone number on the screen there. If you have time, you can throw my phone number up there and people can text me. Well, those of you who are watching on social media, which is video, you know how to reach them. Just comment on the podcast. All right. Have a great day, everybody. Thanks, folks. Happy Friday. Enjoy your weekend. All right. Thanks, guys. Bye.
