Yes. When you look at consumers' budgets, probably the second-highest expense after housing is car payments, along with the gas and the insurance. Sometimes it's a lot more than food, even. If you have a household with two cars, it gets compounded.
We've found that cars are more expensive. You used to finance cars over four or five years. Now, the average is seven years, and we see up to eight years. These are major lenders giving those rates. Payments are getting spread out more.
Also, we're seeing people trade in cars that are not fully paid off. Those get traded in at what's outstanding on the loan, not what the car is worth. When you get a new car, you're rolling in the shortfall on the other one, and now you're paying for two cars or a car and a half. I've also seen scenarios where there are two cars that were traded in. When we see them, the shortfall can be $20,000 to $30,000. Over time, those additional payments grind down on your budget, and that's money you can't spend elsewhere. That's the problem we're seeing there.
