In this post, we’d like to talk about three types of goats.

First, sports GOATs – Greatest Of All Time athletes. This topic creates debates all the time; in living rooms, bars, at games… But we’re not going to do that – the topic exists in this post purely as an example.

In basketball, is the GOAT Michael Jordan or LeBron James? In football, is it Tom Brady or Jim Brown? In baseball, is the GOAT Babe Ruth or Ted Williams? How about hockey? Wayne Gretsky or Gordie Howe?

Heck, the GOAT debate even extends to racehorses. Secretariat or Man o’ War?

As long as there are sports, there will be sports GOATs debates – and that’s the way it should be.

Next, the automotive Goat – the Pontiac GTO.

The Pontiac GTO was introduced in 1964 as an optional high-performance package for the Pontiac Tempest. It grew in popularity and these upgraded cars soon became known as muscle cars. The GTO is sometimes called “The Legend” or “The Great One,” but “The Goat” is what many people call it.

People tend to shorten car names to a single syllable. The Corvette is a ‘Vette. The Mustang is a ‘Stang, and Barracuda is a ‘Cuda. Goat became synonymous with GTO.

Regardless, we love the GTO in all its forms, from the modest 1964, to the classy and fast 1966, to the cool 1969 model.

Finally, we come to GOATS. That stands for Greatest Of All Titling Services, and that means ATC.

ATC is the out-of-state tax, title, and license data pioneer and is still the best. We provide the industry’s most accurate information because we monitor every DMV jurisdiction in the country in real-time and update our platform as license and registration data changes. Plus, we can process your out-of-state titles and registrations in just 5 days compared to the 4-5 weeks it takes our competitors.

The truth is in the data: ATC is the fastest, most accurate TT&L data provider.

When you GO ATC, you get the Greatest Of All Titling Companies!

We promise to continue being the best and most accurate tax, title, and registration fee information provider to make the car buying experience easier for your shoppers. To learn more, contact us.

Every industry has its own lingo. Sometimes it’s used as verbal “shorthand” that conveys direct meaning. Other times it’s used as code that communicates a hidden message. Regardless, when people buy a car, they often hear terms that make no sense to them, so we put together this list of dealership lingo and what the words and phrases mean.

Back Door Trade

After a customer and salesperson negotiate back and forth and a deal has been reached, the customer announces that they’d like to trade in their old vehicle.

Back-End

The gross profit created in the F&I office after the sales price of the car has been agreed to. Back-end profit includes add-ons like aftermarket products, warranties, or GAP insurance.

Beacon

Credit score generated by Equifax that shows a customer’s creditworthiness.

Beater 

An old beat-up car with high mileage, dents, or bad paint. Also called bombs, buckets, clams, clunkers, crates, heaps, junkers, and toads.

Blower or Blowhard

If you’re seriously “just looking” and have no intentions of buying a car, dealership staff may refer to you as a blower. It’s really not an insult, they just know that they aren’t going to spend their time trying to get you to buy something you’re not going to buy anyway.

Boomerang 

A price on a car or trade-in that no one else can match, making the buyer boomerang back to the dealership.

Bring a Lawyer

A lawyer is a friend brought along to help secure a better deal and provide the buyer advice.

Bumblebees

A car buyer that can’t decide between multiple vehicles and bounces back and forth between them on the lot.

Bunny

Opposite from the blower is the bunny, a customer that doesn’t negotiate and is more likely to take the first offer.

Cherry Picker 

A salesperson that only helps certain customers, based on how they are dressed or what they are driving.

Clicks

A click is a mile, so a car with 15,000 clicks has 15,000 miles on it – the number of times the odometer has “clicked” another mile.

Flipped

When a car buyer has a trade-in that is valued for more than the sticker price of the car they are looking to buy.

Front-End

Gross profit made on a transaction, not counting F&I (the Back-End)

Grinder

A customer that haggles back and forth to get the very best deal.

Ham Sandwich

A car sale with a small amount of profit.

Lot Lizard

A customer who visits a lot multiple times a week and talks to every salesperson but never buys anything.

Monroney

The window sticker on every new vehicle that is required by law that includes the MSRP, options, and other required information. Named after Mike Monroney, a former Senator from Oklahoma.

Negative Equity

This happens when you owe more on a vehicle than it is worth. So, if you trade in a truck for $5,000 but still owe $7,000, you have $2,000 of negative equity that must be rolled into your next loan.

Pounder

The same as one thousand dollars. Kind of like “hundo” means “hundred,” a pounder means someone made a thousand dollars on a deal. 

Soft Pull

A credit inquiry that does not impact a customer’s credit score.

Spot / Stiff

A spot is a customer that comes in and buys a car the same day. A stiff is a customer that a salesperson spends a lot of time with but ultimately chooses to not buy.

TD

Short for “Turned Down,” as in, “This customer was turned down for credit everywhere.”

TT&L 

Tax, title, and license (of course you knew that!)

Underwater

See “negative equity.”

How many of these terms do you use at your dealership? Automotive Titling Company (ATC) works with dealerships to provide the industry’s most accurate tax, title, and registration fee information to make the car buying experience easier for your shoppers and more profitable for dealers, lenders, and auto technology companies. We work with every DMV, in every jurisdiction in the country, to make it easier for you to sell cars. To learn more, contact us.

Electric vehicles are the future.

The combination of technology advances and high gas prices are making more buyers switch to EVs. EV registrations grew 60% in the 1st quarter of 2022 with 35,000 EV sales.

Nearly every vehicle manufacturer has pledged that its offerings will increasingly become electric. GM has said 40% of U.S. models will be electric by the end of 2025. Ford’s new Mustang Mach-E SUV has done well and the popular F-150 pickup truck features an electric version. Jaguar declared it will become an all-electric brand by 2025, and Audi offers the high-performance e-tron GT and RS e-tron GT. Volkswagen’s new compact ID.4 is set to challenge the Tesla Model 3.

New brands include Aspark, Bollinger, Polestar, Byton, Canoo, Faraday, Lagonda, Lucid, and Rivian.

According to Statista, EVs accounted for only 2.3% of sales in the U.S. in 2020, but elsewhere, sales are much higher, including Finland at 18.1%, Netherlands at 24.9%, Sweden at 32.2%, Iceland at 45%, and Norway at 74.8% EV sales are growing – everywhere!

Here are 6 things about EVs your customers should consider before buying one.

1 – There are several different types of EVs

  • EV. This is the catch-all name for all electric vehicles and is not a specific type of EV.
  • BEV. Battery-powered Electric Vehicles use only a battery-powered electric motor and produces no tailpipe emissions. Sometimes called an AEV (All Electric Vehicle).
  • HEV. Hybrid Electric Vehicles run on both an electric motor and an internal combustion engine. They use regenerative braking to charge the battery.
  • PHEV. Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles plug into power to charge their batteries and use an internal combustion engine.
  • FCEV. Fuel Cell Electric Vehicles run on compressed hydrogen but are not widely available yet.

2 – EVs are all about driving range

The first thing to consider before buying an EV is how many miles are driven each week, and how common car charging stations are in the driving area. More employers and cities are adding charging stations, but they still are not as common as gas stations.

A couple of notes about EV range:

  • Most BEVs have a range of more than 200 miles on a full charge, and some can even reach 400 miles. Much like horsepower used to be a selling point for internal combustion cars, the performance standard for EVs will be range.
  • BEVs perform well in start-and-stop driving but consume much more battery power at steady highway speeds.
  • Hot and cold temperatures reduce EV range because of AC and heater use.

3 – EV charging

Many EV owners live in constant fear of running out of battery charge without being near a charging station. The United States Department of Energy Alternative Fuels Data Center shows around 48,000 locations around the country and publishes an interactive map of electric vehicle charging stations. And of course, users can charge their vehicles at home.

There are 3 types of chargers for EVs:

  • Level 1. This type of charger uses a household three-prong outlet, but few EV owners use this method because it can take too long to charge. A standard outlet can only add about 3 or 4 miles of range per hour.
  • Level 2. These chargers need 240 volts of power and can add between 15 and 60 miles of range per hour.
  • Level 3. These chargers are mainly found in public charging stations that cost money to use but can add 100 miles of range in 30 minutes.

4 – EV home charging unit costs

How much do EV charging units cost? A budget portable Level 2 charger can be bought for less than $200 with more expensive models costing closer to $400 or $500. These will come with longer cables and higher power capabilities.

Wall-mounted chargers can cost between $400 and $500 but can go as high as $1000. A professional at-home charger installation could cost between $2500 and $3000.

5 – The cost of charging an EV 

Public charging stations aren’t free and EV owners have had to change their thinking from miles per gallon to average cost per kilowatt hour (kWh.)

An average EV gets around 3 to 4 miles for every kWh. If driven 1,000 miles a month with a $0.20 per kWh electric rate at the buyer’s home, the charging cost would be $55 to $65 each month. The average cost to use a public charging station is between $0.40 and $0.70 per kWh, so a full charge costs around $30.

6 – The batteries 

The heart of an EV is the battery system, and like all batteries, they degrade and lose charging capacity over time. So, when buying a new EV, pay close attention to the reviews of its battery system. If buying a used EV, the battery life and condition can be used as a bargaining tool.

It’s also important to find out if the battery has been replaced. If so, someone else went through the trouble and cost of doing it. Finally, find out how much of the battery warranty is remaining. Most battery warranty coverages are around 8 years / 100,000 miles, but make sure that the warranty is transferrable.

Each year, sales of EVs will increase and more of your customers will be interested in learning more about them. We hope this blog post helps educate you on how to educate them. One thing will always remain the same: EVs will still need to be properly titled and licensed!

Automotive Titling Company (ATC) provides the industry’s most accurate tax, title, and registration fee information to make the car buying experience easier for your shoppers and more profitable for dealers, lenders, and auto technology companies. We work with every DMV, in every jurisdiction in the country, to make it easier for you to sell cars. To learn more, contact us.

America of the 20th century was built around the automobile and it influenced just about every aspect of our lives. But sadly, there are some parts of our shared automotive car culture that are gone forever.

Take a trip back in time. Which of these aspects of automotive culture make you long for the “good old days?”

Hot Rods

After World War 2, returning GIs that gained mechanical skills while in the service started tinkering with inexpensive Model Ts and other cars from the 1920s through 1940s that were widely available. The goal was to create the fastest, coolest looking car and these souped-up hot rods created a customizing culture that gave birth to a huge automotive aftermarket industry.

Sadly, young people no longer spend hours customizing their cars; partially because they have become so complex, but also because their interests have changed.

Drive-Ins

People went car-crazy in the 40s and 50s, giving rise to the drive-in theater with its large outdoor screen, projection booth, concession stand and speakers that hung on the windows. There are still drive-ins, of course, but not nearly the same number as there used to be.

Tailfins

Tailfins began to appear on American cars in the late 1940s, and most people credit the 1948 Cadillac lineup for introducing them. The fins served no practical purpose but gave a Space Age look to cars and connected them to the technology that was capturing everyone’s attention at the time: jet planes and rockets. But as consumers’ tastes changed, tailfins disappeared.

Chrome

Sweet, beautiful chrome. 1950s and 1960s cars wore chrome like diamonds. The process of chrome plating had been perfected and chromed car parts were both brighter and lower maintenance than previous nickel-plated finishes, so car designers added chrome. And more chrome. And yet more chrome. Believe it or not, polishing the chrome used to be a weekend chore that some people loved!

Muscle Cars

The 1949 Oldsmobile Rocket 88 is often mentioned as the first muscle car. Putting a big engine in a small body was popular until skyrocketing insurance rates and smog control killed the muscle car in the early 1970s. But muscle cars have made a comeback with the re-introduction of the Dodge Charger, Chevy Camaro, and Ford Shelby Mustang.

Cruising

Just driving around town with friends might seem boring to today’s youth, but it was popular in the 50s, 60s, 70s, and 80s. Gas was cheap, the cars were cool, and memories of cruising spawned movies like “American Graffiti” and “Dazed and Confused.”

Whitewalls

Automotive tires were originally off-white in color, but when B.F. Goodrich added carbon black to the manufacturing process, they became the black tires we know today. But one small tire company only used the carbon black for the treads to cut costs. The result was a white tire with black treads. The look caught on and by the 1920’s whitewalls were mainstays on high end luxury cars. Whitewalls were popular in the 40s and 50s, but the size of the whitewall began to shrink in the 1960s, eventually disappearing completely.

Custom Vans

In the 1970s, full-size vans from Chevy, Ford and Dodge became the ultimate vehicles for self-expression. By the end of the decade, these “shag wagons” featured chrome side pipes, airbrushed murals, velvet interiors, and shag carpeting.

Conversion Vans

In the 1990s and 2000s, the full-size conversion van was incredibly popular. They featured luxury suspension, a high top which made the roof higher, swiveling captains’ chairs, custom lighting, and TVs with VCRs. All good things must come to an end, and the rise of the SUV killed the conversion van.

Vinyl Roofs

Vinyl roofs were originally created to make cars look like they were convertibles but became their own styling element. Vinyl roofs are considered hallmarks of 1970s American cars.

We’re sure we missed some aspects of car culture that we’ll never see again, but no matter what form or shape cars and trucks take, Automotive Titling Company (ATC) will provide the industry’s most accurate tax, title, and registration fee information to make the car buying experience easier for your shoppers and more profitable for dealers, lenders, and auto technology companies. We work with every DMV, in every jurisdiction in the country, to make it easier for you to sell cars. To learn more, contact us.

2021 was a strange year in the automotive industry. We had to deal with COVID, chip shortages, supply chain issues, the Great Resignation – but still, vehicle buyers showed up at dealerships and bought cars and trucks.

The list of the Top 10 best-selling vehicles from 2021 doesn’t hold many surprises but does show recent buying trends remain consistent. That is, SUVs and pickup trucks rule the road. Although to be transparent, the top 3 entries on the list are vehicle lines, not a single model, which slightly skews their numbers.

The 10 best-selling vehicles of 2021 were:

  1. Honda Civic (263,787 sold)

In its 49th year of production, the Civic can be had as both a sedan or hatchback, with an available manual transmission for a sportier feel.

  1. Toyota Highlander (264,128)

With 3-rows and seating for up to 8, this best-selling SUV enjoys good reliability ratings and solid resale value.

  1. Jeep Grand Cherokee (264,444)

Beloved by families, the Grand Cherokee can seat 5 and has an upscale interior not meant for off-roading or mudding! A roomy cargo area doesn’t hurt, either.

  1. Nissan Rogue (285,602)

The all-new 2021 edition of the Rogue features a quieter cabin and updated styling. All-wheel drive is an option, as are five drive modes for different road conditions.

  1. Toyota Camry (313,795)

The Camry was the best-selling sedan in 2021 and continues Toyota’s long history of excellent reliability ratings and high resale value. The Camry offers a choice of 4-cylinder or V6 engines, and a hybrid option.

  1. Honda CR-V (361,271)

The Honda CR-V has a spacious interior and lots of cargo space, plus Honda’s good reliability ratings and resale value.

  1. Toyota RAV4 (407,739)

The best-selling SUV for 2021 was the RAV4 with its excellent reliability ratings and range of trim lines, including an off-road package and a plug-in hybrid version.

  1. Chevrolet Silverado (529,765)

The Silverado line includes full-size, heavy-duty and medium-duty pickups with high tow ratings and trim levels from basic to luxury.

  1. Ram Pickup (569,388)

The Ram line includes the 1500, 2500, and 3500 and offers multiple engine choices and a wide range of options.

  1. Ford F-Series (726,004)

The top spot is held by the F-Series pickup line, including the F-250, F-350, and F-450. Trim packages range from basic work truck to family cruiser.

To show how things have changed (or stayed the same), here are the top selling vehicles from each year of the 1980s. Did you have any of these models?

1980: Oldsmobile Cutlass (469,573 sold)

1981: Oldsmobile Cutlass (454,188)

1982: Ford Escort (337,667)

1983: Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme (331,179)

1984: Chevrolet Cavalier (383,752)

1985: Chevrolet Cavalier (422,927)

1986: Chevrolet Celebrity (408,946)

1987: Ford Escort (392,360)

1988: Ford Escort (381,330)

1989: Honda Accord (362,707)

No matter what type of vehicle is the most sold in any given year, Automotive Titling Company (ATC) provides the industry’s most accurate tax, title, and registration fee information to make the car buying experience easier for your shoppers and more profitable for dealers, lenders, and auto technology companies. We work with every DMV, in every jurisdiction in the country, to make it easier for you to sell cars. To learn more, contact us.

(Source: Kelley Blue Book, 2022)

 

In our last blog post, “Vehicle Buyer (and Dealership) Pain Points,” we mentioned how technology has made buying easier for consumers; order something online today, and it arrives tomorrow. Consumers are looking for a similar level of convenience when buying a car – but only to a point.

According to the Deloitte 2021 Global Automotive Consumer Study, 71% of vehicle buyers still want to buy a vehicle in person but with some parts of the process completed online to streamline the process, and make it less stressful and time-consuming.

The study found that consumers want to research vehicles and complete paperwork online and guide the financing process at their own pace. This includes learning about, and evaluating, add-ons like extended warranties in a less hurried and rushed way. But consumers prefer in-person test drives and vehicle evaluations.

The starkest fact the study found: most buyers only want to spend one hour at a dealership, at the maximum. Let that sink in – one hour.

So, to make the vehicle buying experience more convenient for consumers, consider these four ways to increase the convenience factor for your vehicle buyers.

Let them start the process online
Giving your prospective buyers the tools to start their purchase journey on their own – online –
saves both your customer and your dealership time. According to a recent Harris poll, buyers want to do these things at their own pace, online:

Search for a vehicle – 80%
Negotiate price – 78%
Schedule delivery of the purchased vehicle – 76%
Get a trade-in value / offer – 75%
Complete financing / credit check – 74%
Review / decide on insurance or extended warranties – 73%

Eliminate the purchase “gauntlet”
Shoppers dislike being taken from one office to the next to complete their vehicle purchase, and some dealerships are eliminating the F&I part of the process altogether, allowing buyers to complete the process online and sign documents in person.

Compete on the vehicle buying experience, not the vehicle
The days of selling cars solely based on their performance, features, mileage, and reliability are waning. Modern consumers are interested in a friction-free buying experience, so if you can provide a better experience than your competitors, you will win.

Go to them instead of making them come to you
Buyers still want to take a vehicle for a test drive and check it out up close so take the car to them at home or at work and let them drive it when it’s convenient for them. If a buyer has completed financial paperwork online, this is also the opportunity to have them sign on the dotted line.

The process has changed and perhaps some of these some suggestions seem radical or outlandish, but consumers have changed. Consider all the “must-have” items of the past that no one uses anymore: film canisters, VCRs, pay phones, maps, telegraph machines, carbon paper, and outhouses.

We have seen incredible change in the automotive industry, shaped by both changing consumer habits and preferences, and the pandemic. Now is a great time to take a long, hard look at everything you do and ask, “can we do this better?” More to the point, can you engineer your sales process so your customer spends only an hour at the dealership, because that’s what the goal should be.

Automotive Titling Company (ATC) provides the industry’s most accurate tax, title, and registration fee information to make the car buying experience easier for your shoppers and more profitable for dealers, lenders, and auto technology companies. We work with every DMV, in every jurisdiction in the country, to make it easier for you to sell cars. To learn more, contact us.

Technology has made buying things easy: order just about anything online, and it appears at your door the next day (or sooner!) Increasingly, consumers are looking for the same level of convenience when buying a car – but the automotive industry hasn’t kept up with the technology to do so.

As a result, vehicle buyers encounter multiple pain points in their buying journey. But if you look at the pain points closely, there’s really nothing new – they have always existed in the minds of car buyers.

Waiting. According to a recent study by CDK Global, 41% of vehicle buyers say that waiting at the dealership is the most frustrating part of the buying experience. The reason wait time is so long is that many dealership systems do not integrate with one another, forcing the staff to print information from one system, and manually enter the data in another.

Pressure. Buying a vehicle is stressful. It’s a multiple year commitment to financing, the vehicle, and it’s the second largest purchase many people make (next to buying a home), and for many, it IS the largest purchase they’ll ever make. High pressure F&I managers that quickly explain options (some of which may not be in the buyer’s best interest), and then go through an interminable checklist of add-ons, like extended warranties for wheels, windshields, etc., make this part of the process extremely stressful for buyers.

Too many people in the process. The salesperson. The F&I manager. The title and registration person. Being shuttled form one office to the next makes buyers feel like a cog in a wheel.

Paperwork. There is a lot of paperwork involved in buying a vehicle. You need to have your driver’s license, proof of insurance, title to your trade-in, pay stubs and tax forms. Then you sign the purchase agreement, then the lien, then this, and then that… It’s mind-numbing, and your customers don’t like it.

Interestingly, the dealership has pain points too.

Data. Many systems don’t link to one another, so data must be rekeyed several times during a transaction. As much as buyers don’t like waiting while it happens, dealership staff also don’t like it.

Internet sales. Yes, they are great for the dealership, but 47% of staff members dislike wasting time on duplicate leads, and waiting on their manager (25%).

F&I. Dealership staff cite document retrieval as the biggest area for improvement (53%), and lack of documents being able to be digitally signed (34%).

Consumers and dealerships are both looking to move beyond the industry’s traditional, outdated sales processes, and the last few years has taught us that to make something easy to buy, it must be easy to sell. Since a vehicle purchase is expensive and many legal documents must be completed and executed in order to stay compliant with the myriad of regulations surrounding vehicle sales, the process may always be complicated. But knowing exactly what consumers find frustrating about the process can help you try to alleviate those pain points.

One of the best ways to differentiate your dealership from the competition is to give your customers the best buying experience possible.

Automotive Titling Company (ATC) provides the industry’s most accurate tax, title, and registration fee information to make the car buying experience easier for your shoppers and more profitable for dealers, lenders, and auto technology companies. We work with every DMV, in every jurisdiction in the country, to make it easier for you to sell cars. To learn more, contact us.

The last few years have seen unprecedented events affect the automotive industry, from COVID, to the growing influence of digital retailing, to the chip shortage impacting production. In this blog post, we summarize how things went in the first quarter of 2022.

Supply and Demand. There’s plenty of demand for new vehicles, but the supply side is challenged, and when that happens, costs increase. According to J.D. Power, the average transaction price in March was $43,737 – 17.4% higher than last year, and the average monthly payment increased to $658.

Sales Slumped. First quarter sales dropped as vehicle production continued to be limited. According to NADA, sales in March were down 24.4% from last March.

Loyalty? What Loyalty? With inventory tight, vehicle buyers are switching brands faster than ever, just to buy something, not necessarily what they intended to buy.

Cars? What Cars? In the first quarter, compact SUVs, midsize SUVs, and full-size pickups accounted for 49% of vehicle sales in the U.S.

EVs Are Still Hot. Electric vehicle sales totaled 174,000 in Q1, the most for any quarter ever, and were up 76% from Q1 2021. Tesla’s share of the EV market was 75%!

…And The Winners Are: The best-selling brand in Q1 was Toyota, and the bestselling vehicle was the Ford F-series pickup truck.

Q2 looks like it’s going to be rough, as inventories continue to dwindle and dealer incentives dry up, but we’ve all been through worse, so the best way to stay competitive is to continue to differentiate from your competitors and give your customers the best buying experience possible.

Automotive Titling Company (ATC) provides the industry’s most accurate tax, title, and registration fee information to make the car buying experience easier for your shoppers and more profitable for dealers, lenders, and auto technology companies. We work with every DMV, in every jurisdiction in the country, to make it easier for you to sell cars. To learn more, contact us.

ATC is much more than a company – it is a collection of great people, and together, they make us the company we are. They also help simplify nationwide auto title and registration for you! All our team members are fantastic, and this month, we’d like to introduce you to Bobby Shofi.

What do you do at ATC?
I am the Director of Sales, which means I help develop, craft, and lead the ATC sales strategy. That includes our scope of services, business cases, channel strategy and alignment, sales model and Go-to-Market design, and sales, of course!

How long have you been with ATC? 
I have been here since January 2021, so a year and some change.

What first drew you to ATC, and what have you seen change over the years?
It was a combination of both the company and the role. I am passionate about this industry, and ATC offers a product and service that is both specialized and necessary. I thought, “What is better than selling something a lot of businesses need?” ATC is an established company with a start-up and entrepreneurial culture, the best of both worlds! ATC thrives on innovative ideas powered by ambitious people.

As a company, we’ve seen massive growth in both the data services and titling and registration side of our business. As digital dealers like Carvana and Vroom continue to make massive waves by challenging the traditional car shopping experience, the need for accurate title and registration data becomes more and more important.

How do you balance your career and personal life?
I try to find ways to prioritize my health, like taking breaks during the day to go for a walk with the dogs, play with my son, listen to music. I find that I’m happier and more productive at my job with these short “reset” periods.

What are your hobbies outside of ATC?
I love to play golf and I love to eat. The best is when I’m able to do both! My wife and I love to go hiking and explore new restaurants.

When you have 30 minutes of free time, how do you spend it?
I would play with my son. He’s only 5 months old, but he loves his stories just like his dad.

What is your favorite thing about working at ATC?
The people I work with! Every day, I get to work alongside extremely talented, smart, and driven individuals. ATC also gives me the opportunity to meet extraordinary people outside of our organization in various lines of work and with diverse backgrounds. Gaining a new perspective from well-respected businesspeople is so rewarding.

Before ATC, what was your most interesting or unusual job?
One of the most interesting jobs I’ve ever had was working as a summer camp counselor between college semesters. I taught kids how to swim, play sports, shoot archery, paint, etc., and I could eat whatever I wanted! It was, without a doubt, the most fun I’ve ever had in any summer, and I got paid to do it!

Bobby is one of the many great people on the ATC team, and he helps us provide our customers the high levels of service they’ve come to expect. When you work with ATC, Bobby, and everyone else on the team, works tirelessly to ensure your title and registration work is done correctly and efficiently.

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…” is how Charles Dickens’ classic “A Tale of Two Cities” begins. For this blog post, the Automotive Titling Company (ATC) is taking some poetic license and titling our post, “A Tale of Two City’s Vehicle Tax, Title and License Fees.” It is meant to show that if you have bad TT&L data, out-of-state transactions can really be the “worst of times.”

To show how complicated this process really is and how drastically different two locations’ tax rates, registration and titling fees can be, we will be using the same vehicle, being titled and registered in two different cities. The vehicle is a 2021 pickup truck, and the two cities are Brookfield, Wisconsin, located in Waukesha County, and Fort Lauderdale, Florida, located in Broward County.

The truck’s purchase price (Base Price) and MSRP are $50,000, it weighs 4,200 pounds, and its gross vehicle weight (GVW) and gross vehicle weight rating (GVWR) are both 5,000 pounds. The transaction also had an included documentation fee of $200.

Both out-of-state transactions were run through the ATC platform to show the differences in TT&L fees and documentation requirements.

The pickup truck registered in Brookfield, WI is taxed at a 5% state tax rate, with a registration fee of $100 that is based upon the GVW of the vehicle. Additionally, a title fee of $164.50 and a lien fee of $10 is charged.

The same pickup truck registered in Fort Lauderdale, FL is taxed at a 6% state tax rate, and is charged a county flat tax of $50 and total registration fees of $301.60, also based on the GVW of the vehicle. Title fees add on an additional $77.25.

The total tax, title, and registration fees for the same pickup truck are $2,829.00 when titled in Brookfield, WI and $3,465.85 when titled in Fort Lauderdale, FL (less ATC fees and mailing costs).

That’s a difference of more than $600, but the real cost of out-of-state transactions is how much time your staff spends searching for information and verifying it is accurate. ATC customers have completely up-to-date information like this at their fingertips and finding it takes only seconds. Pardon the pun, but out-of-state titling and registration can really be the dickens if you do not have accurate data.

Automotive Titling Company (ATC) works with the DMV every day to prevent “the worst of times” for your business. As you can see, TT&L fees and requirements can differ dramatically from one location to another, so having accurate TT&L data is crucial. ATC provides the industry’s most accurate tax, title, and registration fee information to make the car buying experience easier for shoppers and more profitable for dealers, lenders, and auto technology companies. We work with every DMV, in every jurisdiction in the country, to make it easier for you to sell cars. To learn more, contact us.