Over the years, you may have heard random myths, theories or “tricks” for enhancing your car’s performance or fuel efficiency. Many of these “tips and tricks” have never actually been proven, and some may be counterproductive.

As a car owner, do your best to decipher facts from myths. You (and your wallet) may be better off for it.

1. The bigger the car, the safer it is

Some drivers are led to believe that if they drive a larger vehicle like a truck or SUV that they will be much safer in the event of an accident. While some trucks can have higher safety ratings compared to sedans, they are also top heavy, which makes them more vulnerable to a rollover crash.

2. Filling your tank with premium fuel will enhance performance

High-end luxury vehicles and sports cars often require premium fuel in order to operate properly. However, if your car only needs unleaded gasoline, paying for premium is simply a waste of money. Unless you are driving a sports car that requires it, premium fuel will not enhance a car’s performance or responsiveness.

3. You should always warm up your car’s engine in the winter

While it is true that engines do need to warm up, that doesn’t mean you need to leave your car running idle for several minutes before you drive it. When you let it idle while you make your coffee in the morning, the car operates at its lowest power (which doesn’t generate as much heat). The best way to “warm up” your engine is to drive it.

4. Using your cell phone at the gas pump could trigger an explosion

This myth dates back to when mobile phones began to grow in popularity when some believed that wireless signals could spark and ignite fuel vapors. There is no scientific evidence or recorded incidents that point to the validity of this myth.

5. Running your air conditioning conserves fuel versus rolling down your windows

Have you ever been low on gas and panicked because it’s too hot to roll the windows down? Despite the weather, it is always better to shut off your car’s air conditioner and roll down the windows in that scenario. The myth that open windows hurt your fuel economy due to drag is not true. While drag does exist and may have a small effect on fuel efficiency, the air conditioning will always use more fuel than driving with the windows down.

6. Boost your car’s power by installing a performance chip

Drivers who are looking to “pimp their ride” might turn to aftermarket parts like performance chips to improve the quality of their vehicle. Although performance chips are marketed by manufacturers as a way to give your car more juice, they don’t actually make your vehicle more powerful.

These chips primarily just manipulate your vehicle’s computer-controlled components to make them perform differently. Some of the safeguards or limits that a performance chips override might have important purposes, which means using a chip could have adverse consequences for your engine.

7. You can charge your car battery just by jumpstarting it

There is nothing worse than realizing you have a dead battery right before you have to go to work or make it to an appointment. When this happens, you can either have the battery jumpstarted or you can buy a new car battery. Keep in mind that jumpstarting a car battery is only a temporary fix — the battery will still need to be replaced (and soon).

8. A car’s safety and technology features will compensate for bad driving habits

Features like driver assistance and backup cameras can give drivers more tools, visibility and warning signs to reduce the risk of accidents, but they can’t fix bad driving. Safety features like blind spot warning and adaptive cruise control are designed to increase accident-avoidance. At the end of the day, a driver can ignore all safety features and continue with their bad driving habits.

9. Hybrid vehicles are much slower

When hybrid vehicles first hit the market, they typically accelerated at a slower rate compared to an average vehicle. Over the last 10 years, manufacturers have improved hybrid models and equipped them to be more fuel-efficient and lighter in weight — both of which allow the hybrid powertrains to operate at an equal power as a regular sedan.

10. Manual transmissions are more fuel efficient compared to automatic transmissions

Remember there haven’t always been automatic transmissions. When they first hit the market, drivers realized they could get better fuel economy with a manual transmission. Of course, automatic transmissions have come a long way since then — some even providing a more fuel-efficient option when compared to manual transmissions.

Find Your Next Used Car at Easterns Automotive

If you live in the Maryland, Virginia or the Greater D.C. area, Easterns Automotive is your source for exceptional pre-owned vehicles. We’ve been serving D.C. and Baltimore car shoppers for more than 30 years and are committed to quality, affordability and flexible financing.

Give Easterns a call at 877-867-0641 or visit one of our eight dealerships today for more information.

Detailing your car is a more in-depth process than your standard wash and will take longer and cost more than simply driving through a carwash. Despite the amount of time it can take, it’s still important to detail your car occasionally. Doing so helps maintain the appearance and value of your automobile.

To detail your car, it’s necessary to have the right equipment and patience. Detailing a car can take a lot of time, so many people choose to hire professionals to handle the process.

What Is Car Detailing?

Car detailing is a cosmetic process that restores the appearance of an automobile. Detailing a car may also include making minor cosmetic repairs to small damages to its interior and exterior. The focus of detailing is more on the appearance of the vehicle than mechanics. You should consider detailing your car every four to six months to keep it in its best condition.

Setting aside time to detail your car will ensure you get the best results as you meticulously follow through on the steps needed.

Know What You Need

You’ll need different cleaning agents depending on the materials inside the interior of your car and its overall state of repair. Before you begin cleaning your car, make sure you have what you need. You may save yourself time and money by investing in a car detailing kit. With a premade kit you can be certain you have most everything you need to detail your car.

Bring two bins with you; one to hold items you’ll want to put back in your car after you’ve finished detailing it and one for trash. This can help you stay organized during the process of detailing the interior.

Start With the Inside

You’ll want to begin detailing your car from the inside out. This is the best way to ensure that any dust or debris from inside your car does not make it to the exterior of your car. Following this logic, while cleaning the interior of your car, begin from the top and work your way down.

Surfaces

1. Start by clearing out all unnecessary items from your car. Clean out your cupholders, ashtray, compartments etc. Put trash like receipts or other items you don’t want to keep in one bin. Use the second bin to keep safe items like your owner’s manual.
2. After you’ve removed all items from your car, begin dusting the hard interior surfaces. To do this, you’ll need compressed air spray, a towel or wipe and a bristle brush. Use the compressed air spray to purge dust out of difficult-to-reach places. Use the bristle brush to clean out your air vents.
3. Wipe all hard interior surfaces like your steering wheel using the proper cleansing agent for the surface. If your car has leather, use a commercial leather cleanser on a soft microfiber towel. If your car has a plastic or synthetic material interior, wipe with a damp microfiber towel first, then use a gentle cleaning agent on a towel. If this doesn’t work to remove all marks, try a gentle scrub brush. Then remove the cleaner with a damp towel and follow up with a dry towel.
4. Clean all glass surfaces in your car with an ammonia-free glass cleaner.

Seats

1. Vacuum the seats of your car, preferably using a brush head attachment. Alternate the heads when necessary to reach and remove all debris trapped in the tight corners of your car seats.
2. Spot treat deep stains with a strong cleaning agent and allow the agent to rest to loosen the stains.
3. Some cleaning agents for car seats need to be mixed with warm water to work. Follow the product label’s preparation instructions and then apply the shampoo to your car seats.
4. Scrub the seats after applying the shampoo with a soft brush. Be sure to focus on any stains. Rinse your brush off as it becomes dirtied in a bucket of water.
5. To dry your seats after shampooing them, use a soft towel to wipe away the moisture trapped in the seat materials. After wiping down the seats, park your car in the sunniest place you feel comfortable and leave your car doors open to allow the sunlight to dry up the rest of the moisture.
6. If your seats are leather, condition them after drying them and don’t let them sit in the sun. Carefully follow instructions on leather cleaning products to avoid damaging interior seats and surfaces.

Floors

1. Take off your floor pads and brush the carpet to loosen and remove any debris trapped in the fiber of your car’s floors. Use a softer brush to avoid damaging the carpet fibers of your car while you detail it.
2. Vacuum your floors. Your vacuum should come with multiple head attachments. Change the attachments when necessary to reach debris in all corners of the flooring of your car. Shift your seats all the way forward and backward to ensure you reach everything.

Clean The Exterior

Tires

1. Rinse off your tires and rims first to remove any loose debris. After that, apply wheel cleaner and allow the cleaner to sit for a minute.
2. Scrub your tires using a brush then use a wheel cleaner. After you’ve washed your tires, apply a protectant to prevent any damage to your tires.
3. Use the most appropriate cleanser for your rims.

Car Body

1. Spray the exterior of your car with a hose to rinse it off.
2. Use a sponge or a car mitt and soap to wash your car in sections. Washing and rinsing your car in sections will prevent the soap from drying on your car and forming swirl patterns.
3. Soak the sponge or car mitt in water to remove any soap and rinse the soap off your car as you move along. Following this, dry each segment of your car with a soft microfiber towel.
4. Use a clay bar to remove any contaminants that might be stuck to the surface of your car.

Polish (If Appropriate)

Cars with graphene or ceramic coatings may not require polishing or waxing. It may be necessary to skips these steps if your vehicle has a protectant layer already applied.

1. Apply polish to your car in small doses and buff out the polish using a power buffer at low to medium speed or with a buffing pad.
2. After buffing, use a dry towel to wipe off any excess polish and dry your car.
3. Clean the metal trim of your car by applying a metal cleaner and wipe it down with a dry towel.

Wax

1. After polishing your car, take a small amount of liquid car wax on an applicator and begin spreading the wax across your car in an overlapping circle motion.

Glass

1. Wipe down the exterior glass of your car by using a glass cleaner. Spray the glass with the glass cleaner and then use a dry towel to wipe the cleaner off.

How Long Does It Take to Detail a Car

How long it takes to detail your car depends on how deep of a clean you’re aiming for and the state of the car when you begin detailing it. Detailing a car can take anywhere from two hours to two days depending on whether you want to clean just the interior or the interior and exterior.

It can be a big task to tackle on your own and there are professionals who can provide you with the level of service you need.

Easterns Automotive Group is the number one used car dealership for D.C., Maryland and Virginia. We have been helping all types of car shoppers find great pre-owned vehicles for more than 30 years.

Our customers can choose if they want to sell online, in-person, or a mixture of both. If you’re detailing your car to prepare it for sale, consider using our 100-percent online car sale option. Contact us to learn more about our used car inventory or look over our inventory online.

Used car dealerships receive a near consistent flow of new inventory. They receive their car inventory one of two ways, from auctions or from trade-ins. Your used car dealership might see new stock as often as every day depending on their buying practices. Keep an eye on used car dealership inventories because of how often they can change, especially if you’re on the lookout for a specific make or model of vehicle.

Auction

A dealership can get their used car inventory from two different types of auctions. One type is closed to the public and is held by car manufacturers. Closed auctions held by car manufacturers are where car manufacturers sell their stock of used cars.

These cars were often leased by the car manufacturer. Leased cars, sometimes referred to as “program” cars, are usually high-quality and kept in good condition. Maintenance is often part of the leasing program.

Another way that auctions receive inventory to sell to dealerships is through repossession. If the owner failed to keep up with their car payments the lender (via a repo company) may repossess the car and then sell it at an auction.

This type of auction is usually reserved for used car dealerships that are franchisees of the manufacturer. Cars that don’t sell at these auctions might be pushed forward to open auction.

Open auctions are available to any licensed car dealership. The used cars sold here can come in a wide variety of conditions. Some cars sold at an open auction can be relatively new with little mileage while others can have high mileage and be undriveable. Cars bought at an open auction are bought at the car dealership’s discretion. Oftentimes, car dealerships will use these auctions to both buy and sell their used car inventory.

When buying a used car, you might want to know where your car dealership bought the vehicle. A closed auction will usually have a higher quality of car than an open auction, but not always.

Trade-In

If you’re buying a new car, you might choose to trade in your previous car. This is the second way that car dealerships receive their inventory and one of the main reasons why used car dealerships almost always have new inventory.

Vehicles that were traded in can come in all sorts of states, similar to open auction vehicles. If a dealership doesn’t think they can sell a vehicle they might auction it off at an open auction. If a car is a fairly recent model year and in good enough condition, a used car dealership will likely recondition the car and sell it on their lot.

Buying your next car from an established dealership can help you avoid trouble further down the road.

When you trade in your car, the car dealership will offer you either a cash payment or they will ask if you’d like your trade-in value to be applied to the purchase of your next vehicle. Doing so may allow you to maximize the equity you have in your existing vehicle and put it toward the purchase of your next car, truck or SUV.

In general, you will want to trade in your vehicle at the same location that you plan to buy your next car from. Car dealerships will buy almost any vehicle because of the many ways they can sell it in the future, whether through an open auction or on their own lot.

Buy From a Dealership You Can Trust

Easterns Automotive Group is a family-owned business that has been operating in the D.C., Maryland and Virginia areas for more than 30 years. We are a top-rated used car dealership with over 48,000 five-star reviews.

You can buy a used car from us comfortably knowing that we carefully vet and select the cars on our lot to suit your personal needs. Our dealership uses a strict multi-point certification check to ensure that our customers can buy their next car with confidence.

Visit us at one of our eight locations or look through our inventory online to see if we have your next dream car.

While looking at the rows and rows of cars available on the lot of a car dealership you might find yourself wondering, do car dealerships own the cars they are selling? The short answer is it depends on the dealership. Car dealerships purchase and outright own the cars that they have on their lot, or they use special financing programs available through manufacturers.

They then sell these cars at a higher price to customers to see a profit and manage the overhead costs of running a dealership. Dealerships can buy the cars on their lots from several sources ranging from trade ins and auctions to purchasing directly from the manufacturer.

Most car dealerships acquire their vehicles using a tool called “floorplan financing”. This helps them keep a large stock of vehicles that are available to be driven off the lot as soon as they are bought. Until the time of the sale of the vehicle, the financer or lender holds the title of the car rather than the dealership itself.

What Is Floorplan Financing

Car dealerships use floorplan financing to finance their wide selection of cars. Maintaining a wide selection allows dealerships to meet customer needs without any lag time in supplying a vehicle and transferring ownership. If this financing option wasn’t available to dealerships, many customers would be forced to buy their cars via a catalogue which can take months before the car arrives at the dealership.

The lender for floorplan financing is often the manufacturer of the vehicle. They offer the dealership a budget, for example, over the course of a year they might extend a dealership a 2-million-dollar loan for 100 cars. While the car stays on the dealership’s lot the dealership makes payments to the manufacturer. This creates an added incentive to sell cars quickly.

The lender will check the dealer’s inventory often and if a car is taking too long to sell, they might ask the dealer to pay for the vehicle upfront to avoid any monetary loss as the car’s value depreciates over time.

Many used car dealerships use floorplan financing as well, but they can also own the vehicles on their lot outright. This is something that you will see more often with used car dealerships because of the lower cost of used cars. Used car dealerships might purchase the cars on their lots through trade ins or through auctions where the price of a vehicle is considerably lower than when buying new directly from the manufacturer.

Do Car Dealerships Pay Taxes on The Vehicles They Purchase

Car dealerships do not pay tax on the vehicles on their lot. They don’t pay taxes because they are a franchise, so it works much the same as when you buy items from a grocery store. Essentially, the tax is passed on to the customers like a sales tax.

You pay the sales tax when you buy a vehicle and then the dealership pays the sales tax to the government. When you finance through a car dealership, you are more likely to see the out-the-door cost of your car than if you choose to finance through your bank. This is because a dealership will roll all the taxes and other costs involved in the purchase of your car into one statement.

It’s important to call your dealership and ask for an out-the-door-cost before showing up to buy your car if you choose to finance your purchase yourself or through your bank. This can help you avoid any awkwardness when taxes and other fees drive the price up from the first sale quote.

Buy Used Cars for a Better Deal

When you buy a used car, you can avoid many of the extra expenses that come with buying a new car from a dealership. At Easterns Automotive, we use a meticulous multi-point certification test to ensure that when you buy a car from us you buy it with confidence that you are receiving a car that will work for you. We have been active in the D.C., Maryland and Virginia communities since 1988 and look forward to seeing you at one of our eight locations.

Look over our online inventory to find your next vehicle.