September 2009 Special Finance Superstar

Jay McCrum

As a regional manager, you oversee three of RightWay’s 15 used car stores. What does your job entail?
Anything from helping with funding, closing customers, sometimes even buying inventory, training my staff, holding people accountable—you name it, I pretty much do it.

What do you see as the most important part of your job?
The most important part of my job is probably holding people accountable for their job, and just being on top of everything, creating immediacy at my stores, creating that environment that things need to happen now.

“Jay is a master of the basics with the customers and always seems to do the right thing when handling them. He also does a great job of making sure that he and his teams follow our processes consistently so that we don’t take shortcuts which cost deals.” Mike Crane, Vice President, RightWay Auto Sales Jay McCrum Regional Manager 12 Years Dealership Experience 12 Years in Special Finance Dealership Stats: RightWay Auto Sales Mt. Pleasant, Saginaw & Bay City, MI Average SF Deals per Month: 18-25 SF Average Days to Fund: 7-10 SF Sales to Total Sales: 25%

What do you feel is most vital to a store’s success in SF?
Right now, cash is king. Without cash down, you’re sitting on the sidelines ... We need to get cash down on these deals because number one, inventory’s more expensive. Number two, banks are wanting to finance less  of book value, so when you have those two variables without more money down, you’re stuck doing a deal for no gross, which is no fun at all. Inventory is very important, having the right key pieces on your lot … and that’s been a big challenge.

How often do you address training with your team?
We do formal sit-down training about once a month, and then every single day we do coaching … If you’re not willing to be learning every single day, then you need to get off my bus, basically. My guys all know that too; they know that I’m constantly saying, “Wait a second, what could we have done differently?”

Any specific topics you address frequently?
[Laughs] Cash down. That’s pretty important … how to get more cash down, word tracks on prospecting calls, calling old sold customers … that we can either get referrals from or try to earn their business again.

What else do you do to help your team excel?
One-on-one coaching, creating immediacy at the stores, always being available, answering questions, not being afraid to do whatever they need me to do for the day. If they need me to go park cars, I’ll go park cars for them; if they need me to wholesale a couple trades for them, I’ll call the wholesaler and get it done. Just being versatile, I guess that would be the biggest key, versatile and being able to close customers. And also being able to pump them up when they’re having a down day.

What’s your philosophy regarding the special finance customer?
I treat them like I would treat anyone else … with respect and dignity … They’re just normal people with credit problems. I’ve seen people that really don’t care about their credit and don’t care about fixing it, and they’re usually the ones I can’t help … but the people that care and want to fix their credit and get to a point where they’re in a better situation in two years, those are the ones that I’ll bend over backwards for … It’s all case-by-case, but I always have an open mind on what we can and can’t do.

It’s been said that you possess an uncanny ability to review a credit bureau and match it to a finance source that will approve a deal at the best structure. How are you able to determine that so easily?
Just studying the lenders, knowing exactly what they’re looking for … Honestly, it’s gotten a lot more difficult over the last six to eight months … The one thing I don’t do is I don’t drop the ball; we work it, work it, work it until we get it done somewhere.

What do you most enjoy about working in special finance?
Every single day having a different challenge, the variety. I’m a car person at heart and being stuck in the daily regimen of doing one thing or two things every single day would get very boring and I would go crazy.

Totally random question: If you could vacation anywhere in the world, where would you go?
I’d say Hawaii because I know my wife would enjoy it. It’s a beautiful place, I’ve heard … I’d like to go visit Israel, but that would a little more of an adventurous vacation versus a relaxation vacation. I just would like to walk where Christ walked. I’m a Christian and … it would just be interesting to me, very interesting. A lot of history happened there.

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Vol. 3, Issue 5