[Roberts:] Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning. Life might not be a highway, but it certainly is at Columbus Circle. Fifty degrees right now outside of the Time Warner Center, going up to a high of 61. It will be mostly sunny though, after what was a weekend of pretty ppftt weather. Christine Romans...
[Christine Romans, Cnn Business Correspondent:] That's a technical term in meteorology.
[Roberts:] Well, it's the word that I couldn't say.
[Romans:] Well, trying to figure out what happens to all those cars in the lots of Chrysler and GM. We're going to focus on Chrysler because we know which dealerships are specifically that will be closing, losing their not necessarily closing but losing their affiliation and their authorization from Chrysler. When that dealership closes, what does it mean for you? Well, first of all, if you own a Jeep or Chrysler or Dodge, your factory- backed warranty is still good. You will just go to another Chrysler authorized dealer. And your neighborhood dealer might not actually be axed by June 9th. They might stay open to sell used cars or to even become a service center. So some of these dealers are saying they will stay open, so if you own a car and that's where you got your car from us. Now if you want to buy a car, you can expect some incentives because Chrysler very plain vanilla incentives they're offering up $4,000 cash rebate on 2009 models. And also, current owners could get in the mail $1,000 voucher for a new Chrysler purchase with a note from Bob Nardelli, the CEO of that company, thanking Chrysler for their customer loyalty. So Chrysler officials say that their studies show that people just want money off the top. They don't want some complicated kind of, you know, incentive. They just want money off the top. So you could be looking at $5,000 or $6,000, maybe $6,000 or more, even off the price of a Chrysler vehicle. There are 44,000 Chryslers sitting in the lots of these dealerships that are going to be going out of business 65,000 GM cars on some of those GM lots that will be ending their affiliation with GM. So there will be a lot of cars that will be available in the next few weeks that dealers are going to try to get rid of.
[Roberts:] You've got a numeral for us, Ms. Romans?
[Romans:] I do. I do. And it's $4.9 million. Excuse me, I'm speechless, $4.9 million.
[Roberts:] It took a cough saying that.
[Romans:] I know. Exactly.
[Chetry:] What is the context?
[Romans:] It is the the context is Chrysler cars. The dealers. Oh, the suspense is killing me. It's the average...
[Roberts:] It's the average inventory that a Chrysler dealership has.
[Romans:] Yes. The average is 4.9 it's 4.9...
[Chetry:] Are you cheating?
[Roberts:] No, I'm not cheating. I just figured that...
[Chetry:] Oh, my gosh, you're so much closer to the paper that says average dealer's new car inventory.
[Roberts:] I swear to God I didn't...
[Romans:] But think of it, that's an awful lot of money, $4.9 million. So you've got some of these people seeing...
[Roberts:] They're all stuck with the cars, right?
[Romans:] And they're stuck with these cars. They're going to try to they can auction them to the other dealers. There's going to be GM there's going to be GMAC financing for the dealers who will continue being authorized by Chrysler. But otherwise, they've got until June 9th to try to figure out what to do with all these cars.
[Chetry:] And if you're looking for a bargain, the closer you wait until June 9th, the better or is this, as you're saying, the $4,000 cash is just now until then?
[Romans:] I think the closer most of the people who we've been talking to said, everything's changing by the minute, quite frankly, but the longer you wait probably the better until June 9th. I mean, obviously, there's desperation out there or they're going to be able to auction this off to other dealers.
[Roberts:] Thanks, Christine.
[Romans:] You're welcome.
[Chetry:] Jordan's king says it's a meeting that could decide the future of the Middle East. President Obama welcoming Israeli's new prime minister to the White House today. The two are split over a two-state solution. An adviser to six secretaries of state tells us how today could set the tone for the next four years. And the man in charge of reshaping two wars, changing the culture in the Pentagon, Defense Chief Robert Gates opens up about the awesome responsibility of sending more troops into battle. It's 26 minutes past the hour.