New car sales are up. People who’ve owned their vehicles for a long time seem ready to spend the money on a new set of wheels.

Buying a car is a complicated transaction. You need to find the right vehicle, negotiate a good price and shop for a loan.

Jack Gillis

During a TODAY Money web chat on Wednesday, Jack Gillis, author of The Car Book 2013 and the public affairs director for the Consumer Federation of America, covered all that and much more.

TODAY: What’s new and exciting for 2013?

Jack Gillis:  There are three things consumers will note.

Increased fuel economy: Car makers are responding to both consumer demand as well as the impending new 54.5 mpg standard.

More 4-cylinder engines: While engines are getting smaller, their horse power is increasing, so it will save at the pump while not seriously compromising performance.

Automation:  I call them technological safety belts. Crash avoidance, lane changing warnings, and even cars that park themselves.

TODAY:  If you’re in the market for a new vehicle right now and you’re not sold on electric, is a hybrid the smart way to go?

Jack Gillis: Hybrids are great because you get the benefits of electric with the fact that your gas engine will keep you going long after the battery dies. And there are a large variety of hybrids to choose from.

JoAnne:  My daughter wants a car for graduation. What's the best low-cost car for teens that are SAFEST!?

Jack Gillis: The key is finding a car that is comfortable to handle and safe. Here are some good choices: Chevrolet Sonic, Chevrolet Cruze, Dodge Dart and Hyundai Elantra.  All are good, economical safe choices.  JoAnne, be sure your daughter takes a test drive and feels confident driving the vehicle.

Read the rest of the Q & A below:

Chauffeuring kids around amid all the other responsibilities that parents face can be exhausting duty. To ease nerves and boost sales, automakers are offering vehicle-shopping parents an array of conveniences. Sifting through the latest models, Parenting magazine has come up with seven to suit just about everyone's taste — even those underage back-seat drivers.

Two of the seven featured in the magazine are:

Courtesy of GM Company

The Chevrolet Traverse can easily carry half your kid's soccer team.

Chevrolet Traverse
By the numbers: Three rows, up to eight seats, 17 mpg city/24 mpg highway

Carpool 2.0: Sliding second-row seats that children as young as 7 can operate. Play tunes on your smartphone through the sound system using wireless Bluetooth.

Mommy, I can do it: The seat belts are easy for kids to snap themselves into.

No sticky seats: The cup holders can accommodate juice boxes and sippy cups.

Price: From $29,510; chevrolet.com

Courtesy of Toyota Motor Corp.

The Prius V has plenty of room in the back — just don't forget the kids.

Toyota Prius V
By the numbers: Five seats, 67 cubic feet of storage with the rear seatbacks down (that's approximately 98 paper grocery bags), 44 mpg city/40 mpg highway

Appy family: The dashboard doubles as a tablet. Toyota's Entune multimedia system lets you use the in-dash touchscreen to tune in to The Muppets station on Pandora, search Bing for the nearest Pinkberry, or get live traffic reports.

Price: From $26,400; toyota.com

Of course, now you just have to find that middle ground between the wheels you want and the one the kids want.

More from Parenting.com:

10 best cities for families 
Common car seat mistakes you may be making   
17 convertible car seats with extended rear facing

AP

If the beach really isn’t your thing and you prefer to spend the last weekend of summer car shopping, Consumer Reports has put together an analysis of the best deals for car buyers in five major cities across the country, including Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, New York and Los Angeles.

The end of summer marks the transition between the 2011 and 2012 model year for many automakers. Historically, that means you can find deep discounts on cars for the outgoing model year as manufacturers and dealerships make way for the brand new models rolling off production lines.

Consumer Reports says it’s seeing the trend happen again this summer, and buying a leftover 2011 model rather than a 2012 model can save you serious money upfront.

In Chicago, for example, you can save 20 percent off the manufacturer's suggested retail price (MSRP) for a 2011 Nissan Altima 2.5 HEV eCVT, according to Consumer Reports data (the offer expires on Sept. 30). And in Dallas you can find a 2012 Ford Mustang GT Premium Coupe with a 15 percent discount on its MSRP until Oct. 30.

For more information on the car discounts, click here.

Chris Kasson / ASSOCIATED PRESS

1994 Honda Accord

By Jessica Mintz, msnbc.com contributor

Reading the 2010 top stolen cars report from the National Insurance Crime Bureau got me to wondering: What is it about the 1994 Honda Accord that thieves find so irresistible?

Certain Accords and Honda Civics from the 1990s, along with the 1989 Toyota Camry, have dominated the list for the past eight years. For the sake of variety, the NICB cuts duplicates from its top-10 lists, says public affairs director Frank Scafidi. It’s possible, then, that another vintage of Accord could have bumped another contender from the list. (The 1996 version was also a very popular target in 2010.)

The 1994 Accord was special, however. That year, Honda revamped the design of the Accord and changed details under the hood. That kind of full model change, as it’s called, would have been accompanied by a big publicity push, said Chris Martin, a Honda spokesman, in an interview.

Thieves are likely interested in mid-90s Accords simply because there are so many of them still on the roads, Martin said. Demand for replacement parts may be keeping shady actors in business.

 “I think a lot of vehicles are stolen to tear them apart,” Martin said.

Honda hasn’t stopped selling Accords, but it has made them a lot harder to steal. In 1997, Honda started putting tiny microchips into car keys. If someone tried to hot-wire a car without the key, the car simply wouldn’t start. (Hot-wiring may be obsolete, but other methods, such as driving up with a tilt-bed tow truck, still work, notes Scafidi.)

The NICB report breaks thefts down by state, offering an abundance of opportunities to draw ties between car thieves’ preferences and the way we live today. For example:

• Texas is the only state where the full-size Chevy Tahoe makes the list, and five of the remaining nine vehicles on the list are pick-up trucks;
• In Michigan, the top-10 list was comprised exclusively of American cars;
• Minivans — mostly Dodge Caravans — were among the most frequently stolen cars in Delaware, Kansas, North Carolina, North Dakota and Vermont. In Missouri, the Caravan was the No. 1 choice for thieves.
• 1990s Subaru Legacy wagons are prized primarily by thieves in Montana, Oregon, Maine and Vermont;
• New York’s claim to fame: it’s the only state with the Ford Econoline E350 passenger van on its list.
• In Maryland, the 1999 Ford Crown Victoria — the iconic law enforcement vehicle — made the list.

GM / Wieck

2011 Chevrolet Cruze

Here’s a potentially worrisome sign for carmakers and auto dealers: In the current weak economy, more than half of Americans recently surveyed said they’d put off purchasing a new car because of the financial burden.

The American Automobile Association asked respondents if, in the past 12 months, they had decided to keep an older car because they didn’t want the financial burden of newer one. Fifty-four percent of those surveyed said they had.

The news comes as some automakers openly fret about whether economic worries are dealing a blow to consumer confidence, in turn causing potential buyers to shy away from a visit to the car dealership.

Even though U.S. automakers saw sales rise in July, executives said they are worried about high unemployment and other economic woes.

In addition, automakers are still recovering from the effects of the Japanese tsunami in March, which damaged carmakers and suppliers and left some dealers with few vehicles on their lots. That’s continuing to hurt some Japanese automakers.

On the other hand, used car sales appear to be faring much better.

Everyone knows the downside to holding on to an older vehicle: They break down.  The AAA phone survey of 1,000 people also found that nearly 4 in 10 of those surveyed could pay for a $2,000 repair with cash. The rest would either rely on credit cards or borrowing from other sources.

At the same time, however, about one-fourth of those surveyed said they’d neglected repairs and maintenance because of the weak economy.

TIMOTHY A. CLARY / AFP - Getty Images

The front of the Mercedes-Benz Concept A Car is shown during the 2011 New York International Auto Show.

If this year’s New York International Auto Show is anything to go by, the rich are making their consumption more conspicuous these days.

Earlier this week, the world’s major luxury vehicle manufacturers launched their newest cars with almost pre-recession opulence.

Bentley, for example, kicked off the premium gatherings with a reception at the new Manhattan store for Breitling watches. High rollers had the chance to ogle watches that cost as much as cars, and cars that cost as much as a house. Bentley used the occasion to debut the new $38,900 Bentley Barnato watch (made by Breitling). It’s named after Woolf Barnato -- one of the drivers who scored five wins for Bentley in the 24 Hours of Le Mans sports car race in the 1920s. Breitling will make only 25 of the watches (and one customer who attended the event placed an order for one of the watches the next day).

Mercedes-Benz also hosted a gathering in an intimate venue -- its new 330,000 square foot Manhattan dealership, purpose built to coddle luxury customers by minimizing some of the hassles of driving in Manhattan.

Example: three levels of parking underneath the building, with entrances and exits making it easier to get in and out of it no matter which direction you’re going.

Maserati, Lexus and Formula One car constructor McLaren showed off its new models at media parties, with the McLaren get-together also serving as a sneak preview of a new biographical film on the team’s icon world champion driver, Aryton Senna.

Let the good times roll!

(The 2011 New York auto show is open to the public from Friday, April 22 through Sunday, May 1.)