Certified used cars/extended warranty [How does this work?]

I'm hearing about these warrants constantly lately on the radio/ late night TV and I've got to say it sounds like a scam.

 

I had a bad experience ith an extended waranty I bought with a new car. Basically it was a third party and they would weasel out of paying. Don't buy unless you know it is the manufacturrs and even then I don't think it is worth it.

 

Along with the above members' advice, go with a Certified Used Car. It's different ways to approach a problem, but I think the certified option is better; you have the possibility of buying a lemon (exaggeration for argument's sake) in which case you have the headache of getting it fixed, being w/o car, garage to-and-fro, etc. or having it 'screened' already for not being a lemon and just taking good care of it.

 

There is a big difference between third party extended warranties and manufacturer warranties. For instance, Ford extended warranty allows you to have your car fixed by ANY ford dealer. Its basically like your initial comprehensive coverage extended, depending on which level you buy.
A certified used car generally is a car that has had an inspection plus power train extended warranty by the manufacturer.

So basically you need to decide if its cheaper/better to buy the car then buy a manufacturer warranty or just buy a certified car outright.

 

I have had a very good experience with the Mercedes issued warranty. In fact the local dealership makes more money when they hammer it so they were always looking for ways to use it for me. On my ML I went in with 98,000 miles and they found $4000 worth of stuff to fix before it ran out at 100,000.

So, I recently bought another one when I bought my wife a certified 2006 E. But, I think it's only a reasonable insurance policy if you plan on driving the car for the life of the policy. We keep out cars an average of 8 years.

I just assume I want to drive a car with a warranty and look at the payment including the warranty and see if that's what I want to pay. I would not consider a third party warranty though, solvent dealer issued only.

 

^ Note i'm all for extended warranties through the dealer -- it's the ones you can buy for your used car up to 250,000 miles that seem high on the scam probability.

 

I friend of mine purchased a car from Carmax and also purchased Carmax's used car warranty. He has had several warranty service calls and it seems that it works just fine. So that may be an option. Its not a manufacturers warranty, but its backed up by a pretty big company.

 

I would not worry about it.

 

Even though I have bent my third party extended warranty over a desk I have had a hard time with them.

First off the lady at the credit union sold it as being "the same as a manufacturers extended warranty". That is not the case. There is a lot of stuff they don't' cover. one day my sunroof stopped working. I took it to the dealer rather than a smaller shop. They charged me 140 dollars to reprogram it. The warranty company said since no parts were broken I am liable for it. Same thing happened when the check engine light came on. Dealer could not find anything wrong, so I had to pay an 89 doll diagnostic fee.

The worse situation was the car radio. My stupid Maxim's radio costs about 1800 bucks refurbished. I went to the dealer, had them contact the warranty company. They insisted on sending their own radio because of the cost. I was fine with that, only the one they put in was even worse than the one I was replacing. The lady I was working with left Nissan so I Never was bale to get stuff taken care of even after 20 plus calls. So I was pissed and dealt with it. 6 months later it breaks completely so I go to a local shop. It turns out Nissan never mailed the 1800 unit back so now the warranty people won't mail a radio to this other shop because "it may go missing again." I said it was another shop and I am not responsible for Nissan's crap. I yelled a lot but it got me no where. I had to get the radio pulled out and mailed in and they sent me another refurbished on but at least it worked.

However I think Ihave taken the warranty company for well over 5000 dollars in repairs so I am fine with it since the warranty only cost 800 bucks. I am lucky I am good friends with the manager at my Dad's old shop. he will let the warranty people have an earful if they try to whole, "it sounds like wear and tear" song and dance

 

Third party warranties are sleazy in my experience. My dad got one in the mail a few years back and asked me to look into it. They pull the high pressured move of saying once we take this next step, if you don't buy, then you can't get this "rate" or whatever. I remember saying the mileage of the car was already over 100K and the guy is like, "hmmm, let me talk to my manager" he then put the phone down for a minute doing most likely nothing before picking it back up and saying "my manager/supervisor doesn't usually do this, but we are willing to blah blah at this rate blah blah."

Anyways, my dad just wanted to know what the price was and after I said we weren't interested, the guy would not let me hang up. He wasn't trying to convince me it was a good deal, it was more like insulting me for being too stupid to realize what a good deal this was.

Anyways, definitely get a certified used car.

 

Certified pre-owned is great for luxury cars. The extended warranty is nearly as good as the original factory warranty. You can take the car to any authorized dealer, etc. Some companies make you pay a deductible with each claim, some don't.

CPO for non-luxury cars is not nearly as good as the warranty is usually only for 3K miles or so.

CPO is also good, because you don't really need to hire a mechanic to give the car the once over as that's part of the certifying process.

I wouldn't buy an extended warranty from an individual dealer. Too many scams out there.