Has anyone had experience with a car warranty program, especially for a used car? CarShield is probably the most well known, but there are others advertised on TV, and others without the ad campaign. Is there a different between buying a car with a limited warranty already (such as buying a used car from a dealer providing a 90-day warranty) vs. one that has not be warrantied? Does it matter how old the newly-purchased used car is? For example, is the premium more expensive for a 5 y.o. car vs. a 10 y.o. one?
Does coverage vary by state? We didn't have a policy like this and our wonderful 2010 workhorse of a Prius died after 160,000 miles. It wasn't worth $5000 just to take the engine apart and see if it was repairable or to put in a new engine, you know? Still, I was grateful that the car got my husband and me safely moved to our new home 1500 miles away, and that the engine didn't die somewhere on the highway en route.
A friend is looking into buying a used car for her teen daughter, and she's not sure she wants to pay dealer prices but of course is concerned about reliability. As a single mom, she doesn't really want to deal with open purchases such as Facebook Marketplace. There's a possibility of acquiring a used car from a friend, a car that has been properly maintained and the owner wants to upgrade to a hybrid or electric car. She feels better about that overall, but she still has to look at repairs and worries about a teen on the road alone and at college. She has AAA for towing, so it's more the repairs.
So, what experiences have you had, positive or negative? Are there questions you should have asked but did not?
I can’t address cars specifically because we haven’t been in that position yet, but extra warranties for other items have been complete and utter poop.
Between our awful experiences with warranties for appliances and furniture, and the whole country’s insanity with health insurance companies, I say f*&^ 'em all.
Sorry not to be of any practical value, but real questions are so rare here any more that I feel impelled to respond, even with uselessness.
I may be the only one who has a positive opinion on extended warranties. I purchased my used car a few years ago. The dealership kept pushing on selling me an extended warranty. I was open to it, as it only added about $10 extra a month to my car payment, but my mom was against it. The salesman convinced me and I purchased it as part of my sales contract (though I didn’t know it at the time, it sadly only covered me until I reached 60,000 miles, which was up before I even finished paying the car). My car only had 13k miles when I purchased it. Not even a year since having the car, my transmission blew at about 18k miles. The dealership quoted me about 15k to replace it. I almost passed out, until I remembered about the warranty. The warranty covered the whole thing.
The dealership had my car for a month, as this was during COVID so transmissions and parts were hard to come by. They found an issue with the engine mount, the hydraulic lift, and my car also had a roof leak, which I had noticed but didn’t want to pay to repair or be left without a car. The repairs were about 20k by then, and the warranty covered EVERYTHING. My plan was with First Mile Automotive Warranty. I would like to buy another extended warranty, but now they’re quite expensive (around $100/month) and I am still paying off my car. Maybe once I finish paying it off, I’ll consider it again. The average car payment these days is about $700. Not sure how people afford that, but if you can get a fairly new or low mileage used car for a decent monthly payment, the extended warranty might still be worth it.
Definitely find out what they cover or do not cover. Different plans cover for different things, and see which warranty is worth it. The cheaper one may not be worth it in the end if they barely cover anything. I wish I had asked how long the warranty covered me for, as I had a false sense of security until just recently when my A/C compressor needed to be replaced and I assumed the warranty would handle that. The mechanic put in a freon shot, it’s been about a year since that happened and luckily, the A/C has been cooling us enough to be able to hold off on an $800 repair.