Folks I am here today to inform you that you want to get that service contract. Im here at the Honda dealership service department and my car has 37000 miles...out of warranty. My TPMS sensor is bad and this might have cost me a few hundred if I had not purchased the Honda Care from Hyannis Honda. You do not want to purchase the contract when you buy the car but look online. I found that Hyannis has the cheapest contract. I know some here want to believe that Hondas do not require service. Look, all cars require service over time. Ive had Toyotas and Hondas in the past. All of them had some type of malfunction during their life. You want to at least buy a contract which doubles the warranty. I bought the 120k. 8 year contract. Do yourself a favor and get the contract.

 

I need to spend $1000 to avoid paying $200? And I need to spend the $1000 now to avoid the problem of spending $200 some time in the future?

 

dooo eeeet. you know you want to. ever since the f&i guy told you that you must, or you will have to give your first born in payment for service at some future date. he awaits.

 

I need to spend $1000 to avoid paying $200? And I need to spend the $1000 now to avoid the problem of spending $200 some time in the future?

#1) I payed about $800 if I remember correctly, not $1000, from Hyannis Honda.

#2) This is my first problem after the factory warranty was out. I had two other issues while the vehicle was under the factory warranty such as the Fan Control which would only blow on the high or #4 setting and the TPMS sensor. There could be other problems. What if the fan control busted on me after the 36000 miles? I know there will be more issues in the future. I have read that some people have experienced a sound in the auto transmission at around 70000 miles.

#3) I worked in a Toyota dealership once. Today I am a licensed automobile inspector in the State of New York. I have owned Hondas and Toyotas in the past. Right around 50,000 miles there are expensive issues which seem to creep up like Oxygen sensors and other sensors. There is no car which is trouble free. All dealerships have a service department and I can assure you they do more then just oil change and brake jobs.

#4) The service contract goes beyond the factory warranty paying for a rental vehicle, trip interuption and towing. They give you a sticker to put on the outside of your vehicle. If your vehicle becomes stuck then you call their number. So it goes beyond just being a warranty, but insurance against greater things.

 

So I need to pay $800 to save $200?

 

lol

10 char

 

Simply put, the service contract is a gamble and the house has the advantage. In the case of a service contract it does reduce your financial risk but at a cost.

 

This is one of the reasons I got it, I dunno... I take lots of roadtrips with my family and 75% of the time we take the Fit.

Also,

SevereService thread

 

" What if the fan control busted on me after the 36000 miles?"
I had the exact same problem on my Nissan. Thanks to a similar board, I found out it was a resistor that need to be replaced, and bought one from the dealership for $20.

 

Your Fit is already out of warranty with 37,000 miles on it?

 

Insurance companies gives much better prices for that kind of thing. I pay ~ 20 a year for towing on two cars.

 

The first decision you should base this on is if your car breaks down will it ruin you. Will you be in such dire straights that the consequences are unthinkable if you lose your car. Only after that point, then you can evaluate and run the numbers and see if it makes sense or worth the trouble to deal with it. *
People who are convinced of one perspective of advice that works for them; often don't take into account the other person's life state and point of view.

So this actually boils down simpler in my mind...
1) If you don't have the cash or finances to afford the loss of the car, then you're somewhat stuck in the position to get the insurance/warranty to avoid future ruin.

2) On the flipside, if you have the cash where it's an option to you, then why bother with it, you have money to "gamble" and you may win and come out ahead and save a few hundred. Or you are going the other way and thinking that your car will break and you're gambling and can win a few hundred in service savings.

3) Or if you are even in a better financial position, then I would take the perspective of "why bother with the hassle with Honda for the potential of only saving a little", they're a stealership, and nickel and dime me every time i go. Like the armrest thread, they're just going to try to weasel out of the warranty anyway if I need to use it. I'll take responsibility for my own car. If something goes wrong, I'm just going to go with my trusted local mechanic and pay cash out of pocket and cut out the paperwork and support a local business anyway".

(As a side note, I'm in position 3).


So I'm taking a more holistic view and think all 3 of these options all are valid, but depends on the position in life of the owner. What works for 1 person isn't always what's needed for someone else, so I'm not going to give a blanket statement that one way is better than the other.

 

I felt secure having towing and auto services through State Farm but when I needed them once I was only across the Bay from SF in Berkeley and I discovered the company that handled the towing wouldn't service me since I wasn't in SF. Guess I should have asked more questions upfront.

I see that most here feel the extended Honda Care is a waste of money but I actually bought it for piece of mind after having just gone through 7K worth of repairs on my old BMW and carrying the repairs costs on a credit card with a fairly high interest rate.

I realize it's a gamble with the house having the favorable odds but having something major going wrong and having to endure carrying a large balance on a credit card again didn't feel worth taking a chance.

 

Yeah, towing is cheap, rental reimbursement is relatively expensive to carry (for 8 years, at least on my policy, idk about where you're at). Do you have trip interruption option on your insurance policy?

I didn't pay full price for the warranty, so it was worth it. If I were to get all the options through my insurance company for 8 years instead of the warranty I would save about $300... buttttt.... my insurance company doesn't cover mechanical failures, so, i'll gamble my $300 dollars I would have saved by going with Honda.

I would have even paid $800 and gambled $500. I'd do worse in Vegas, but would have more fun probably.

 

As far as I know, my towing coverage should cover everywhere. That's what its supposed to do anyway, hard to verify though. Should it come up though, the advantage of a smart phone means I can find a not rip off tow truck without too much trouble. With all the things like this though, it makes a lot more sense to self insure extended warranties on car, house, electronics, etc, and just keep a safe rainy day fund than to burn the money on warranties. Car breakdowns/electronics failures/hot water heaters rusting out are inconvenient but relatively predictable in that I know to plan on all of those things failing at some point.

 

W o w ------------------------

 

I just went outside to see my fuel door is acting funky. I think something might have broken off. This will probably be covered under the warranty.

For those who believe the warranty is a waste of cash...you have probably never worked in the service department at a dealership or at a mechanical shop. Things do go wrong with cars and whatever goes wrong will be fixed somewhere in the neighborhood of 90-105 per hour. The average bill is usually 300-400. Now if nothing goes wrong thats great, but if that were the case then these mechanical shops and service departments would not be in business.

Ive owned a lot of cars over my lifetime and things usually do go wrong. There are, of course, those stories out there of guys going a million miles without any major service calls, but I can tell you confidently they are the exception.

 

Of course things go wrong, but on average they're less expensive to fix than the cost of the service contract. Do you think that the folks who sell these service contracts LOSE money on them on average? After all, they're the ones with all the historical data to be able to price the policies. We don't have that info.

And the reason the dealers push these contracts? They get a big commission. Which means that much of what you're paying for isn't even covering the cost of repairs, but the cost of selling the policy.

If you want to reduce your financial risk go right ahead, but on average it's costing you money.

I mean, it's what, a $16,000 car? Worst case, three years and one day down the road the engine and transmission fly away, taking the cat converter and other expensive parts with it. At that time your car's worth $12,000 (higher now because of gas worries, but on average...). So you're out $11,000 after paying for the svc contract.

How many times is that going to happen over your lifetime with all the cars you've owned and will continue to own?

I insure big risks, like my house and my health. for $16,000 I'll take the risk.

 

And the door to door encyclopedia salesman is pretty sure that I absolutely need the newest year's set of encyclopedias.

The point isn't that cars magically never need repairs. The point is that dropping a huge wad of money to insure against really big repairs doesn't make a lot of sense. They aren't sold as loss leaders. They are designed to make money, lots of money for the business selling them. If one can at all self insure against it, it makes a lot of sense to do so. If one can't self insure, I'm not sure of the analysis works out, but there's that old adage about holes and digging while in them.

 

power train is 5 years.