I think CNBC did a great job of outlining many of the issues causing the higher repair costs.
Rising repair costs
- Thread starter Oillover
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I just watched this earlier today. Like every one of their segments, it's poorly put together. They left out the main factors like greed, greedflation, and underpaid & overworked mechanics. Most good mechanics are long gone. They either went independent or switched careers entirely. No one in their right mind wants to works 2X book time on difficult warranty repairs, or be constantly nagged by their manager. To makes matter worse, shops and dealerships hire just about anyone with a pulse, try to train them, and let them work. Now you got incompetent people working on expensive vehicles. Misdiagnosing issues, shooting the parts cannon at he problem, and executing slopy repairs. All of the above leads to super expensive repairs. Pay mechanics a living wage, start with that, and you'll attract talent instead of folks who use an air impact to install a drain plug.
^ to add to that, shops don't want to keep talent on staff in house, they want to reach out and use tech lines when their so-called master mechanic gets stumped.
The B2B scene then gets toolmakers, like alignment rack suppliers, to show upper management how they have this brilliant tool that lets the shop hire hobos off skid row, so long as they can watch the full color cartoon on the screen about which nut to turn how many turns.
Finally, with all the makes and submodels, and with them lasting longer than ever, there are more parts in stock now in your city than ever, and someone's got to pay the overhead on all that. I'm trying not to, LOL, if I can plan a job and get it through rockauto I keep my costs mostly what they were when I started doing this 20 years ago.
The B2B scene then gets toolmakers, like alignment rack suppliers, to show upper management how they have this brilliant tool that lets the shop hire hobos off skid row, so long as they can watch the full color cartoon on the screen about which nut to turn how many turns.
Finally, with all the makes and submodels, and with them lasting longer than ever, there are more parts in stock now in your city than ever, and someone's got to pay the overhead on all that. I'm trying not to, LOL, if I can plan a job and get it through rockauto I keep my costs mostly what they were when I started doing this 20 years ago.
I know dealer techs making almost 150k with shop rates of $185/hr. Depends on the brand. Slopy repair is standard procedure these days. Workmanship and pride are not part of work anymore in any industry. Doctors, too
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I particularly love how they conclude damage in collisions is greater because vehicles are heavier while having more hp. Yep, it's just that simple.
First, I would say today's cars are lighter than the average sedan in the 70s (they show a photo of something from that era to prove their point) when everything was steel -- and heavier gauge steel at that for body panels. However I could believe the average weight of all vehicles on the road is pushed up by SUVs and larger pickups of today.
Second, today's vehicles are meant to crumple to "save" the driver. Couple this self-sacrificial mentality with things like air bag deployment (which is expensive to restore) and this could maybe be why damage in collisions is greater AND more expensive to repair??
First, I would say today's cars are lighter than the average sedan in the 70s (they show a photo of something from that era to prove their point) when everything was steel -- and heavier gauge steel at that for body panels. However I could believe the average weight of all vehicles on the road is pushed up by SUVs and larger pickups of today.
Second, today's vehicles are meant to crumple to "save" the driver. Couple this self-sacrificial mentality with things like air bag deployment (which is expensive to restore) and this could maybe be why damage in collisions is greater AND more expensive to repair??
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We have a 2011 GM.
I didn’t research but assumed parts would be cheaper as well as overall repairs and maintenance. Not so….
With DIY BMW is surprisingly cheap. Again just one example OE brake sensor wire $28 OEM $14.
Lexus is about 5X and if not heavily discounted which can happen, GM not cheap either.
Point being dealer price is not discounted…
I didn’t research but assumed parts would be cheaper as well as overall repairs and maintenance. Not so….
With DIY BMW is surprisingly cheap. Again just one example OE brake sensor wire $28 OEM $14.
Lexus is about 5X and if not heavily discounted which can happen, GM not cheap either.
Point being dealer price is not discounted…
Man its crazy how right you are and ive literally experienced all the issues you have mentioned through many different cars too, and its only going to get worse.
Many dealers are doing the whole "Lean inventory" thing I have a Nissan dealer almost walking distance they didn't have a thermostat for a VQ in stock which is crazy. Not to mention inflating its price by 2x so I just ordered it myself.
No dealer discounts their parts, most if not all charge over MSRP, you could be paying 500% up charge on a $2 item. Its always best to get a P/N and buy online.
Where? State law here is $31/hr for anyone that brings their own tools. No shops pay even that here.
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Good news! Used cars should get cheaper because they cost more to repair.
Point me towards the cheap used cars. I will repair my own thank you.
Point me towards the cheap used cars. I will repair my own thank you.
NJ- Porsche. Move here
Hard to believe "state law" prohibits more than $31/hr. I read some McDonalds in CA are paying $20/hr for burger flippers. One more reason to move out of CA
Its low point is double minimum wage which is $31ish, but depending on the county or city it could be higher. Shops get around this by supplying the tools and not letting techs being in tools from home.
As far as the dealer parts inventory, the thing now is to no longer have experienced parts people use data provided and time in the trenches do stock ordering. They have outside companies with people who have little to no parts experience run programs and use algorithms dictate our stocking levels and penalize us financially for not doing what they say.
I don't know about shop prices, but I feel like parts prices have not been hit much by inflation (yet). An AISIN timing kit for a 3.5 Honda is still around $200.
We demand low-costs as consumers, but then we get upset when we receive poor service… We complain when there are no qualified people, but we don’t want to absorb the costs for higher wages… We say that big corporations are “greedy” when they turn large profits, but then we expect our own investment portfolios to grow as shareholders of these same companies… so we ourselves can reap the financial benefits…
Capitalism for me and none for thee.
Capitalism for me and none for thee.
Thank you- sure changes the conversation LOL
Dealer parts prices? If you have a business number you can get dealer parts for about whole sale price. In the old days it was a huge price reduction.
Are you sure? You have any evidence of this? I know a few folks bringing in more than $150k annually working in dealerships in Cali. They provide their own hand tools.
Edit: I misunderstood your post. My cousin just retired from a BMW dealership in the bay area. He said his last year was nearly $250K. He also has many tens of thousands of dollars worth of tools.You can't even get into his garage at home because of all the Snap-On, Matco, Mac roll aways taking up space. He say's his retirement is going to be subsidized by 40+ years of tool purchases.
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Just remembered- highway flaggers get $54+/hr around here. Thats more than $112K/year
I agree. Dealership Techs make a lot more money if they can do a job in 30 minutes that the book specifies is a 2 hour job. They still would get paid for the 2 hours even though it only took them 30 minutes. So there is a financial incentive for them to rush through a job and cut corners, taking shortcuts.
Also, dealerships nowadays mark up their parts by 100% to 200% for any parts installed by the Dealership service department techs.
I try to avoid dealerships as much as possible.
Also, dealerships use low skilled young guys to work in their express lube for oil changes.
They use bulk oil and you pay a lot but get cheap oil and potentially have a young low skilled person doing the oil change.
