Reputable warranty company?

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Friend bought a '10 E550 MB. Don't ask why. Has 27k on it, wants a warranty. Anyone have experience with a good company? Probably drives 20k per year. I dont really like getting these things, but I'd personally want one that takes me to 150k. Dealer offers them, but none cover more than 72k.
 
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Your friend would be better served to purchase something he can afford to repair when/if it does require repairs. A warranty is nothing more than an insurance policy against breakdowns, and with very few exceptions cost more than the repairs (the warranty company has to make a profit somehow).

He should just put $200-$300 away each month in a bank account; when the vehicle needs repair your friend will have the money to do it, and will collect a little interest as well. To top it off, if the vehicle doesn't need much repair over the time your friend owns it, your friend will be money ahead.
 
USAA (if he's a member) has an excellent warranty. Carried one for the first two years of S600 ownership. Great service.

Doubt they'll take him to 150,000 though...that's a long, long time...
 
Those extended warranties mostly cover things that don't usually fail like brake backing plates, engine block, oil pan, alternator drive pulley, etc.
 
He should have bought one CPO from Mercedes they offer an excellent warranty.

Carmax is another good option.

Since he has the car I'd just fix it if it breaks, I don't trust aftermarket warranty companies.
 
Originally Posted By: pcoxe
Those extended warranties mostly cover things that don't usually fail like brake backing plates, engine block, oil pan, alternator drive pulley, etc.
i agree. Not worth the paper they are written on. Another wallet flush
 
Originally Posted By: montero1
Dealer offers them, but none cover more than 72k.

Strange. We had an extended MB warranty on our C300 that was good up to 100K miles.
 
Shop around. You maybe able to negotiate a deal from another dealer on the MB warranty. I did on my Honda.
 
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There are several that get mentioned like Fidelity, but they aren't cheap. Best would have been either a CPO which comes with one year and you can buy 2 extra years from any MB dealer in the US. Or one that still had the original 4/50k warranty and then you can buy the extended MB warranty for up to 7/100k. The CPO warranty is good if you drive a lot as it's 3 years, unlimited miles. He probably would have had to get a 2012 which would still have the original warranty. Was it CPO from an MB dealer? 2012 models had even more power as they went to direct injection I believe. You can go ask on the MB forums. Be careful about new companies, those are probably following the model where the price is low, but then they go out of business in a year or two so your warranty is worthless.
 
Originally Posted By: rshaw125
Shop around. You maybe able to negotiate a deal from another dealer on the MB warranty. I did on my Honda.


You can only get the MB warranty if it's a CPO car from an MB dealer. Same with the extended factory warranty, you can only buy it if it's still under the factory warranty and a 2010 would be out of the factory warranty just due to the age unless it sat on the lot and wasn't sold til Sept 2011 which I doubt.
 
Originally Posted By: Pop_Rivit
Your friend would be better served to purchase something he can afford to repair when/if it does require repairs. A warranty is nothing more than an insurance policy against breakdowns, and with very few exceptions cost more than the repairs (the warranty company has to make a profit somehow).

He should just put $200-$300 away each month in a bank account; when the vehicle needs repair your friend will have the money to do it, and will collect a little interest as well. To top it off, if the vehicle doesn't need much repair over the time your friend owns it, your friend will be money ahead.


^^^^^ THIS is the only really sound solution that I've ever found in regards to the type of question asked by the OP.

Bottom line, when you buy the car, you're basically accepting responsibility for whatever may break down. Your best bet is to plan for the worst and be your own warranty company.
 
If you are going to buy warranty, look for "exclusionary" one. This is where the warranty company will list what is NOT covered. Anything NOT listed there is automatically covered. Then read the list and make sure you understand it. Only thing it should list would be brake pads, filters, fluid, wiper blade inserts, tires etc aka normal consumable items.

$300 per month for repairs? That is over $10,000 in less than three year of owning the vehicle!
 
I'll just tell him to cross his fingers that nothing goes wrong with it and save his money. He went to a Mercedes dealer and I think they quoted him near $5,000 just to cover it up to 72k. It was purchased from a privately owned dealer that deals with high end cars probably from auction and who knows how many owners it's had.
 
The fact that it was sent to an auction means there were issues with it that prevented MB from turning it into a CPO car. This happens sometimes if a vehicle was in a serious accident or is in an overall poor shape and would require too much $$ to bring it up to standard. Although on the other hand I think 5 years is too old to even bother with CPO process. It would have had to have been still within the original factory warranty.
 
Originally Posted By: Vikas
That is over $10,000 in less than three year of owning the vehicle!

Wife's C300 would have racked up significantly more than $10K in repairs over the 4 years that she owned it, had it not been for an extended warranty.
 
Originally Posted By: Quattro Pete
Originally Posted By: Vikas
That is over $10,000 in less than three year of owning the vehicle!

Wife's C300 would have racked up significantly more than $10K in repairs over the 4 years that she owned it, had it not been for an extended warranty.


It's easy to do that at the dealer, but it probably would have been less at an indy. Local dealer likes to charge $200 for a diagnosis, some indys do it for free and the labor rate at a dealership is in the $125-$150 range, but indys can be in the $75-$90 range, sometimes you find guys working out of their own garage for $30-$50/hr. Plus aftermarket prices can be 1/3-1/2 of OEM prices, just depends on what you're replacing.
 
Possibly. But in my experience, a reputable indy that knows what they're doing knows its worth, and as a result isn't much cheaper than a dealer, at least around here. Many of them will not allow you to bring your own parts either, because they want to make money on parts as well. With that said, I did let some guy "working out of his own garage" do some work on my 530i, but I'm not sure I'd be comfortable doing the same with a newish high end car. If anything were to go wrong, you won't get much warranty for that kind of work.
 
Originally Posted By: Quattro Pete
Originally Posted By: Vikas
That is over $10,000 in less than three year of owning the vehicle!

Wife's C300 would have racked up significantly more than $10K in repairs over the 4 years that she owned it, had it not been for an extended warranty.




Now that's a lot of $$$.
 
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