Car problems at 41,636 miles suck |
In December 2004, we purchased a 2005 Saturn Relay.
It was a new SUV-type vehicle for Saturn that was loaded with features and seats seven. We planned to use it — and did, several times — for family vacations for the five of us. Plenty of room, DVD in the back, good sound system, it was all good. I blogged about the new car buying event with pictures of the new wheels (pictured above).
As I wrote when we bought the 2007 PT Cruiser in August, you never really know how good a car is until you’ve owned it a few years. Until you’ve had things go wrong, both minor and hopefully not major. The new vehicle elation can always cloud your judgement. That’s what car salesmen prey upon. It’s the reason they always want you to test drive the car and “feel those seats.” Time and experience is the only way to know if you bought a good or bad car.
The ultimate vehicle owner scare happened to us at 41,636 miles: the check engine light came on — and stayed illuminated.
Unsure of what this meant, we parked the Relay and made plans to take it into the dealer for repair. We have three vehicles in our household with only one driver, so not a major deal to park until we could get it into the shop. We were near the time for an oil change anyway. Over the weekend we went in for our Saturday appointment. Saturn charged us $51 to put the Relay on a diagnostic machine.
(Does this seem a little expensive to plug into a computer? I’m sure there’s more to this than that, but ok, we agreed.)
Turns out our EGR sensor is having problems. They indicated it would cost almost $600 to fix, and yes, it would be an out of warranty repair. My first thought, admittedly biased by past experience: here we go again.
Over 10 years ago we bought a brand new Hyundai Elantra GLS which worked great until it left the warranty period and then there were major transmission issues. We ended up sinking a stream of money into that dog. Terrible investment. Hyundai is on our Likely Never To Do Business With list again.
But it wasn’t only the EGR sensor, they said there were four errors related to the heating and air conditioning system? What? Now we were even more concerned. Maybe I’m being too naive, but I don’t buy a new car expecting problems this soon. 41,636 miles with one $600 out of warranty repair and another unknown repair requiring exploratory surgery which would also be out of warranty?
Dump or keep the vehicle?
Here we are three years later and we’re at a different stage in life as far as vehicle needs. While it’s cramped, we can pile into the smaller car for shorter trips and we’re not taking or planning on taking as many family trips. One of our teens will be graduating later this year and is talking job and looming in the distance is the inevitable: need a car. Until now we’ve staved off the whole kids driving thing because we’ve added the requirement: no job, no car, but that doesn’t seem viable much longer as our oldest son has a line on a job as a plumber as soon as he graduates.
Now we need to start thinking about the possibility of cars for at least one of our teens as well as my wife who has her driver’s license permit. She doesn’t want to learn on a stick (the PT Cruiser is manual), so now we’re thinking about selling the Relay and exchanging with a smaller car that Kara could drive initially and could be sold to our son down the line.
Talked to the Saturn salespeople and as you might expect, they were salivating over the prospect of a new sale. They showed us a couple different cars including a new 2007 Ion 3 Coupe. Any readers buy an Ion Coupe? Good? Bad? Consumer Reports gives the 2007 Ion 3 Coupe high marks but past year models haven’t fared as well.
As we did with the PT Cruiser, I went to carsdirect.com to check into the Ion 3 Coupe and printed out the pages. They are running a $1,750 rebate or 0% financing deal at the moment.
We were planning to head back to the dealer today to look at the Ion 3 Coupe and also to look at some other cars too, but the weather is starting get nasty around here, so maybe not. We didn’t think we’d be back in the car buying mode again so soon, but it appears we might be with this new information on the Relay and our needs changing. Then again, maybe we’ll just suck it up and pay for the repairs.
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Lestat (thanks!) gave me this helpful link which specifically points to an known issue with the EGR:
http://consumerguideauto.howstuffworks.com/2005-to-2007-saturn-relay-6.htm
Comment by TDavid — November 12, 2007 @ 10:14 am PST
how about looking at Kias? My sister sold them for a couple of years, and also has had one for several years that she likes a lot, and has held up well..
Comment by Matt Wardlaw — November 12, 2007 @ 11:56 am PST
We looked at a Kia when shopping for the last car. They seemed alright.
Comment by TDavid — November 12, 2007 @ 12:03 pm PST
TDavid, $600 sounds steep for a part that is no more than probably $70! I think auto repair is still one of the worst consumer ripoff/scams going. I used to do most all my own work on my cars, though nowadays with all the electronics it is tough to diagnose problems. Bet if you took a look at a good Chilton’s guide to that car i bet it is a DIY job… Nowadays Chilton’s even has their guides on DVD…
Comment by FranciscoIV — November 12, 2007 @ 1:13 pm PST
FranciscoIV, dealer is saying labor is $300 and replacing “takes awhile” — whatever that means (I didn’t ask them to elaborate on the exact time, we didn’t get that far). The part is the rest of the cost. Could we buy the part direct and save money? Probably. No way would I want to do the work myself, unless it is as easy as replacing the battery.
Comment by TDavid — November 12, 2007 @ 2:07 pm PST
I would probably end up keeping it just because new cars aren’t getting any cheaper and you can always fix the current problem for a bit less than buying a new one, but like you stated your at a different point in your life…it appears you want to sell it so go with that
Comment by Matthew Anton — November 13, 2007 @ 12:51 am PST
“they said there were four errors related to the heating and air conditioning system” I wonder if that is an upsale by the service advisor. the egr makes sense with the engine light.
you should check the Chevy cobalt coupe, there between 11,000 and 18,000 you can negitiate the best deal quickly, by going to gmbuypower.com and price quote a bunch of dealers in your area. 1750 rebate on an 2007 with a 5 yr 100000 powertrain.
also the dodge caliber, and jeep patriot by chrysler have lifetime powertrain warranty for the first owner if your looking for long term ownership. they also offer a bumper to bumper lifetime wrap coverage, cost on that is 1365 with $100 dollar deductable, not sure what they will sell it for.
I recommend buying american car, our economy is bad enough, kia’s have horrible resale value, and banks don’t like to finance them unless you have golden credit.
if you do go foreign, honda did about 2 billion in warrranty work last year, compared to about 3 billion for toyota, the big detriot 3 were around 4 to 6 billion.
best of luck.
service bill sounds high.
Comment by John — November 14, 2007 @ 4:17 pm PST
After some in-depth research many years ago, I discovered this info that I have passed on to a lot of people with I think not a single person ever using it. You might be a Saturn person or whatever small pool of brands you might consider. And I have noticed that whatever this pool of potential brand options might be for some person, they will not deviate from it. Probably one of those things sales people instinctively know and take advantage of. So a long preamble to why anyone reading this post will most likely ignore it, but perhaps it will make you go hmmm…
The car tip is simple. Buy a vehicle made in Japan. But not any Japanese brand but an actual specific model manufactured in Japan and shipped over in a boat. This will need to be carefully researched for any specific model and year. In general, the upscale models such as Acura, Lexus, etc are still made in Japan.
Buying a four year old upscale made in Japan vehicle should be approximately the same price as a brand new domestic model. The end result would be a vehicle that will last almost forever with almost zero repairs.
For reference, I am driving a 1990 Acura that I bought in August of 1989 and has cost about 3k in expected repairs (timing belt etc) over about 20 years. There is really no need for people to experience the problems they have… I have a relative that will buy only Fords, another friend that swore by GM Mini-vans. etc. I was amazed that they couldn’t see the reality in front of their faces with their vehicles constantly in the shop for warranty repairs and then of course the out-of-warranty problems would start. I just smile now when I hear of car problems, since there is no longer any point of repeating my “tip” which for some mysterious reason just cannot enter the human brain…
Comment by Don — November 16, 2007 @ 12:29 pm PST