Certified Pre-Owned

"Steve in Manhattan" (blogenfreude01)
09/28/2014 at 15:39 • Filed to: None

Watching the Jets pile up penalties and turnovers, and a certified pre-owned Audi commercial came on. Of course Mercedes, BMW, and who knows who else have this sort of thing. These programs always seemed like a good idea to me. Has anyone used one? Good experience? A tale of woe and intrigue?

DISCUSSION (14)

Manuél Ferrari > Steve in Manhattan
09/28/2014 at 15:41

I got a one year old CPO X5 3.0 once. Glad I did. I had a full 5 years and 85K of warranty to use. Had a lot of little gremlins that they had to fix for free.

Conan > Steve in Manhattan
09/28/2014 at 15:42

My Dad digs his 335xi. I think the CPO part made him feel more secure with buying German.

Alex B > Steve in Manhattan
09/28/2014 at 15:43

Like you, I've heard of them, but have never done it.

JQJ213- Now With An Extra Cylinder! > Steve in Manhattan
09/28/2014 at 15:44

Ive heard some pretty good things about them. Volvo has a great program with them where every car comes with a 7 year 100,000 mile warranty which covers anything and everything.

The prices are also usually very nice. I'm tempted to try and get one when I can.

PS9 > Steve in Manhattan
09/28/2014 at 15:47

The Pro is that you can combine the discounts associated with a used car with the security of a Warranty.

The Con is that a lot of CPO checklists consist of only one question (Does the car exist? ) and don't really filter out problematic vehicles from the system at all. Sometimes CPOs can come at a significant and occasionally severe premium for the car over it's used price (see; anything from Europe at Carmax like this R8). CPO Warranties also don't cover the vehicle as long as a normal warranty would for a new car, for obvious reasons.

For what it's worth, I'd seriously consider CPO if I were in the market for a used car, even given some of the downsides. Even a little bit of security is better than nothing.

E92M3 > Manuél Ferrari
09/28/2014 at 15:50

My experience was different. I bought a CPO E46 M3 (before my current one), and the rear view mirror leaked all the dimming fluid onto the interior after purchase (a very common problem). I thought to myself, good thing I bought a CPO one. To my surprise not only was this never a recall, but it is not covered under CPO warranty either. They did offer to replace if for $600. That doesn't include a new center console that was ruined by the fluid. I ended up using a 3rd party repair company that repairs them for good, over buying another one from BMW that would fail again in 3 years.

Steve in Manhattan > PS9
09/28/2014 at 15:52

I suppose you're paying a bit of a premium for the security. However, I'd still invoke the Car Talk rule and take a CPO car to an independent mechanic. I think I've said it in this space before - a friend was looking at a private sale Audi S4, and I told her to take it to a mechanic. It needed an ENGINE REBUILD. She then bought a new Jetta despite by advocating a Focus ST.

Textured Soy Protein > Steve in Manhattan
09/28/2014 at 16:14

I bought a CPO Mazdaspeed 6 back in 2008 and got rid of it last summer. There weren't too many issues with it, but it was nice to have the warranty in the few instances that something went wrong. It wasn't appreciably more expensive to buy one CPO compared to regular used.

Steve in Manhattan > Textured Soy Protein
09/28/2014 at 16:17

That's a nice outcome. Unless I get dragged out of NYC kicking and screaming I'll never have to make the choice, but I was interested in others' experiences.

claramag, Mustaco Master > Steve in Manhattan
09/28/2014 at 16:34

Ford had (has?) a CPO program a few years back. Same check up as any other used car got, more $$$, small warranty for what's probably not going to fail. It was a clever way to jack up a $14k fusion up to $15.5k

Manuél Ferrari > E92M3
09/28/2014 at 17:27

oh shit! That sucks!

Now I'm worried this will happen to me

E92M3 > Manuél Ferrari
09/28/2014 at 18:13

If it does I would suggest using Sybesma to repair it. It was $90 IIRC. This really should of been a recall. It's happened to hundreds of thousands of BMW's built in the late 90's-early 2000's.

Manuél Ferrari > E92M3
09/28/2014 at 18:46

thanks for the info. Totally agree, bmw got away with some BS. My sister's used E46 323i was such a lemon. The whole car should have been recalled.

AMGtech - now with more recalls! > Steve in Manhattan
09/29/2014 at 01:05

I don't know about other brands, but I can tell you what I know about how Mercedes does it. It's a couple hundred inspection points, many of which will cause the certification to be denied if not fixed. Every one gets a Carfax, and the Mercedes internal history of the vehicle checked, any issues warrants instant denial. Any mileage discrepancy or structural damage also cause immediate denial. Tires must be from an approved list with more than 5/32" as measured from the wear bars. Brakes at least 50%. No leaks, no electrical gremlins. Every one gets a full readout of faults from every module, all issues must be resolved. All maintenance that is or will be due within the next 6 months or 6k miles must be completed. Basically the car must be as close to new as it can reasonably be.

I don't know how much this adds to the purchase price though, but have heard it's really not much compared to what you're getting for the money. Obviously this is very subjective, but the program is quite popular.

You get at least one extra year of warranty on top of remaining factory warranty, unlimited miles. You can purchase extended CPO warranties on top of that for I think a total of an extra 3 years. As far as I know, CPO covers everything excluding normal maintenance or wear and tear. Chrome trim fell off of your bumper? Covered. Convertible roof leaked water onto a bunchof modules and caused them all to fail? Covered. Stitches are coming out of your leather seat? Covered. Unless the massive keychain on your belt caused it to happen. Your wood trim is cracked our fading? Covered. The navigation system has no reception? Don't worry, we'll launch 10 new satellites just to follow your car around so you are never again without reception*.

*Disclaimer. This may be an exaggeration.

The point is, we've got you covered. Even if you did something stupid, we might look the other way or cut you a deal. At least that's how it is in my store. I've seen MBUSA pay 20% of the repair bill for a car with 180k miles, not including the discounts my service manager threw in.