Car buying quandary.

"Meatcoma" (mastapoof) 07/14/2016 at 09:47 • Filed to: mechanic, buying used

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Pic for your time.

Mine may be a difference of opinion. After reading Ross Krazs post - “ !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! ” about how he bought a car from a mechanic, I wondered why I tend to shy away from mechanic owned cars.

Most people probably assume that buying a used car from a mechanic would be a great idea. The mechanic being known as someone who is knowledgeable with diagnosing issues or noticing when something is slightly off with a car that they are driving and the ability to fix said problem, not to mention the access to a multitude of tools to help them along the way.

However, I personally know a few mechanics and while they are very good at their job, once they leave the shop they do not want to work on a friends cars much less their own, sometimes they even seem like they don’t want to answer any questions you have about an issue with your car. I personally do not think I would buy a vehicle from a mechanic and I do tend to stay away from listings/vehicles where the owner is/claims to be a mechanic. Obviously there are varying degrees of what people define as a ‘mechanic’, from someone who changes oil to someone who can rebuild an engine without direction.

So I pose the question to you, would you prefer to buy a vehicle from someone that is/claims to be a mechanic, or would you rather buy from someone that makes no claim to be one? What if any experiences have you had buying vehicles from ‘mechanics’?

TLDR: Would you prefer to buy a vehicle from someone that is/claims to be a mechanic, or would you rather buy from someone that makes no claim to be one?

The only bonus to buying a vehicle from a mechanic I can see is free tools when you start poking around in places that are rarely visited, trunks, glove boxes, under seats, etc.

iSureWilll > Meatcoma 07/14/2016 at 09:55

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Double edged sword. First off, do you consider yourself a mechanic? Would you let someone buy a car from you?

Second, People that don’t know anything about cars will tend to pay for things to be fixed whether it is really necessary or not. They just go off what the mechanic says, who is trying to make money of course. Mechanics will know what needs to be fixed but ALSO know that it doesn’t NEED to be fixed NOW and they can let it go for a while so a mechanic owned car may have more “problems” but they probably aren’t big ones.

I would buy from a mechanic owned car. Just probe him with questions about specific things on the car and what has/hasn’t been done to fix them. If he knows what he is talking about you should be good to go. At the very least he should be able to say, “X is the problem and its not a safety issue and I’ve been lazy. Shouldn’t cost more than $x.xx to fix.”

Monkey B > Meatcoma 07/14/2016 at 09:58

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If you know what to look for in a car it doesn’t matter who you get it from. If you don’t know have a mechanic inspect it.

It’s generally said, mechanics have pretty cars that don’t run right and body/paint techs have great running ugly cars. I can attest that I only painted one of my own cars and it was after I left the industry.

smobgirl > Meatcoma 07/14/2016 at 10:00

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I think the scariest possibility for a mechanic-owned car is the potential for project car hell. I mean, sure, they could just flip cars because they like variety and have the ability to fix anything they want to drive. Or they could be selling it because they can’t fix what’s wrong (and neither can anyone else) - OR - they could’ve MacGuyvered the shit out of it knowing they weren’t in it for the long haul, but it would last “long enough” (either long enough to sell or long enough that they could make time for a better fix). I dated a mechanic once and I'd buy his daily driver in a heartbeat, but I wouldn't touch his off-roader if it was the last available vehicle to escape a horde of zombies.

Aaron M - MasoFiST > Meatcoma 07/14/2016 at 10:02

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The conversation we have about the car is going to be way more telling than any label on a Craigslist ad. If someone is knowledgeable about the car, forthright about problems and what’s been done to fix them in the past, it’s going to make me feel more comfortable about possibly buying the car. Would I be more likely to have that sort of conversation with a mechanic? Maybe. At the same time, no conversation about any faults of the car is a much more severe red flag from someone who has claimed to be a mechanic than a schmo who may honestly not know that anything’s wrong.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > Meatcoma 07/14/2016 at 10:04

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There’s an old axiom along the lines of “The cobbler’s children go barefoot, and the children of the baker go hungry”. Very much can apply to mechanic cars - life-ending problems will tend to have been taken care of, but it’s not uncommon to be a mass of niggles to serious issues the mechanic has been limping with because he does that shit for money, knows what’s serious *for him to deal with*, and kind of doesn’t want to.

Meatcoma > smobgirl 07/14/2016 at 10:06

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I agree, one of them offered to sell me his daily but specifically told me that while he was selling his truck that I should not buy it. While I assume his daily was mechanically sound, there were items that I would have fixed if it was my car but he did not because of laziness.

Meatcoma > smobgirl 07/14/2016 at 10:09

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I would also be worried about a mechanic knowing how to rig it to work through the test drive or even through the mechanic inspection. As in you used to be able to put sawdust in a transmission to quiet down the gears until a car was sold(40 years ago). Things like that are what worry me about buying a car from a mechanic as well.

Meatcoma > iSureWilll 07/14/2016 at 10:11

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I consider myself a ‘shadtree’ mechanic, as in I have no training, but I can wrench on my own vehicles to a point. I would never state to someone that I am a mechanic because I am not.

Meatcoma > iSureWilll 07/14/2016 at 10:13

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While a mechanic will know what needs to be fixed and what doesn’t, they would also know what a mechanical inspection would look for and what it would not. Obviously this would depend on the mechanic and if he was unscrupulous or not, but when buying a vehicle my first assumption is to protect myself and my moneyz!

Meatcoma > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht 07/14/2016 at 10:14

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I can understand that.

smobgirl > Meatcoma 07/14/2016 at 10:19

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Yeah, for sure. I seem to remember from a Lehto podcast that they could be legally liable in a situation like that but that's still going to waste a lot of your time to pursue.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > Monkey B 07/14/2016 at 10:20

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It’s funny - a good mechanic always knows someone better for the job at hand, and knows how much he costs. Doesn’t really want to do the job himself. A decent painter knows somebody better - likewise. That can stall the will to actually get things put right - both having a professional take/self-criticism/having to live with the results and letting the perfect be the enemy of the good.

AMGtech - now with more recalls! > Meatcoma 07/14/2016 at 10:34

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As a professional mechanic myself, I tend to avoid mechanic owned cars, and on the flipside have had a harder time selling if I’m open about my profession.

The reasoning is simple. There are far more bad mechanics than good ones but we all have the ability to cover up problems and most of us have no interest in working on our own vehicles. I’ve also encountered my fair share of people who claim to be mechanics but only do very basic work on the side ever since they were fired from jiffy lube or have never even worked in a shop, then claim to have already done some major job to the car (such as a head gasket). I want nothing to do with a car that person touched.

Typically those of us who do good work and are competent with a wrench won’t go bragging about being mechanics because we know that information isn’t necessary and probably won’t help with the sale. It’s usually the “mechanics” who have hammer hands and deliver pizzas for their main source of income who will brag about mechanics.

Meatcoma > AMGtech - now with more recalls! 07/14/2016 at 10:40

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Thanks for the honesty.

shop-teacher > Meatcoma 07/14/2016 at 10:53

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I wouldn’t hesitate to buy a vehicle from my mechanic, because he is just plain into fixing cars. He’s an independent with his own shop, who works crazy hours. The shop and parking lot are always full, on word of mouth alone. His personally vehicles are flawless.

Now your average meathead Craigslist “mechanic”? Yeah, no.