Same here. We recently bought a second hand Prius at an official dealer (because new is unreasonably expensive, we do care about emissions, and I think we got some warranty from the official dealer). Half a year later, the brakes need to be replaced. Turns out not to fall under the warranty, whereas we think it's unreasonable to sell a car with brakes that need to be replaced that soon. Repair at the official dealer is pretty expensive.

So my wife takes it to our old, trusty local mechanic, and their repairs are a lot cheaper. I forgot if they could also advise us on whether this was reasonable in the first place.

I think my mother also often ended up at an independent mechanic after getting disappointed by official dealers. (My dad always drove leased company cars so didn't have to worry about this stuff. I know nothing about cars (but I'm glad my wife does).)

I bought a used car around 2 years ago and went to the dealer because of a problem and was shocked when he informed me about (obviously after selling the car) what everything doesn't fall under the warranty. It's probably easier to say what falls under which is the motor and transmission. Otherwise they bring the argument with wear parts which I can understand for the brakes.

It's unlucky that they sold you a car where the brakes were soon to be replaced but they are really wear parts. However I was suprised to hear that also most of the electrical stuff doesn't fall under warranty. I'm from Germany so it might be different in other countries.

Among many, many other models both in and out of production, Teslas are not the best choice for hot rodders. Got it.

You don't have to be a car mod enthusiast to have a desire to use a business you trust and have a good relationship with to repair the property you own.

I would wager that the vast majority of non-enthusiasts do not have a "business they trust and have a good relationship with" that isn't the dealer.

That wager might go pretty bad for you - there is a real lot of independent shops which aren't dealers and they have a lot of business. Moreover, these shops are often significantly cheaper than dealers with same or higher speed and reliability. I've seen dealer trying to change me several times more for the same job than independent shop - dealers seem have their set prices and enough business "by default" not to care about openly overcharging me. And I don't have particularly bad dealer - they are generally fine, except for being prone to quoting outrageous prices for some things.

Of course, there are also crooks out there, so challenge is finding good shop, but once you did, there's absolutely no reason to not do business with them except for things like recalls.

And, of course, for older out-of-warranty cars - which is the vehicle of choice for a real lot of "non-enthusiasts" who just don't have money to buy a shiny new car that loses 20% of value right after driving off the dealer parking lot - there's absolutely no reason to prefer dealers if you have a competent independent shop.

I wasn't arguing against independent shops, im well aware that they are capable of preforming excellent service. But the reputation of the shady mechanic exists for the same reason the reputation of the shady used car dealer exists. Cars are complex, and the average person doesn't have enough time to fully understand them. That is why YourMechanic was able to just raise 24 million in funding (I believe it was that much, I am on my phone right now) there is a huge market of people that don't want to do the research, or put up with the perceived risk of finding an independent mechanic.

I think you have no idea what you're talking about. There's an independent repair shop just down the street from me that has as much business as they can handle (they smartly located themselves right outside a major employer's campus, so it's a convenient location for all the people who work there). Everyone knows dealerships are expensive. With the average age of new cars being over 11 years now (according to the article), most people are not going to be taking their cars to dealerships when there are cheaper places to go.

And how many of those people would take their car there after they switch jobs? I'm betting very few. Also things like tires and oil changes are different than major repairs.

No, 'Grishnakh was right. You have no idea what you're talking about. If a particular repair is under warranty, then sure, one gets it fixed at the dealer. Otherwise, especially for a "major" repair, why pay 40% more for a mechanic: with decades less experience, who doesn't have an interest in the business, who won't speak to the customer, and who will be replaced by somebody else when the customer needs another repair next year?

This is a government installation. People don't switch jobs here very much.

Tires and oil changes are the two biggest service jobs on cars these days, since everything else is so reliable. But on a 10-year-old car, it's entirely possible to do more substantial repairs thanks to the OBD-II service tools that are available. You can get one of these scanners for $100 now (or less for a crappier one), look up any codes thrown by the ECU, which will tell you exactly which sensor has gone bad. As long as the manufacturer isn't intentionally making it so you need a dealership tool to do stuff, these cars can be quite a bit easier to work on that older ones since they tell you what's wrong.

I'm well aware of that, I've personally changed my own oil, replaced the starter on an ex's car, replaced my mass airflow sensor, and have my own OBD-II scanner (crappy one).

I'm not sure why this thread turned into multiple attempts to convince me that independent mechanics are a good value that can do the same or better work than a dealer. I never claimed they couldn't, I stated that I don't think most people have a trusted mechanic that isn't the dealer. So far I've gotten a lot of down votes, anecdotes, but no data. I very well could be wrong, I was stating my opinion based on what I've seen and experienced.

Look at YourMechanic, it's filling a need in the market to link independent mechanics to car owners. It is using a verified user trust model to rate them. If the vast majority of people had trusted mechanics they wouldn't be gaining much traction in the market.

>I'm not sure why this thread turned into multiple attempts to convince me that independent mechanics are a good value that can do the same or better work than a dealer. I never claimed they couldn't

Yeah, I'm not sure how that happened.

>I very well could be wrong, I was stating my opinion based on what I've seen and experienced.

I'm not sure there's any easy way of proving it one way or the other really. Personally, I still see plenty of independent mechanic businesses; I live down the street from two of them now, at a prior residence a year ago in a totally different state, I lived down the street from another one that was constantly busy and had people working there at very late hours to get all the work done. Then why I go to dealerships (I was shopping for a car a while back) I find them all closed all day Sunday, and closed early on other days. If your service department were busy, you wouldn't be closed on the weekends.

So again, I don't think we can prove anything either way here, and I'm not so sure about "the vast majority of people having trusted mechanics", but I really don't think that the vast majority of car owners use dealerships for all their service. I think that people use them when their car is brand-new (because it's covered by warranty), and I think owners of not-too-old luxury brands (BWM, etc.) probably use dealerships more often, however I think people who own cars that are 10+ years old probably rarely use dealerships, if ever. People who have less money to spend on cars, and who buy used cars (or keep cars a long time) I believe are naturally going to look for better deals for car service, and that's going to rule out stealerships very quickly.

As for YourMechanic, I hadn't heard of that, but it sounds like a great idea. But if it's successful, I think that shows that a lot of people want a trusted (non-dealership) mechanic, even if they don't currently have one. Also, don't forget, a lot of people these days are more mobile, and move around from time to time, so they'll need a new mechanic when they move.

I found a datasource, it's dated (2011) it shows people trust their "shop" which could be a dealer, chain, or independent. With a 37% split going to independent and 30% to dealerships. I think you are right that we probably wont find any data on if people have a trusted mechanic since this also shows that there is a lot of price shopping going on.

But with all that said, in the broader conversation I'd say I was wrong. Even if you don't have a trusted independent mechanic more people prefer that option, even if they use a different one every time, over the dealership.

http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/news/2011/12/survey-consu...

My whole family brings ur cars to a single shop. We trust them and the prices are good. My wife and I go there even for oil changes, even after we moved two towns over. They are also the highest-rated shop in the region, so we're not the only ones who trust them.

This does not comport with my experience, but I'm not sure there are reliably studies on the matter.