That was a conscious choice on your part though, an AMG is a pretty expensive car and buying those out of warranty means you know you are taking a substantial risk of high costs if something breaks.

Engine or ABC work on those cars can cost a fortune, for one because you'll need a shop that really knows what they are doing, for another because the parts are expensive.

Maintenance as you've correctly identified is key, as is a good inspection prior to purchase and a good warranty by the company you buy it from.

On the plus side, you can buy these for a very small fraction of the new value even with very low mileage. If you want to pity someone it would have to be the first owner, it's fairly regular to see write-offs in excess of $4/mile driven.

I wonder if there's a cultural difference here? In the UK there's a strong second hand market and it's incredibly common to see cars driving around old enough to have no warranty. I have one, it's 12 years old. When it goes wrong (which is rarely) I just take it to the local (non-affiliated) garage to fix. Mostly the yearly service is all it needs.

Mercedes UK sells more broad market vehicles. Mercedes USA is focused on the premium market. The cheapest Mercedes in the USA is a CLA with the 2.0L turbo. We don't get the A/V/X-Class or anything with an engine that is <200bhp.

Most shops in the US won't do more than basic work on them. Being so rare, you typically have to go to the dealer or a Euro-import specialist shop in the US. These shops typically won't work on a new-new car, they typically wait until the model is 5 years old before picking up the equipment for them (which can be expensive).

It's not a cultural different, but an economics one. I'm sure getting a Ford Mustang fixed in the UK is expensive despite being a car any American mechanic is comfortable working on.

Interesting. I'm in the UK and I have always thought of Mercedes as the "taxi manufacturer of choice" rather than a luxury or sportier brand, in terms of where they do their big volume sales, both in the UK and globally - i.e. the S/E/C/V class. I have literally never seen an X class in my life, although I see quite a few G-wagens (easily more than I see A-classes).

The average age of cars on the road in the US is just under 12 years.

The issue is that German cars in particular have a reputation for being quite expensive to maintain outside of warranty. In general for most cars it's not a big deal.

Also depends on brand, Volvo owners in the UK tended to keep using the dealer network for a lot longer than other makes.

Are you talking about 50k+ cars or cheap cars?