golfxx

I have purchased an 03 SC 430 and I am considering purchasing an extended warranty thru my Lexus dealer. What I am considering is a 7 year bumper to bumper 100,000 warranty for $2200. My SC only has 7500 miles on it and I probably will keep it for 7 years or so. I have had 2 other Lexus's and have keep both for about 7 years each. I will put about 8000 miles a year on it and at the end of the 7 year warranty the car will have about 65000 miles and will be 12 years old. The warranty is transferable when I sell the car for only $50 dollars transfer fee. I realize extended warranties are like insurance and most of the time you do not get the return on your investment, however with the expense of an SC this might be an exception. I need opinions anyone might have on the value of this extended warranty. GOOD DEAL or NOT

tfeni52355

Golfxx:
Do you work on your own cars? If so I would not get the extended warranty. Very little goes wrong with the SC's as you can see from this forum. I bought our '02 with 15K in Dec. 07 on it and it now has 20K on it. The car is outstanding!

I like working on the SC. Doing service mainly. Oil, trans fluid, tire rotation , brakes, plugs etc. It's a hobby for me so I like digging in. The only trip my car will make to Lexus is for the timing belt which is due now because of the age of the vehicle, not the mileage.

However, if you are a hands off guy, and let the dealer do your service, I would recommend you get the warranty for piece of mind.

I think you will find your SC a joy to own either way you go! Good Luck and Congrats on becoming an SC owner!

golfxx

In the past I have worked on my 93 and 98 GS's however the work I did would not have been covered by any warranty. General maintenance (oil changes, breaks, transmission fluid, etc) is not covered by any warranty. What I am considering an extending warranty for is non general maintenance things. Computer malfunction, AC compressor, (had AC compressor issues with my GS400) power roof, etc. Any and all of these issues I would not do myself.

Yes

i got the extended warranty on mine. most likely, i'll never use it. but it's nice to know i'll never have to shell out thousands of dollars for a repair.

robsvdp

Is it 7 more years, or 7 from date of first purchase? Haven't heard of the latte r beofre.

tm510

Echo Rob here. a 7 year waranty will take your car to 2010. Not a long time. At least that's the standard way Lexus does it.

Also, do a bit of shopping. Any Lex or Toyota dealer can sell that warranty to you. I found a Toyota dealer who would sell it for about 46% off the Lexus list price. So shop a bit. It can be done on the phone - you don't have to limit yourself to local dealers.

Jerry

SCRXOwner

There was/is a post on this web site for a dealer that will give you a great price on the Lexus Warr. Search the SC & RX forums and I am sure you will find it. Sometimes local Lexus dealers will match a price from another out-of-state dealer. I was told that only Lexus could sell Lexus warr. So I am not sure if Toyota can officially sell Lexus Warr.

Shop around and get a better deal that $2200. Lexus Warr. does go back to the original in service date of the car.

EskieFan54

Consumer Reports does not reccommend extended warrantys for vehicles with the SC's reliability ratings.
I also have a 03 SC, love it (except for the run-flats) and did not purchase extended.
Good Luck

LeslieRC

If the struts need replacing as mine did on the `02, you'll wish (or will be happy that) you had that warranty. $2200 for 7 year/100K miles bumper to bumper does not sound like a bad deal.

golfxx

I have another quote from the Lexus dealer. Originally I was looking at a 7 year 100,000 miles. I have been quoted 500 dollars less for a 7 year 70,000 mile for $1700 dollars. I have calculated at the end of 7 years from now I will only have about 65,000 miles so the 70,000 miles warranty will give me the same coverage for $1700 instead of $2200.

rcpeters

You probably should investigate warranty plans from companies other than Lexus, although the cost will probably be about the same as the Lexus dealer is quoting. Might be an advantage to have a warranty that does not require you to use a Lexus dealer. However, you need to carefully examine the coverage, item by item.

I bought a max coverage available, $2500, 48 month, 60K miles warranty on a 2001 LS430 with 63K miles from Western General through a used car dealer. The deductible is $100. per visit. We now have 77K miles on the car in 10 months, and no claims yet. These cars are so well built, we probably won't need the warranty.

I recently purchased a low mileage 2002 SC430 and decided to save the warranty expense because I only drive a few thousand miles a year.

Bottom Line: If you can afford it, buy it. If money is tight, save it. You can always sell the car cheap with problems and forget it.

scdroptop

iTrader: (1)

I bought my 2002 SC with 23,xxx miles on it two years ago. It was owned by a female who did just the bare minimum on the car. It was one of the first in the production VIN #'s that came out. Now it has 25,xxx miles on it. it has been garaged its entire life and never driven hard or abused.

I am a bit of a perfectionist, and my opinion is that for the money you spend on these cars, they should drive, feel and perform like a $65k Lexus. You shouldn't have rattles, shimmy's, skipping cd's, speakers blown, wind noise, etc and vibration coming from the engine. Read below...

In my opinion, my car never got all the new "tweaks" done to it that most owners would notice and take in for warranty. The lady I bought it from only had the oil changes and some basic stuff done, no actual "warranty" items.

Well, I bought the most expensive Platinum Warranty and it has absolutely paid off. I am summarizing and rounding off numbers, but in the two years I have had about $10k in warranty repairs covered on the car. Although my car was a cream puff, and I have only put 2k miles on it.

Here are some of the things that have gone wrong:

#1 most expensive item:
Five different Mark Levinson speakers have gone out...about $3k total
#2 most expensive item: Engine motor mounts $3k
#3 Error 2 showed up on CD player. Had to replace entire ML CD
#4 replaced struts $2k
#5 replaced transmission mounts

A very expensive warranty item was the seal that goes all the way around the top, windows and windshield. It was not sealing properly and causing wind noise. I believe it was like $700 with labor.

I have also had the center console and stereo bezel replaced for corroding and squeaking.

If you pull the maint history and see a lot of warranty items taken care of in addition to normal maint. then that might give you more of a piece of mind. I didn't see that with my car, just normal scheduled maint, and a well taken care of car, but I sure am glad that I bought it. I paid $1800 for mine, but I have a special hook up at Sewell Lexus.

I would strongly recommend it period even if I hadn't experienced any problems due to the fact that your car has very low miles which means it's probably been sitting a lot, just like mine. I think these cars need to be driven regularly. They have so many gadgets, moving parts, sophisticated engines and suspensions and transmissions that anything could cost you close to what the warranty costs.

I'd definitely recommend it. PM me if you want more info. The roadside assistance is a huge bonus too, because I am spareless!

golfxx

I do appreciate all opinions. I will check for roadside assistance and towing with the bumper to bumper warranty I am considering. I too am without a spare tire. SCDROPTOP you sure have gotten your money's worth with your extended warranty.

antigeek

I have an '02 from 11/01 that will be at the end of its extended warranty period soon. I had an issue with my TPS (throttle position sensor, not the report) last year -- jumpy after it sat a while. No idea how much it would have cost to fix without the EW. However, I haven't had any major issues since. Oh yeah, it only has 63k miles on it, and it's my only driver (thanks, 4.7 miles to work from home!).

Note that trim is not included in the extended warranty (even though my SM worked it out with some other "need-to-remove-the-door-panel" issues), and I'm not sure the speakers are, either (I'm on my 4th blow-out). Please, Lexus, stop under-powering the speakers on a convertible!!!

My experience from my '93 SC 400 was that AFTER 7 years, the issues started to appear (alternator, water pump, radiator (damn composite top!)). While I got the EW on my '02, I probably wouldn't do it again. Who knew that reliability of a FIRST-YEAR RUN of Lexus' first convertible would have JD Power's fewest defects per 100 vehicles for ANY VEHICLE EVER?!

(OK, so it's debatable, but I do recall the report a few years go. No topic changes, please! :-)

stw

i just purcahsed a 02 certified sc430 with 34k, and i upgraded to a 5year 125k warranty for $1750 it says certified platinum warranty, but i don't think i can transfer it?? i haven't used it yet, so i don't know if it's worth the $$$.