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Just acquired a 2012 RX350 AWD with 68,000 miles. Purchased a warranty from CNA National (top rated). Already steering column starting to make noise. While I feel Lexus has the best quality, today's vehicles just have too many components to malfunction.
If you can and will do your own repairs, it makes an extended warranty a lot harder to justify financially due to reducing/eliminating the extremely high dealer labor costs.
Does your car have navigation?
Does your car have computers?
Just problems with those alone could cost you big bucks for replacement !
Yes, I have NAV. I didn't use it since day one. Lexus Nav sucks. Google maps actually recognize voice. I simply say to google, 1234 Sunset Blvd. Out pops the nav instructions avoiding traffic. On the RX it ask me, what city? I say, Los Angeles. It enters, Los Alamos. I try it again, it comes back with Los Alamitos. I try it again, it comes back with Los Gatos. Then, it give me a list on the menu to which I have choose while driving with the pointer. after that, I say the street name to which I have to confirm. Then I finally enter the street number. The worst thing is that traffic monitor on lexus NAV doesn't pick up local roads (not to mention having simply bird's eye view screen - Garmin had this since 2005). As such it doesn't really do much in terms to taking you there quicker.
back to the original point....... the nav was broken to begin with. Thus, extended warranty is worthless for me. Instead I invested my auto insurance deductible's worth of money on a clear bra which WILL save me money down the line.
By computers, I think you are referring to MAF and O2 sensors. Perhaps the exhaust recirculation system. Not sure. The variable valve timing valve (or oil control valve) and some others like idle control module and a bunch of small little stuff could go wrong but they are only moderately expensive parts. None of them amounts to thousands of dollars unless you go to the dealer all the time. I've gone through major parts replacement cycle (due to its age) on my 01 RX and can tell you from experience that RX is much cheaper to maintain and repair than the European rivals, which, by the way, MUST be purchased with an extended warranty. So true for BMWs, the Ultimate Leasing Machine, FIATs - Fix It Again Tony or Range Rover - (bad word starting with the letter S Rover.......
...can tell you from experience that RX is much cheaper to maintain and repair than the European rivals, which, by the way, MUST be purchased with an extended warranty. So true for BMWs...
Hope you're right about maintenance on the RX.
Something I noticed about BMW, for 3, 5, or 7-series cars, it doesn't matter what you brought it into a dealer for, the bill will always be around the same, $500, $800, or $1000 respectively. It's almost like the service underwriter puts the amount on the total line and finds things until it gets up to it. A friend with an X5 just took his in and got a bill for around $1000, so I guess there is a $200 bonus for having the "X" (kind of wondering what the bonus is for "Z" and "M".)
I just picked up my 13 RX 450h with just over 26k miles on it, and did get a 100k mile extended warranty. Normally I would not get an extended warranty on anything, but I will for my winter commuting vehicles. My daily commute totals a little over 80 miles, most on the Chicago tollway which is covered in salt/saltwater most of the winter. After 2-3 years the bodies on the SUVs are fine, but almost everything else looks like it has been soaked in saltwater, and expensive things will start to fail. Among my co-workers that have similar commutes, we have all had similar experiences with all of our vehicles.
To a lesser extent, I also looked at the number of "boxes with wires" in the RX. I understand that a luxury vehicle will need to have more controllers and components for them to control, but more pieces means more things to fail (it's not like the classic elegance of a vintage VW Beatle, that never had a radiator, automatic climate controller, power window, power seat, Nav system, etc, fail since it was never really needed and never there in the first place.) Looking at the price of the warranty v.s. the price of the various pieces, and how many there are that could go bad, the warranty started to look reasonable.
Hopefully the RX is better designed than the previous SUVs, but for the price of the warranty and knowing what I have had to fix over the years based on how I will be using it, it made sense to me to spend the extra money on the RX.
If it helps the forum, here are the parts that went south on me from the 01 RX model. I'm a real live case of someone owning the car for this long. Right now the 01 RX has 251K on it. Believe it or not the most expensive part (if my recollection is correct) was the air mix servo which was over $300 - the thing that mixes cold and warm air for the cabin. The book says, 90 minutes for repair but they can do this quite quickly. Thus, indy shops don't charge 1 and 1/2 hour of labor.
You should also note that I drained and refilled my tranny fluid every 15K to 30K miles depending how good my recollection was. this is not the typical factory recommendation. many 99 to 03 RX had engine sludge issue. So, I've been running synthetic oil until now. After 5K to 7K miles (my usual oil change interval) I burn around 0.3 quart of oil, which I think is exceptional (new Porsches burn oil like it was on fire), and I have zero oil leakage when parked.
MAS - went south at 55K miles (it shoudn't have - but a new mechanic at the time tinkered with some performance parts and messed it up)
Door lock actuator - happened to two different doors well after 140K miles
Master auto window switch - after 190K miles
Exhuast pipe - corroded too much and had holes around 120K
engine oil control valve (for variable valve timing, I think) - at 160K miles
Idle air control valve - started showing symptoms around 120K but I waited until about 150K
radio antenna - right around 90K
air mix servo (climate control) - happened twice. Once at 45K miles and again around 120K
High beam relay - around 80K miles
Trunk door shocks (both sides) - around 70K miles
The "D" light - around 40K miles - 01 RX had a D for Drive in the transmission selector
Drive shaft center support - at 210K miles
a bunch of maintenance items like pads, rotors, belts, shocks and stuff - it varies
I'm currently under an extended warranty by a third party that was purchased when our car was purchased. When I had purchased it, the dealer had informed me that if the warranty is untouched by the end of the contract date, I could get all of my money back. Luckily, I have not yet had to use it. Perhaps you can check to see if you can also get the same deal where you can get money back. If you have something that needs repairing later on and you deem it worthy to use the warranty, I believe it's better to have than to not. Otherwise, you could get your money back at the end of the term.
My personal starting point is to find and purchase a vehicle with a reputably low cost of ownership (infrequent post-warranty repair needs and not excessively expensive parts or overly specialized tools for repair work). That is why I purchased my 2010 RX450h, because it meets that criteria.
In general, aftermarket (non-Lexus or non-OEM) extended warranties are generally wastes of money because they either cover almost EVERYTHING for an exorbitantly high cost, or cover nowhere near enough realistic stuff for a more reasonable cost point. The "almost everything" coverage can be nice if something major (or a lot of minor stuff) goes wrong, but if you've purchased a known reliable vehicle, you will more than likely hit the warranty with one or two minor claims and be left having spent a lot of money with minimal return. I have only once purchased an extended warranty for a 1996 Suburban about 17 years ago, and not only did I actually make money on that deal because of repeated repair problems, I learned that I will not ever own a GM vehicle outside of OEM warranty without having an extended warranty on top, and my REAL plan is to simply never buy GM again!
The real question you're facing is whether or not you're going to even keep your '17 past the OEM warranty point. If not, it's a moot point because the extended warranty would be a complete waste of money.
Consequently, my personal recommendation for you is to budget your incoming cash flow to make monthly escrow payments to yourself. Base it on a projected monthly equivalent payment amount for the best extended warranty you can buy today. Put that money in a completely separate account (preferably with an automatic monthly transfer) where you WILL NOT touch it or need it for any other expenses. THEN, as you approach the end of your OEM warranty period, if you still want to keep the vehicle and feel the need for an extended warranty insurance plan, you have virtually all of the cost in hand to make the purchase and can continue to rock on without having to scrounge or scramble for the high cost ($2500-$4000, if I recall correctly). If, on the other hand, you are ready to sell or trade up, you have a nice tidy bundle of cash sitting aside for whatever you feel the need to use it for.
If you assume that the cost of a plan is $4000, and you have 4 years to get there, that means that you put $84/month into your separate Warranty Escrow Account and then let it accumulate, untouched, for the next four years. Truly... pay yourself first, up front, and you'll have the cash when you need it and not have to worry about paying off a credit card or borrowing money from someone. It's a great personal discipline and works exceptionally well.
I'm currently under an extended warranty by a third party that was purchased when our car was purchased. When I had purchased it, the dealer had informed me that if the warranty is untouched by the end of the contract date, I could get all of my money back. Luckily, I have not yet had to use it. Perhaps you can check to see if you can also get the same deal where you can get money back. If you have something that needs repairing later on and you deem it worthy to use the warranty, I believe it's better to have than to not. Otherwise, you could get your money back at the end of the term.
Can you provide the warranty company's name and web site link? I would like to become educated on this "refund" aspect of your extended warranty. I've never seen or heard anything like it before, and am quite intrigued.
Can you provide the warranty company's name and web site link? I would like to become educated on this "refund" aspect of your extended warranty. I've never seen or heard anything like it before, and am quite intrigued.
I believe the company was called Portfolio or something like that? I'm unsure of the website. After rereading the details, it says that they only reimburse a maximum of $2500. I had paid $2600 so I'm almost getting all of my money back.
The extended warranty was also purchased at the same time when we bought the car. I did not realize until afterwards that it was not a Lexus extended warranty but a third-party. Perhaps the sales person had forgotten to mention that part when he sold it, or I had missed it.
Last edited by ThChinaman; 02-09-17 at 04:06 PM.
Reason: Added image
Looks like NADS took your money and flew the coop. Gone, nada, bye bye, and etc.
I called the 800 toll free number listed on the bottom of your PINK SLIP. Guess what? It had a recording that said if you or a member of your family is over the age of 50, please press *whatever*. Then it was trying to sell me a medical alert system.....You know, the "I've fallen and can't get up" little necklace pendant thing!!! LOL. 😎😄😃😀😁😉😄😃
Incidentally people on this forum back in 2013 had trouble collecting at the end of their term of 7 years of NO CLAIMS!!! I guess some may even paid some out of OEM
warranty repair expenses that was smaller than the $2500 they were hoping to get back at the end of the 7 years term. For example, one might paid out of pocket $1200 at year 6 or so for some out of OEM warranty hoping to get that $2500 at the end of the 7 year term BC they are SOOOO CLOOOOSE TO THE FINISH LINE OF 7 YEARS!!! THE FOLKS SPENT A GRAND TOTAL OF $2500+ $1200 POTENTIALLY FOR NOTHING BUT AGGRAVATIONS.
Personally I would either keep the car if still trouble free AND GO TAKE A NICE VACATION WITH THE MONEY SAVED (OH, I FORGOT, THAT MONEY ALREADY WASTED ON SOME USELESS THIRD PARTY WARRANTY.
Moral of this is SAVE YOUR MONEY. You ALREADY bought a Lexus and any major problems will have already surfaced prior to the OEM WARRANTY ANYWAY.
I'm not saying don't buy extended warranty. You must consider the vehicle involved. For a Lexus, No because the odds are in your favor. For a MB AMG, YES AND A BIG YES!!! BECAUSE on the MB AMG, THINGS, EXPENSIVE THINGS WILL GO WRONG AND YOU CAN BET ON IT!!! I bought third party extended warranty on my MB's TWICE and both times I came out ahead only because I made claims rather quickly BC the MB tend to break down a lot. And I was ahead before the third party extended warranty company even had a chance to go bankrupt!!!! LOL😊
I believe the company was called Portfolio or something like that? I'm unsure of the website. After rereading the details, it says that they only reimburse a maximum of $2500. I had paid $2600 so I'm almost getting all of my money back.
The extended warranty was also purchased at the same time when we bought the car. I did not realize until afterwards that it was not a Lexus extended warranty but a third-party. Perhaps the sales person had forgotten to mention that part when he sold it, or I had missed it.
Dang that sucks. Going to have to call dealer to see if they can reimburse me.
if you purchased it with financing, the most you could do is have it refunded to the loan. Better than nothing, but it's not like cash in hand, even if you paid for the warranty with cash at the time of purchase. Salespeople always forget to mention these details.
Paid $2000 for the platinum extended warranty a few years back. I didn't think it was worth it at the time since I didn't use it at all on my last vehicle that had it, but it was peace of mind for the wife. Towards the end of 2016 the trailing arms started creaking and the radio started acting up. Took it into Lexus and they confirmed that both items were defective and covered under warranty, total price to repair came out to $2,600. Granted if I were to repair it myself it would have been a lot less expensive. I still have mixed feelings about getting an extended warranty though.
09-23-16, 07:05 AM
