Extended warranty

[Ozzie Osmond]

With my car approaching 3 years old Mr Porsche has asked whether I want to extend the warranty. In round numbers the cost will be £1,500 for 2 years.

I tend to buy good cars and keep them for quite a while. So on this basis if I keep extending for the next 7 years (to 10 years old) my additional warranty cost would be more than £5,000 - which is 10% of the original cost of the car.

Sounds a bit steep! £5k in a jar in the kitchen looks a better bet to me.

[Ozzie Osmond]

Interesting comments.

As regards the "attractive to buyers" point I checked the terms again. It seems you can buy the warranty at any time up to the sooner of 10 years or 125,000 miles. The car just has to pass a full inspection at OPC (cost £216) and then you can buy the warranty at £700 for one year or £1,400 for 2 years. In other words, the warranty doesn't have to be continuous from new.

I guess the risk is how many things the OPC finds which "need fixing by us before you qualify to buy the warranty"!

[Ozzie Osmond]

sidicks said:

To be accurate, I think a car can have a warranty up to 10 years of age, meaning that you can add a 2-year warranty on an 8-year old car, but only a 1-year warranty on a 9-year old car etc.

Correct. My "10 years" was shorthand for the web but the £5,000 figure is correctly calculated.

sidicks said:

how many things the OPC finds which "need fixing by us before you qualify to buy the warranty"! Hence a car already with a warranty is attractive!!

Agreed, although as a seller you'd want to be sure you were recovering value for your significant investment. Where it falls down for me is that if I want to extend the warranty again in 2 years time the car has to go back through the "things that need fixing by OPC before you qualify to buy the warranty" process all over again.

It's interesting to weigh the pro's and con's though!