A service managers perspective on car value over their lifetime

The internet has existed for decades and its only taught people to ignore the value in what it has to offer them. Every day people ask me should I buy this car or that and I am getting tired of giving advice no one listens to. I see it all as a service manager albeit informed by the cars that come through my door. Here are some stories I have shared with people whose own families provided the data I gave them... which was summarily ignored. The people who still want to buy something even when given the common issues & average repair costs. Consumer reports.... a long time authority on value... has even done reports about Jeep reliability and value ranking them in the bottom 10 percent of every manufacturer in the world. Yet still every time we take one on trade its sold in a matter of days.

This is something I think of often. A family that has owned multiple Toyota Matrix's that they have put more then 300k miles on each before they decided the cars have become so "ugly" due to rust that they want to upgrade to something newer. There kids (some of them) have grown up and are ready to buy something newer to drive. Having known them since they got their licenses I feel at least a little bit responsible for what they drive next. One of their siblings even bought a used Subaru giving perspective to their family tradition of driving Toyotas. Given I would not wish Subaru ownership on even my worst enemies I did everything I could to help them pick their replacement vehicle...

The best part about having service records from a shop that has existed for 26+ years is that it is easy to break down what it has costed people to own a vehicle based on the mileage they have driven. The family in question had one of their matrix's totalled in an accident but the other still is running and driving. They requested a replacement since it was getting a bit ugly. Still rock solid, zero rust issues preventing it from being inspected, & runs and drives great. According to our history they have spent 12,000 dollars in 300,000 miles including 2 deer hit collision jobs keeping that specific car on the road. That is 1 dollar spent on tires, oil changes, maintenance, body panels, headlights, ... total spend for every 25 miles. If you exclude the collision damage that is 1 dollar every 35 miles. In comparison their daughters subaru, which had only 120k miles with no timing belt change purchased with more then 60k miles on the odometer they had spent over 8000 dollars on the same stuff (minus deer hits). That's 1 dollar spent every 7.5 miles on maintenance.

So a subaru is 4 times more expensive to keep on a road than a Toyota? Well there is some more data from other customers to compare to this. Consumer reports lists Toyota and Lexus as the cheapest cars to maintain and operate out of every manufacturer in the world to date. The amount of people who care what consumer reports says... very little my experience shows. Fast forward to another customer who purchased a 2008 outback with 120k miles. They have yet to reach 200k miles and they have spent more then 18,000 dollars on repair and maintenance with a used car discount that cuts the labor rate almost in half. Torque converters, axles, abs lights, brakes, tune up, timing belts but there is something more important to realize here. And that is completely ignoring my own families Toyota experience with them having a mechanic in the family...

Comparing a dollar amount spent per mile is a simplistic analysis. If you actually compare what each vehicle actually needed during its life you should see how completely insane it is to even buy a Subaru. I have one friend with a subaru that had bent some valves during a timing belt changes around 200k miles. The motor was pulled, the heads sent to a machine shop, and that vehicle NEVER ran again... Eventually it was sold for parts after 3 engine removals & reinstallations, countless new parts, and no clue as to why it never could pass a compression test again even with all new parts.

They say 97 percent of subarus are still on the road today. When people say that to me I asked them why it is that it is okay that only 3 percent of subaru owners actually made it home?