2013 JSW mileage / extended warranty

Bought a new 2013 Jetta SportWagen on 5/30. We've been driving the heck out of it, and like it a lot.

Driving it so much in fact, that we're slated to burn through the factory 36K mile warranty in the first year.

I opted not to purchase any extended warranty. I had previously purchased the extended warranty on 4 other vehicles and just didn't think they were worth it.

Any thoughts on whether the extended warranty might make more sense in this case? And if so, any suggestions on one?

This is a heated topic, but since I intended to keep my TDI a long time, I got an extended warranty. One HPFP or intercooler icing incident and it is paid for. Also, since I have a highline trim with all the electronic stuff (moonroof, windows, climatronic, etc..) this can also cover the cost of the warranty down the road.

Plus, up here in Canada at least, you get a credit on your extended warranty on a new VW purchase if you do not get it which mitigates the cost somewhat.

You are basically pre-paying future maintenance on the car. Some people prefer to put money away on the side to have a fund in case of an incident. Each way has its merits, I got a decent deal on the car (for up here anyways, TDI's very popular) and with the difference got the extended warranty.

Part of the reason we bought the JSW was to take some of the "pressure" off our 2013 Acura RDX AWD (base). We did buy the 7yr / 100K (from memory - I should look at the paperwork again) warranty on it and had been racking up miles on it like crazy.

I expect as we move into Winter, we won't be driving the JSW quite so much.

My thinking when I purchased the JSW was that I'd drive it exactly 11K miles/yr and trade it in for something else around the 3-4yr mark. I didn't predict we'd like it so much and drive it exclusively.
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I got the extended warranty 'cause while I love my VW's - this is my 5th one and counting - they have unexpected and very expensive things break on them. The current generation, for instance, has the infamous HPFP and DPF time bombs that may or may not explode under our ownership period.

If I wanted a reliable appliance, I'd drive a CamCordCivRolla, but I like my twisties and for a car to drive like a proper car, expensive time bombs be damned.

Any suggestions on an extended warranty?

The finance guy offered me a "VW" warranty for ~$1300 and said he'd honor that cash price for 30-days. I haven't checked back to see what's available now.
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Ask your insurance company about MBI ( mechanical breakdown insurance ) . I have geico and their MBI is 7/100 with a $250 deductible for under $10 a month .

I am at 30K on my '12 that we have had just over a year and we bought the extended for a piece of mind.

Softrockrenegade said:

Ask your insurance company about MBI ( mechanical breakdown insurance ) . I have geico and their MBI is 7/100 with a $250 deductible for under $10 a month .

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We've got State Farm now. They don't offer it.

I've kind of been looking for an excuse to move to USAA though, and they do offer Extended Vehicle Protection Program.

off topic does anyone know if travelers offers MBI??

With the amount of miles you're racking up the extra warranty coverage could be useful. Just make sure to look closely at what is actually covered under the plan.

in the past I voted no for this as I was like you and drove way past the 36k in less than a year, I know have 64k in less than 20 months and had no issues until last week when the AC stated to be less cold, today my indie said I may need a new compressor to the tune of about 1000 bucks so I am not sure I made the right decision. It is a killer to be making payments and have a major repair.

Softrockrenegade said:

Ask your insurance company about MBI ( mechanical breakdown insurance ) . I have geico and their MBI is 7/100 with a $250 deductible for under $10 a month .

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Geico MBI at $6.28 sure works for me.


ez

i believe this is where you might think about contacting chris at langhorne. he usually cuts some good deals on extended warranties also. something like this:

http://forums.tdiclub.com/showthread.php?t=374170

USAA has a bunch of mechanical breakdown insurance options. Only 5K miles so far, but we're averaging a little over 3K/month right now.

I assume we'll drive it less once Winter rolls around.

I bought my 2010 as it was Certified Pre-Owned, and VW tacked on 2 years onto the bumper-to-bumper. I still went for the warranty even after that because I plan to drive the wheel s off the thing.

It really depends on how long you plan to keep the thing, but I'd go for it provided you can snag a good deal on it. If anything, how much is the peace of mind worth to you?

Thanks for all the comments. Still not sure what we're going to do, but we're leaning toward NOT getting the extended warranty.

It's never been our plan to keep the SportWagen "forever", although that was based in part on the potentially expensive maintenance as it ages.

Had an extended warranty on our 1999 Land Rover Discovery Series I. I think we only used it once, and it was a huge hassle / fight, but it probably paid for itself.

We bought an extended warranty on our 2003 Honda Accord. It was kind of nice to have, since the factory 3yr / 36K was exceeded at around the 2yr mark. I think exhausted the extended warranty around the 4yr mark. I'm pretty sure the warranty never paid for itself though. We drove that car for 10yrs / ~160K.

Bought an extended warranty on our 2011 Outback 2.5i Limited. Got rid of the car while it was still under factory warranty and received a pro-rated / partial refund for the additional warranty.

We went kind of crazy with this 2013 Acura RDX. Bought the "Service Contract" (extended warranty) for $2371. 7yr / 100K, as I recall. Then we bought bought the "tire, wheel, and key fob" warranty for $795+tax (my wife has historically been tough on wheels, tires, and key fobs, and these items are EXPENSIVE to replace). We even bought the lifetime pre-paid oil-changes for $895+tax.

The SportWagen has been running $.105/mile for fuel -vs- the RDX $.165/mile. I was going to say it might be less-expensive to just drive the RDX more instead of buying the extended warranty on the SportWagen, but actually we'd still come out ahead on fuel-costs with the SportWagen.
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extended warranty is a good way for someone to make money. if you want to spend some money to reduce your risk, know it is priced so that you are not the one making money.

just like the lottery or casino. one way to make money, buy stock and own part of the house.

meerschm said:

extended warranty is a good way for someone to make money. if you want to spend some money to reduce your risk, know it is priced so that you are not the one making money.

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I'm leaning toward NOT buying the extended warranty.

Shortly after I purchased a used 2005 Outback XT Limited, I started reading comments on the forum about turbo's exploding and that you should never own one without a warranty. I looked for a warranty for it at the time and came up pretty empty. I see now that USAA does offer one and I might have purchased it back then if I'd known. That said, the Outback has been awesome and no issues. Knock on wood.

I'd be OK with something like "major medical" insurance. Something that's not super-expensive, with maybe a $1K or $1500 deductible, that would cover an $8K HPFP explosion or super-expensive emissions problem.
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