Warranty expiring - to extend, or not....

my 07 750Li is at 43k miles and warranty will shortly expire at 50k. Do a lot of highway miles - typically 3k per month at the moment, and planning on keeping the car to around 200k miles, so questioning the wisdom (and expense....) of the factory extended maintenance and parts warranties which extend to 100k miles. Quoted $2,500 on maintenance (which is basically pre-paying oil changes & brakes) and a whopping $4700 for parts until 100k miles.

I'm pretty anal about car upkepp so always have the best of everything, and practice preventative maintenance.

Thoughts?

I went with the extended maintenance on my car. When it needs Inspection 2 and brakes, that will pay for the maintenance not counting the oil changes etc. My car is a CPO so the warranty goes to 100K or 2013 so I was not concerned about the extended warranty. These cars are not cheap to fix and if you plan on keeping yours for 200K, the extended warranty might be worth it. I always thought that you could just bank the money and pay for repairs until I got the BMW and found out the cost of service and repairs.

I also went with the extended maintenance on both our cars. With your 7 series my service shop tells me that visits will start at about $1500 per. I would at it as a $2500 insurance policy. Heaven forbid an electrical issue come up on your beauty. Additionally you are paying for taking it to an authorized and trained BMW mechanic. Sounds like you travel some serious miles every month and the peace of mind of maintenance extension.

But warranty only runs to 100k....

So that's a load of money for 50,000 miles - chances are more will go wrong between 100k and 200k, than between 50k and 100k.......its a tough choice...

I purchased both the extended warranty and the extended service for mine and am very happy I did. Its been in a few times for service and I believe I am about even and still have 11 months and 28k left to go... I expect to runout at about 92K on the odo. I paid a lot less than the amount you've been quoted, but I bought it over a year ago. Double check the price, I paid in the vicinity of $2500 for the extended warranty and another $2000 for the extended service plan. If it needs brakes this could easily pay for the extended service plan. Pay attention to your "in service date" since this is what will most likely terminate your plan at 6 years after the car was first sold.

I recommend it.

Chuck

Extended warranty, and profits for the dealer.

Up front I am a Indy shop owner, so am slightly biased on the subject. That said, isn't it pretty simple to figure out?

BMW is selling insurance for repairs. as well as pay it forward for service.. Both have a very good amount of profit margain bulit in for the dealer? So naturally they are betting against serious repair issues and over-charging for the pay ahead services.

So strictly from an economic view, it's not a good investment, and it's a loser many more times tha it is a winner. Of course everyone has a story of when one extended warranty paid-off. But the facts remains that they are extremely profitable for the seller and almost never for the buyer. Just another profit center for the BMW Stealer.

Human nature being what it is though... The same conservative BMW owner that will spend hours scouring the internet to save a couple bucks on this or that will readily throw a large chunk of money at an extended warranty on cars that for the most part never start having mechanical problems until well into their second 100k miles. It's amazing really.

If for some reason you are one of those weak at math and/or you just can't resist spending money for nothing,or more likely those sharks at the dealers just got to you,at the very least shop around to all the BMW dealers to get the very best price.

IMHO, the decision whether or not to purchase an extended warranty boils down to this

a) how did you acquire your BMW, and b) if you bought it new or CPO, what kind of relationship do you have with your dealer for warranty issues.

If your vehicle is still under warranty, there's no reason to take it to anyone else but the dealer, since the dealer is reimbursed by the factory for warranty work. Granted, warranty work isn't a high priority over PAID work at a dealer, since the dealer has to pay the salary for the technician and pay for the parts, then WAIT to get reimbursed by the factory.

Also, if you're the kind of person who takes their BMW in for every little squeak and strange noise, the customer is likely already building in a bit of an addiction to the relationship with the dealer. Some customers probably drive their dealers crazy with a hypochondriac habit of driving it to their dealer for every single little real or imagined "bug," rather than taking the time to educate themselves about their car. Case in point: I thought my 750 had a nest of bees living in the dash because I heard buzzing every time I turned the key off. It turned out that the E32 with the automatic climate control like the 750iL will automatically return the vent solenoids (there are TEN of them in this car) to a standby position, which was the buzzing I heard.

I've never seen any extended warranty go beyond 100,000 miles from any brand, but by then, the customer has likely already become so addicted to the dealer they may very well pay the $120 or more per hour for dealer service than a) get to know their car and learn to do their own DIY service, or b) learn to price shop independent service centers that are likely just as physically capable of servicing a BMW as the dealer, without the stratospheric rape markup $$.

The BMW's I am currently in love with are no longer produced by BMW and are considered to be ancient, obsolete vehicles that would be a waste of MY money and a waste of the dealer's time. That and I purchase my BMW's used from private sellers or third parties. So I don't have any of the issues I mentioned above.

To each his/her own.

Cheers.

A man after my own heart. I've been telling folks for years that the only reason a Stealer sells these things is because they make money on it. TONS of money!!!

It's so simple it's insane.......If they didn't make money on it....they wouldn't sell it!!!!!