Total car parts and labor charge: $442.74!!! Reluctantly, I said yes and went to find my fianc? who came to pick me up. When I told her the story, she quickly told me that I could just find an auto repair shop to replace the parts for half the price! I ran back in and asked the service people to stop what they were doing (luckily they were slow and didn?? even start anything yet). We called a repair shop that?? close by and had done some repair work for my girlfriend. After speaking to them, they told me the prices will be: Total car parts and labor charge: $200 tax included! To add to the savings, he said $180 including tax was okay when I asked him since I?? doing all three at the same time. So after some time, the repair shop told me that I didn?? really need to change the transmission fluid. He mentioned that since my car is manual transmission, I do not need to change the fluid until maybe 90,000 ??100,000 miles. Hmm. Standard dealership scam, another $40 saved. So I ended up paying $140, which means I saved $302.74 today just because my girlfriend stopped me from overpaying the car dealership! For those that still get scammed by car dealerships, I suggest getting the inspection checked, and then asking the repair shops to do the actual replacement. You can probably save more money by asking oil change specialty shops (like Jiffy Lube) to do the inspection and then going to the repair shops to do the actual replacement. The ultimate money saving approach is obviously doing everything yourself but it is only for those that know exactly what they are doing. For the others (like me), stick with a hybrid approach. I’m quite happy of what I accomplished today. Hopefully this will benefit you too.
Today was 50,000 mile car maintenance day. I?? one of those people that don?? try to pretend I know everything about cars, so I go to the car dealership for maintenance etc. So at 9:00am today, I get to the dealership and do the usual (give them keys, sit and wait forever). After an hour or so, they give me a call explaining to me that there are a few things I need to change/replace. For those that are familiar, you probably know how expensive this can get but here?? the list I was told that needed fixed right away:
Alternate choice to save money
Car dealership scam
How much I saved today
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Good job! As a mom of two, saving money tips are always appreciated.
If you don’t mind could you take a peek at my first article and maybe comment on it? Good or bad, love to hear from you.
Thanks-
~Laurie
I thought this was pretty much common knowledge. Of course with all the computer chips in cars today, there are some things only the dealership has the equipment and know how to repair.
I guess I’m one of those that “sort of” know this too but never actually done it since I’m lazy. I hope that if readers read these types of articles more, they will actually do these things which will help them save money!
Doing the maintenance yourself will save you much more money. Get a Haynes or Chilton manual for your car. They will give you step by step instructions on how to do replace/repair everything in your car.
If you want to save more on maintenance you should replace your air filter with a stock cotton replacement and you never have to buy another paper filter.
Great tip! We are always thinking of how to save money and specific suggestions like the one you mentioned is great!
I have always thought of buying a Haynes manual but as my car is getting older and older I have less of an incline to worry about my car (even though the benefit is actually more when the car is older)
Check out this article: 12 Steps to better fuel economy. There are a lot of great tips here for saving money in fuel economy.