Selling an 11 your old car : WWMD

[schindlerpiste]

So I own a 2006 Mercedes-Benz are 350 . It has served me very well over the past 11 years and 126,000 miles . Really the car is still good all things considered . The car has been regularly serviced and well-maintained . Saturday the brake light went on so I scheduled an appointment for it to be serviced . Also it was time to outfit the vehicle with new tires . Today the repair shop called and advised that the car was in need of major repairs to the brakes, rotors, rear struts, pulley, belts and transmission. The cost of repairs and new tires totals about $6300 . My estimate is that the wholesale value of the car is $5500 and retail maybe $8000 . At this point I cannot see spending over $6000 to repair the car . WWMD?

[adrenalated]

Well, I probably wouldn't sell my car to an 11 year old.

[mcski]

11 year olds money no good? What is this, Russia?

[Beaver]

An 11!?! She must be smokin!

[TAFKALVS]

11 years and 126k miles sounds like a new car to me.

$6,000 sounds like an unreasonably high repair bill for the things you listed in my opinion, but I've never owned a Mercedes. Can you post the quote (with personal details blocked as appropriate) so we can see what kind of premium Mercedes parts cost over GM or Toyota? I'm curious if this is preventative maintenance stuff or if the shop is trying to fleece you.

My personal philosophy is: Does the car drive or ride like shit? If no, turn up the radio and ignore the squeaks and rattles. But take care of any preventative maintenance that could cause a major competent to fail. Coolant, Oil, Fluids, Timing belt etc... important. New struts probably aren't needed if the car doesn't ride crappy.

[wooley12]

for 6k + maybe another 2k you get another 150,000 miles.

Did your shop owner have a lot of copies of "Yachting" laying around? Transmission?

[basinbeater]

Sell it to me and ill tune it up and flip it.

[digitaldeath]

350
Ha

[Vt-Freeheel]

Sounds like a Midas or Mineke quote to me.

[schindlerpiste]

Here is the estimate sans new tires. A couple more details: The car rides nicely. I gave it to my son, who drove it his entire senior year in H.S. He is going to college in August, and is not allowed to have a car on campus, so the car would just sit in my garage for a year. I say this because I don't need to keep this car. For what it's worth, I bought the car new, and it has never been serviced by anyone other than a M-B dealership. Then, next August, when he returns to school, he will be taking another old car German workhorse with ~72000 miles on it. That car has sat in my garage all winter.

[SB]

How much does this 11 year old have?

You thinking down payment then weekly shakedown for paper route money?

[4matic]

If you like the car and trust your mechanic I'd fix it. If you get a year or two more clean you are still ahead. Brakes and tires alone are $2k for that car so your maintenance cost is $4k. That's not bad.

Unless you want something else. That's different.

[Dexter Rutecki]

[TAFKALVS]

Holy cow, they charge a lot of money. Why not take it Les Schwab or something and get a second quote. $125 per hour for shop time seems like a lot to me. But mostly I do all my own work on cars so I might not be the best guy to judge shop rates.

[schindlerpiste]

Yes. I was not sure whether $125/hr. labor for a german car was outrageous. I tend not to think so.

[iceman]

Is that quote from a dealership or an independent shop?

[schindlerpiste]

dealership. I always like to service at the dealer. Free like kind loaner. Reputable. I don't get the sense that they have ever tried to get over on me.

[iceman]

well I'm sure they're not robbing you per se, in other words I'm sure the hours are basically right and the parts are what they charge, but you don't need a loaner, you need a couple of ubers or someone to drive you, why not consider the indy route?

[Dexter Rutecki]

You could go to my Africans on 102nd Street. What's the worst that could happen?

Answer: after they use some sealant on the new clutch/transmission that should never be used, you drive around without any transmission fluid for several hundred miles and end up stranded by the side of I-91 in VT in January and have to run through deep snow with two kids for a few hundred yards to get back to the motel, then negotiate with crusty NH mechanics on the phone the next day who "don't want anything to do with that" before getting the car towed to Claremont, NH (which in another thread here was described as the Tennessee of NH).

[schindlerpiste]

That would be an option, if the secondary shop charged $80 instead of $125/hr labor and they were certified, or otherwise excellent and reputable M-B mechanics. However, more often than not, with these guys, they have problems with things like resetting the computer. I'm not looking to save $200 to get an inferior job.

[adrenalated]

Your loaner isn't free, it's rolled into the fucking $125/hr labor rate and dealer markup for $600 POS OEM struts.

Take it to a reputable indy mechanic that specializes in Germans and I bet the cost is 25-50% lower.

And next time don't buy a German car.

[philth]

That car has another 100k on it no prob. Fix it cheaper somewhere else and store it

[SB]

pics or gtfo

[schindlerpiste]

Definitely an option. I like OEM parts. Either I spend the $6k and get it done right, find a reputable M-B mechanic who saves me maybe $1K, or sell the car for $2k and say good bye to a car that has served me well.
As for German cars, I have owned German since 1985. I'm not changing anytime soon.

[iceman]

Schindler you're nutty. Love you man but supporting dealers' service departments on out-of-warranty German vehicles is literally nutty.