Financing a 2014 Sentra that I bought brand new. Plan on keeping it another 4-5 years. Currently have 40k miles. I will be driving about 12k miles per year from here on out. Nissan said if I want to get another 4 years or 48k miles it would cost 2,400. It would be the same warranty that came with the car.
Do you think this is a smart choice to get the extende warranty? Thank you
Try and negotiate the price down, it is like an insurance policy, Insurance companies are profit run, so like any insurance policy the odds are against you, but if any extra car expenses are going to destroy your budget it might be a consideration. Also be sure it is a mfg warranty vs second party because second party coverage has not gotten great reviews in my experience on this board.
Thank you.
The warranty that came with vehicle when it was new was a 3 year/36,000 mile drive train warranty.
This covers the engine and trans axle.
So, what are the odds that the engine/trans axle are going to fail if properly maintained over the next 4 years?
I’ve worked on vehicles so long that I can tell which vehicles are worth purchasing an extended warranty, and which vehicles where it’s a waste of money.
With your Nissan, I’d skip it.
My 95 Nissan pickup just keeps going!
Tester
Put the $2400 in a savings account. This is your insurance against repairs. If you need any, take the money out to fix the car. At the end of the 4 years, take the $2400 you never spent plus interest and take a nice vacation.
Absolutely perfectly said. Why give the money to some stranger from whom you might get part of it back if you have a problem? Not everything is covered by the warrantees. And then if nothing happens you get NONE of it back? Why not just keep it yourself?
Totally agree!
I had 2 Nissan Altimas to go to 100K before, purchasing used at around 50K miles on them and never spent more than $200-300 total on repairs.
I had 2004 Sentra, which was beaten to the ground, but got it very cheap from a friend at 70K miles and repaired for my daughter to drive to around 95K before she traded it: spent $1500 to buy and $1000 to make it run like new (my labor).
Having car you bought new, if you maintain it well on all recommended things like brake fluid, CVS fluid and good quality oil, you will easily do 100K and have your $2400 saved
Thanks a lot guys. Much appreciated
$2,400 is HUGE money for a warranty. As others have said, if you put that money in a car repair savings account, you’ll likely have most of it still there when you sell. I’ve never bought one, and never missed it.
I have bought them before, mine were 1400 for an extra 40k miles, now a days 1400 is a minimal cost compared to prices I have seen for transmissions etc. Got $500 worth of repairs so I lost money, but at the time the extra $23 per month on the 60 month loan seemed more reasonable than forking out a couple of grand I would not have for a trans or ac failure etc.while still paying off the loan.
Problems that didn’t happen.
“it depends” really
I do not want to start a new crusade, but if one checks reliability ratings on different brands, then Japanese makes become way more appealing when planning to keep car beyond basic warranty 
The warranty costs more than you would pay for just about anything that will happen to your car. Engine or transmission failure is not likely in the next four years. Warranty free is the way to go for low priced cars.I like owning a house. Whwn the refrigerator is noisy, I know who can decide whether to kick or keep. I don’t have to fight with the apartment manager to decide anything.
Suppose you by the warranty and you do need end up needing a new engine or transmission. There is no guarantee the warranty company will pay for the repair. They carefully word the fine print to enable them to weasel out of paying for many repairs.
Not necessarily. We replaced the transmission in our Olds Silhouette at just before the 60/60 extended warranty expired. Olds paid the $3000 for a new transmission. We got the warranty as an inducement to buy and Olds just after GM announced the end of Oldsmobile. These warranties can work in the consumers favor, but not often.
I’m glad you said “likely”. That’s the proper way to explain it, as there are people who come out ahead by buying a warranty, but those people are definitely in the minority.
There is a lot of good advice to be found here, but I just want to add a bit of advice for the OP:
Although a dedicated savings account that you will designate for nothing but car repairs is a better approach, if you feel that you will sleep better with the protection of an extended warranty, then–by all means–you should enroll in one. However, be sure to buy an extended warranty from the vehicle manufacturer, NOT one from the many aftermarket providers.
The aftermarket providers may actually charge less than the vehicle mfr, but the aftermarket guys are notorious for two things:
>Lots of “weasel clauses” that cause them to either totally deny your claim, or to pay–at most–an extremely small percentage of the claim.
>Going out of business after a few years, thus taking all of your money with them, with no recourse on your part. This is actually VERY common.
All of that being said, the price that you were quoted was high, and because a substantial portion of that price consists of dealer markup of the mfr’s warranty price, the price is almost always negotiable with the dealership, potentially saving you hundreds of $$ from the originally-quoted price.
I was one of them!
The only time that I ever got an extended warranty was on my Chevy Citation, which was one of GM’s notorious X-cars. God must have been looking out for my best interests when I somehow decided to opt for that extended warranty, and it paid off BIG TIME, given the poor overall quality of that car.
My decision was probably influenced by my really bad experience with the POS Volvo that I owned prior to the Chevy Citation. Oh, how I wish that I had paid for an extended warranty on that Volvo, but I don’t recall that the mfr even offered one back in '74.