I just bought my 7th Toyota, and my 3rd Camry. What's different this time around is I bought this vehicle used - all my other purchases were new. Let me tell you what I bought, and a couple of questions:
The vehicle is a 2010 Camry LE with 4-cyl engine and only 10,600 miles. Paid only $16,300. The vehicle looks and drives as new. It appears to have been garage kept, traded in by a local owner. Carfax and car check reports came back clean. The vehicle was placed in service on 8/15/2009, even though it is a 2010 model - so it must have been one of the first 2010 Camrys out. My questions are:
1) Can I purchase the same Toyota Platinum warranty offered by Toyota Motor Credit that is sold for new vehicles? As I understand it, if you buy a NEW Toyota (as the first owner) you can buy an extended warranty from Toyota as long as you buy it within 3 years and 36K miles from the date it was initially placed in service. I'm almost one month away from that date, but I am NOT the original owner - one other person owned it before I did. Can I purchase the same Toyota Platinum warranty, or do they sell different warranties for used vehicles? The dealer wanted a ridiculous price (1895) for a 6-year 100K mile warranty, and it wasn't even a Toyota warranty.
2) The car has the 2AR-FE 4-cylinder engine. Timing belt or chain? It's been awhile since I bought a Camry, so I have no idea what they are using on the Camry 4-cylinder engine these days.
3) There is an official-looking decal on the underside of the hood. It says Authorized Modifications: The following Toyota Authorized modification has been made: AOA/90L. A dealer code of USO55 followed by a date of 5/1/10 is shown. I presume this was in response to a recall or service campaign of some kind. I did see an Alldata list of service bulletins for that year Camry, but none of the numbers appear similar to this one. Does this ring any bells with anyone? I am very curious exactly what was done.
1. Contact Toyota about that, I'm not exactly sure on that.
2. Timing chain. Toyota has no recommended interval for it, so don't even bother worrying about it.
3. AOA/90L is the accelerator pedal and floor mat recall. Sticky accelerator pedal fix, shaving the accelerator pedal to shorten it and some sort of software update that stops acceleration (if the pedal is stuck or held down) when you brake if I recall. Floor mat recall was mainly for the optional all-weather floor mats that could slide forward and trap the accelerator pedal.
Excellent! Thanks for the quick response. The answers you gave for #2 and #3 were exactly what I was hoping for. I plan to make some calls tomorrow to inquire on extended warranty possibilities...
I just purchased a 2005 with 53K from a Lexus dealer in May and they offered me a warranty for 4 years or until the car reached 100K. It was through Toyota but was a little pricey, I purchased one from my Credit Union for slightly less than half the price.
Yes, purchased from a Toyota dealer this evening. It is a certified pre-owned, which comes with a 7-year 100K Powertrain warranty, but I want everything covered. If I can buy a genuine Toyota warranty for a reasonable price, I am going to obtain one...I will be making some calls tomorrow, and will re-post here when I find out the results.
FYI, for those who are interested, I have the answer regarding the extended warranty:
You CAN buy the same Toyota factory extended warranty that you could buy as if the vehicle is new, EVEN IF you are NOT the original owner. The only catch is that you MUST be within the 3 year, 36,000 mile mark of when the vehicle was placed into service by its first owner.
So: This is great news for me. Although I just bought the car as a certified used vehicle as its second owner yesterday, the fact that I am still within the 3-year 36k mile mark (although just barely) means I can still buy the same warranty. I am getting the 8-year, 100k warranty. However, the other catch is that the clock starts on the warranty from the date the car was originally placed into service by its first owner. So, since the vehicle was placed into service in August, 2009, I will have only about 5 years remaining on the 8 year warranty. For me, it's worth it.
I work at a dealership. Believe me we will sell you a warranty, bumper to bumper or powertrain, almost anytime under 100k miles.
The Toyota brand warranty is good. They decide what will be covered. We have run into problems when we think a problem should be covered and they won't cover it. It's out of our control. We started using our own warranty at my dealership. Now we control what our good loyal customers have coverage on not Toyota.
The cost to the dealership is typically between $550 and $1,000 (powertrain.) Then we'll mark it up whatever we can. Remember if you wanted to warranty on a Dodge, for example, the cost of the warranty would be much higher than a Toyota. The reasons are obvious.
A side note - Interesting, but consistent reaction from the selling dealer for my past two vehicle purchases.
Before the current purchase, I bought a brand new 2011 Tundra. The dealer tried to push their own warranty (Third Party) for a very high amount - I believe it was over $2000. I told them no way - that I could get a Toyota factory warranty for a little over half that amount. They insisted this was not possible, that the amount I told them was less than their cost. They did not seem to be aware that you can purchase the warranty from another dealer.
I got an almost identical reaction when I bought this used Camry - they tried to sell me a third party warranty for about $1900, and when I declined it and explained I could get a factory warranty the same length for half that amount, they seemed very skeptical that it was even possible.
Either the dealers are completely oblivious to the fact that you can buy a warranty this way, or they are deliberately disclaiming all knowledge that this is even possible. I have no idea why they would do this, because in both cases, I made it clear that there was no way I was going to get the warranty from them at that point.
I guess like everything...do your homework. The folks in the business office don't go looking for other warranty products. They just sell what they got. Yes you can buy a warranty from the manufacture or distributor (SET) until your warranty expires. You don't have to buy it now.
We are a small town dealership and perhaps do things differently. I have been at the dealerships sell more aggressively. Just love the 4 square!
I bought my Camry and deal with a 'small town' dealer in NC. Wonder if you are at the same one. Without naming the town, in TV ads mine has the owner saying "Just Get Here".
I guess what puzzles me is the ability for a consumer to be able to purchase a warranty from any dealer undercuts the ability of the original dealer to sell their warranty products. If I were the dealer selling the vehicle, I would be complaining to Toyota about this - it directly impacts my ability to sell the warranties I offer.
On the other hand, I know Honda has this same situation - so perhaps there is some consumer law that makes this possible.
As a buyer of vehicles, I am not complaining, this saves me lots of money and gives me the ability to get the exact warranty I want. But from the car selling dealer's perspective, this situation stinks.
The manufactures want you to sell just in your assigned area. But we are all capitalists. Honda will not let a dealer advertise a price. You'll only see Honda dealers use a national advertised price or MSRP in ads. Is this restrict of trade? I don't know. The manufactures will hold back on vehicles if you don't do what they want.
Remember these are all franchises like McDonalds.
The manufactures want you to sell just in your assigned area. But we are all capitalists. Honda will not let a dealer advertise a price. You'll only see Honda dealers use a national advertised price or MSRP in ads. Is this restrict of trade? I don't know. The manufactures will hold back on vehicles if you don't do what they want.
Remember these are all franchises like McDonalds.
That's really interesting, I never knew that about Honda. I work for Toyota up here and we are constantly putting out radio ad's with low ball prices, we are all just choking the life out of eachother!
I agree! You should contact Toyota about that matter, or you can also talk to your dealer. I have no problem with my new Toyota. I got it from Sandy Springs Toyota dealer, which I found through the best search site. When I started trying to find a cheap Toyota dealership, the site helped me out. I came across the best car dealership in my area. Not only did I get the best price on my new vehicle, but I got some additional stuff too. Within Toyota Atlanta GA Dealership you're going to get the top car or truck buying experience possible.
Just an FYI....
When I got my 05 (w. 95,000 miles) last month, the credit union offered me a 48month/4 year $0 deductable service contract for $2,000....I declined....
… In the old days (1949 to 1996) I bought 6 to 8 year old cars and trucks because I could work on them and keep them running while saving a ton of money. Now days I buy new cars and trucks because I can only do the maintenance. I only buy vehicles recommended Consumers Report and fore go the warrantees.
… Non factory warrantees are vulnerable to being sold to third party companies that can quickly go bankrupt and leave you holding an expensive empty bag. This happened in the D-FW area 10 or 15 years ago ripping off thousands of car owners. The management of the warranting factories or companies can get choosy about the repairs they pay for in order to keep up their profit ratio.
… I’ve never had a repair bill (knocks on wood) on my 14 year old Nissan 4x4 pick up or our 4 year old 4 cylinder Camry.
BTW... We got 29.4 mpg on our last trip with the A/C on...
Good luck and have a good one.. Don S..
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