Wolfsburg Tech

Hey, it's Rick with Wolfsburg Tech here to give a talk about whether to fix an old car or whether to buy a new car or a new used car. I have found that a lot of people are making their decisions about cars out of fear. A lot of times the fear is generated by people going to some place Now NADA stands for National Auto Dealers Association. They don't work for you. They work for the dealer situation so the dealer can tell you, oh, your car is not worth much with the mileage and the year of your car, even though you've taken very good care of it and even though there'seemingly unlimited amount of miles left in your car, we can only pay you t So they basically steal your car from you on trade in. So the NADA is the national auto dealer's way of quantifying that in a published way that makes you feel Unfortunately the insurance companies use the NADA values total your car out early and at a very low amount, even though there's plenty of wear and use left in your car. And it just devalues cars that are on the road. So Ignore the NADA value on these cars because I know that most of the ve You may have to get some engine work done if you experience these t So to give people a way to decide whether to work on a ve The average car payments in the United States is $450. So an average sized car, maybe $25,000, $30,000, you should be able to get financed out for eight years at $450. If you go buy a decent used car for, I don't know, $10,000 and you finance for two or three years, still the car payment is going to be somewhere around $450. Just the average car payment. If you get a crew cab diesel truck, you can end up with an $800 a month or $900 a month payment, but we're talking about Volkswagen's and small Audi's here. So if you have to spend $1,500 in a year in maintaining a car, especially one that hasn't been looked after in the past, you can say, all right, $1,400. Roughly three and a half car payments. I've only spent three and a half car payments on keeping t So that's a win-win. If you got a new used car or a brand new car, you'd have 12 car payments. Plus if you had a note on the car, you've got full coverage insurance to worry about. So it just keeps on giving that gift of the new car. If you have a new car fever, there's not You'll have to go buy a new car. And then five years later, you're in the same boat. Really the last t You don't want to have to make repairs out of pocket, and you don't want to have a payment on top of that. Because if you're making repairs out of pocket, you're taking the money that you're supposed to make your car payments with, and you're making repairs with that so you're double dipping. Plus you still have full coverage insurance, still have Advalor So my father, who trained me how to work on Volkswagen's, told me one time, if it was cheaper to own a new car, all broke people would have a new car. So to take the stress out of driving an older car, first of all, find a good shop that can support you. An honest shop that works on your brand of car, whether it be a Chevrolet, Toyota, Dodge, you want to make sure you're taking it to a specialist shop so you can get dealer- You want to make sure they have a good stock of parts for that particular brand of car, because if you don't have a good stock of parts, you can end up with a bunch of big box parts on your cars, And God only knows where those parts are coming from. Some of them could be C You can bet there about the cheapest parts you can get your hands on if you're getting house brand house parts. So what I tell people is find a good shop to support your ve And at the beginning of the year, when you submit your tax returns and you get a refund, make all or some of that money, the equivalent of two to four car payments, depending on the condition of your car, put it in the bank in its own account, not to be mingled with your personal household money. Why would you need to do t Well, when you drive a car, you wear certain parts out. You don't wear the whole car out, you just wear certain parts out. And some of those parts can be buried under 100 other parts that can be removed in order to get to those parts. For instance, an engine overhaul. There's not that many parts in an engine overhaul. Just a few bearings and seals and a couple of incidentals and that. But you've got to take half the car apart to get to it. That's where the real money comes in, the labor. So you take the equivalent of two to four car payments, you set them aside. T Whether you spend your money with me or the other specialist shop, the money belongs to the car. If you're going to drive the car, it's going to cost some money. If you don't drive the car, it'still going to cost some money. Because of somet A lot rot is when you park the car for six months, you come back and you've got a dry rot crack on your tire, your fuel p So it's not really a good idea to set a car in the weather or with ethanol in the fuel tank, which most of the p You want to, if you're going to store a car, I'll have another video on how to do that. But so whether you drive a car or whether you don't drive a car, it's going to cost some money. So put the money in the bank when you need something Or if you need a down payment on another used car, or if somet So it belongs to the car, doesn't belong to me, doesn't belong to you. That's the way to do it without any stress. Just put the money in the bank, Christmas club style account, and then just have it available. No stress. You don't have to call your parents, You just pick up the phone and say, hey, my car is broke. We come get it. We find out what's broke on it. We give you the estimate. You say, well, the money is there. Let's go ahead and do it. And then we get it done. No drama, no mess, car runs So knowing that your car has a certain amount of wear in it, and knowing that you're never going to get the money back out of your car that you put in it, unless you get it out in wear and use, then you don't have to worry about what the NADA says your value on the car is. If you're one of those people that wants to use your car for currency, you're always going to be stressed out and you'll be making all of your decisions and fear. For instance, if you had a car that you could go out and buy for $2,500, you went out and bought it for, say, $1,500, but the car needed a transmission or it needed all the brakes replaced or something And then you ended up in the car at $4,500, but you're only able to sell it for $35, then you're just going to be stressed out if that's the only figure you're looking at. Well, just consider that $3,500 car, $2,500 car that you buy on Craigslist or go down to the auto shop and buy it, it's not going to have new brakes on it. It's not going to have all kinds of maintenance done on it. People typically won't do the maintenance on a car when they know they're going to sell it or trade it in. So those values are not the same as if you had taken a car and done all the work that's necessary to fix it and then taken care of the car. A well-kept car, one that'set up for getting a lot of miles on it, is completely different than a car that's just a used car. Me and my wife have been in the Volkswagen business for about 25, 30 years. Most of the ve To us, that's a broken-in ve We usually start by replacing the shocks and the struts, doing a time-and-belt service on the car so we're not surprised by a bunch of bent valves and expensive engine work. And then we go town with cleaning the car out, oil changes, putting tires on, alignment, all the t By the time we're done with the car, after we've had a car about a year or so in our spare time, we've usually restored the ve And then either we get bored with it or somebody comes and offers us a lot of money for the car and that's the way it goes. But we have a lot of experience with You're not looking at a lot of drama. On Volkswagen's and Audi's You might have door handles breaking on some of the early, early cars. Usually your mechanics are supposed to lubricate the door handles at oil change time or every other oil change and your door hinges so they don't squeal and squeak and things Just little t If you don't have somebody who knows that car or looking after the car, you're going to end up with a lot of little drama stuff And the car will feel worn out when it's really not. And it's only a couple parts that are worn out.