Yeah, all good points - which is why it would have been a good idea for me to come to this site before going to the dealer (that’s one me, for sure). And the reason for the CPO/extended warranty consideration is that we almost got burned on my wife’s two-year-old/used Volvo S60 when we bought it a while back. Dealer offered a 8-yr/100K extended warranty on the vehicle (which only had 20K miles on it) for $2,000 - and due to the various issues with the car, that extended warranty more than covered us within the first year alone.
Then again, our 2019 CX-5 is no 2015 Volvo. We’ve had a few issues with the CX-5 (battery died within first year, some electrical quirks, etc.), but not worth spending another $3,000 to worry about. At this point, we’ll take the $600 CPO, which gives us at least another year of extended factory warranty, and then hopefully sell the car in a year or so once our 2022 Lexus NX 350h is ready (we’re currently wait-listed a year out at the moment - hence why we’re buying the CX-5 for a year of vehicle coverage).
I probably would have kept the CX-5 longer, but I just never could get comfortable with the seats (like I could in my wife’s S60). Otherwise, I liked the vehicle. But my wife wants something fancier anyway, and we’re looking to sell both the CX-5 & her S60 within the next year while the used car prices are so high, and then go down to one, nice, new car. We’ve toyed with the idea of getting an electric SUV, but will probably wait a few more years until the technology & battery range improve a bit (my wife has family that live a long drive away.
So, lesson learned with the lease buyout experience. My wife, again after our Volvo experience, wanted the security of an extended warranty. The $600 CPO option is a suitable enough compromise (happy wife = happy life). At least witnessing the dealer markups with the CPO convinced my wife to pass on the $3,000 extended warranty package.
And lastly, while expensive, I would have been fine enough if the dealer had charged us $189 for the inspection, $189 for both software updates (the transmission one is worth it), and then $70 for the CPO certificate/paperwork. That’s reasonable. It’s the additional $189 for the PCM update that really bugged me - and then wouldn’t even let me update it myself like I’ve done before. Then again, if they hadn’t gone the markup route, we might have dropped $3,000 on the extended warranty, so really they were penny wise/pound foolish.
Oh, and the sales rep told me that by getting the $3,000 extended warranty package, it would basically pay for itself by helping us get a lower interest rate on our used car loan. Yet, none of the banks that I vetted even considered that factor. So, no real “savings” there, either. Again, lesson learned: dealership = stealership in many cases.