As the title states, what is the cost to CPO an Acura?
The answer with most brands is: don’t. Just buy an extended OEM warranty instead
I would be shocked if Acura were any different.
Honestly don’t care too much for the certification either, but Acura has special apr on CPO’s. 1.49 for 36 months and 1.99 on 48 months. Just leased the (mdx) car because of the extra 2k loyalty incentive. I was doing the math and if I CPO it (1000 Cert fee+ 175 inspection fee) and get the special apr I’ll save about 3k in interest vs the apr they had for new purchases (3.9).
I’m aware the dealer has to make money, so I was just wondering if their fee was fair or not?
I’ll try and give a more complete answer to this, everything in this post is ONLY for Honda/Acura. Other brands will differ.
First, I agree w/Max. You generally don’t want to pay a premium for CPO Honda/Acura
Reason being, the HondaCare/AcuraCare 1st party extended VSC plan has equivalent coverage for longer/cheaper, in most cases.
Generally, the move with Honda/Acura is to buy a non-CPO unit and add the extended vehicle service contract later.
Right before the factory warranty expires is typically the best day to do it.
If I’m reading this correctly, OP’s situation is a little more complicated.
- Lease buyout of OP’s own leased MDX
- Acura running financing special on 1.99% 48-month APR on CPO
- OP has to ask dealer to CPO car and charge their fee in order to qualify for the incentivized financing rate.
- OP is on the right track in asking how much the CPO warranty “costs”, in order to determine if it’s worth adding CPO to his own lease buyout.
I think the thing to do here is instead of focusing on the cost of the CPO, let’s drill into the actual value of the Honda/Acura CPO program.
What warranty coverage do you actually get, and is it valuable for how you plan to own and use this car?
The AcuraCare product is essentially the same type of exclusionary coverage as CPO, except Honda does a weird thing about how they calculate the “years” of the coverage differently for different products.
Note: You MUST buy the HondaCare/AcuraCare while the car is still under manufacturer warranty. 50k and 5 model years for Acura, 3 model years 36k miles for Honda.
Here’s how the Acura CPO warranty works:
2 years or 100,000 total odometer miles (whichever occurs
first) from the date of sale of the Acura Certified Pre-Owned Vehicle if the New Vehicle
Limited Warranty has expired at the time of sale, or provides coverage after expiration
of the original New Vehicle Limited Warranty up to 6 years/100,000 total odometer
miles (whichever occurs first) from original In-Service Date.
But, with the HondaCare/AcuraCare VSC sold separately from CPO, as long as you buy the extended service contract, WHILE THE CAR IS STILL UNDER FACTORY WARRANTY, the YEARS of your VSC starts on the date that you buy the HondaCare/AcuraCare. This is different than the years on the CPO coverage that starts from the in-service date!
For example, here’s a quote from one of the online dealers for a 2020 MDX.
So, if you’ve done a 3-year lease, and get the CPO option, your warranty coverage will still expire at the 5 year mark, when it would have anyway. You are covered until 100k, so if you drive a crapton of miles and plan on selling the car at 5 years/100kmiles anniversary, CPO may add value. If you don’t cross over 50k miles on your odometer before the car’s 5 year birthday, this CPO warranty isn’t doing anything for you, and you’d only be buying it the warranty coverage for the APR savings. Also if you wanted to extend your coverage, you’d still have to do it inside of 5yr/50k.
If you drive less than 10,000 miles/yr, then you can wait until the car’s 5 year birthday and add a coverage option below, and you’ll have factory VSC coverage for 10 whole years!
If you drive more, you’ll want to add that AcuraCare before you cross 50,000 on the odometer.
You can purchase the HondaCare/AcuraCare warranty from any Honda/Acura dealer. There are 2 well-known dealerships that sell the warranty plan online.
I am not affiliated with either of these dealerships:
(West coast) https://www.saccuccihondacare.com
(East coast) https://www.hyannishondacare.com
You can only purchase the CPO wrap warranty from the dealer that sells you the CPO car.
So all of that to say:
- OP’s intuition is correct that if the CPO fee is high, there probably isn’t much value in the CPO coverage, and this option should be considered solely for interest rate savings. Between the CPO and the doc fee, OP is probably better off buying out the car directly from Honda Financial vs involving a dealership.
- If OP plans on keeping the car longer than 5 years, the best time to add warranty coverage will be right before the car’s 5 year anniversary of its in-service date, or 50k on the odometer, whichever comes first.
- OP can add extend for around $2000, but needs to set a calendar reminder to do it right before the car’s factory warranty expires, that will cover the car as long as 10 years and 120k odometer miles, making the total cost of ownership on the buyout pretty attractive.
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Thank you for the break down and yes I agree with what you said about there not being much value in CPO. The doc fee is limited to 85 so it doesn’t add much to the price.
(1000 dealer fee+175+85 Doc Fee=1260)
When you add 2k loyalty from lease and 3k in interest savings - the fees to get CPO’d, the CPO is pretty much free. I guess the only other factor are the DMV fees which I am assuming shouldn’t be much since I just paid them on the lease?