Most of us love our cars, and with good reason. It gets us where we want to go and it is, in reality, our means of freedom. That doesn’t mean that wasting money on it is a necessity.
There are a few ways that you can save money on your car and still give it the best of care. Some of the ways that we spend more than we need to on our vehicles and can save a few dollars here and there on the cost of our cars operations are listed below.
Buy lower rated gasoline. The less expensive gasoline doesn’t give your car any better of a ride, and in fact merely costs you a lot more. The octane that you buy counts only if your car begins to knock without it.
Unless you have an incredibly high performance car, you don’t’ need that extra super special incredible oil that they are trying to put in for you. Don’t let your mechanic talk you into anything but a high quality motor oil.
Using a dealership mechanic for your cars servicing is a waste of money in most cases. Some dealers will even tell you that if you don’t it violates the warranty of the car. That’s an out and out lie that dealers get away with all the time. Your dealership may cost you as much as double the normal pricing for the same work. Getting a good deal and a good mechanic doesn’t mean that you have to use the dealership to service your car. Concentrate on service and price rather than name.
Your car’s manufacturer will recommend that you change your oil about every 5000 or 7000 miles, while the oil change guys will tell you 3000. Well of course they do. If you stick to that service recommendation rather than the one that your car’s manufacturer gave you you’ve just paid two times what you had to for an oil change.
Saving money also means not taking bad advice. If your car has minimal problems, has no timing issues or fan issues, then changing the belt is probably not necessary, but some mechanics will ask you to have it changed to “prevent” a problem. The same holds true for tires. If your tires still have tread enough to ride well, have no bald patches or bare spots, then chances are that you don’t need to spend the cash for those all season radials that the dealer is trying to sell you.
Get yourself out and wash your car by hand. Using a ten dollar car wash to spray off your car and buff it using those huge brushes sometimes removes a mirror, can scratch your car endlessly and may damage other parts of it. Nothing says you love your car more than washing it off by hand and giving it a good dry job.
Tags: car maintenance, car oil changes, keeping maintenance costs low, saving money on your car