There are several types of warranties you can purchase when you buy a vehicle,depending on if it is a new or used vehicle and if used,the mileage on vehicle at time of purchase.

If you purchase a vehicle with some factory warranty left on it you can buy an extended factory warranty that will take over when the new car warranty expires.

The extended warranty will cover most of the things the orginal warranty did except for maintenance items such as belts,hoses,light bulbs etc.

The extended warranties will have different levels depending on what you want covered and what deductible you want.

The factory extended warranty is probably the best you can purchase on a newer vehicle,but always compare before you purchase and make sure you get the most for your money.Here at the Carfacts Warranty page I will try to show you what to look for before you buy.

The aftermarket warranty is the most popular warranty and most times will cost less than a factory extended warranty, but one thing you must do is read the contract and make sure you understand it fully before you buy so you don't get a shock when you have a failure and its not covered.

There are hundreds of aftermarket warranties on the market some are very good and some are not worth the paper they are written on and just because a dealer sells it dosn't make it a good policy as there is a heavy markup for the dealer to sell these warranties. Sometimes a dealer will loose money on a vehicle sale and then sell you an aftermarket warranty to make a profit on the total sale.

I will touch bases on a few of the things to look for in an aftermarket warranty. Like I said before there are many different types of warranties and the aftermaket warranties vary from policy to policy and company to company.

There may be a free,or low cost, 30-60-or 90 day warranty that the dealer will offer you on certain vehicles and then offer an up grade to a better warranty. Usually these 30-60-90 day warranties cover very little and if you have to pay for them they are of little value and you should get a 12-24-36 month policy.

If you plan on keeping your vehicle or have it financed you should definitely go for the length of finace if possible as there is nothing worse than paying for a vehicle and then have a $2000.00 failure.

Your less expensive warranty will be on a driveline failure only, and this can get sticky if you buy one of these and have a failure for a couple of thousand dollars and then find its not covered.

This is where you read the policy, have it fully explained or get someone that knows warranties to go with you and check it over before buying.

If you can't do any of the above I will be putting up a check sheet on my web site (

You may buy a driveline policy that dosn't cover gaskets and seals, then have a cylinder head gasket fail, overheat the engine and dump antifeeze in your oil and damage the rod/main and cam bearings and other internal parts to the extent of needing an engine replacement. Then you find out none of it is covered due to the "MAIN" failure being a gasket failure with sub damage to the engine.

Another thing to look out for is a pre-existing clause. Pre-existing is where there is a problem with the vehicle that is not visable or noticeable at time of purchase.

Since you don't know how the vehicle has been maintained before you bought it there may be a serious problem lurking and then raises its ugly head after you have had the vehicle a short time. You may be stuck with a major repair due to the failure being considered "PRE-EXISTING".

Make sure the vehicle has been inspected and has a signed inspection sheet that states all items that had been checked and has no problems, then have the dealer waive any pre-existing problems that may arise or make sure your policy states that any "unknown" pre-existing problems will be covered.

About The Author

Jack Cooper

Occupation: Auto Appraiser/Inspector

Website: www.jtcbiz.com

Biography: I have over 40 years experience in the Automotive field, from ASE Master Tech to owner of my own repair shop and have been doing Automotive Appraisals and extended warranty/pre-purchase inspections for the past 12 years.

I have been working on building and just about anything connected with cars all my life. I have been a Drag Racer (early years) drove stock cars (asphalt and dirt) built Hot Rods and restored classic cars, so have been around just about any type of vehicle you can imagine.

My hobby is NASCAR and building web-sites. My current web-site www.jtcbiz.com is a site I started several years ago as an information site for Cars and expanded into trucks, 4X4's, ATV's, Motorcycles and NASCAR. The site started out to be a business site, hence the jtcbiz name, but turned into a site on vehicles so don't be alarmed with site name as it had a lot of exposure so I left the name.

I am just getting into writing columns and also a couple of books coming out so check me and my site out at www.jtcbiz.com and email me any comments or suggestions you may have for articles or site improvement or something you would like to see on the site at jack@jtcbiz.com.

Thanks

Jack Cooper