Volvo Owners

[jipsy]

I am in the process of purchasing a car and I am strongly considering a volvo. It's a 2002 S40.

For those of you who own Volvos, tell me the good and the bad. The main thing I am hearing is that repair costs are atrocious.

What about yours?

 

[cynsaun]

I have an XC90, and I love it. I have had it for a year and a half, and have had no troubles with it whatsoever. We have only ever had to do the oil change on it, nothing more so far.

My only issue is that my daughter spilled RED juice on the tan carpet!

 

[Lynn CC]

I got an S70 in 2001 and have since given it to my son to drive when he got his license. It's safe and we love it! If you take it in for service to a Volvo dealer they will take good care of it for you. We haven't had any problems and I have almost 90k mi on it. I'm going to drive it once again while DS is away at school!!!!

 

[coach4448]

I've got a 2005 S60 and love it. No problems at all with it.
Volvo service is also very good, at least here.
I also looked at the S40 and thought it was a very nice car. I wanted something a bit bigger and the S60 seemed to fit the bill.
I have friends who have had Volvo's for years and have been very happy with them.

 

[Aimeedyan]

I have a 2001 S40. It's been my favorite car so far =)

I have had some issues, most of which have been routine maintenance OR been things that can go wrong on any car, so I don't want to scare you too much:

- cruise control has NEVER worked right, under warranty, but they've never gotten it fixed all the way. It works when it wants to.
- AC hose got a hole in it and the AC stopped cooling. My uncle is a mechanic who works on luxury imports so I just had to buy the hose and his dinner =) Hose was about $80 straight from Volvo parts. If I didn't have that connection, it would have been much more expensive
- AC sensor is funky here recently. It doesn't seem to sense the temp right anymore and will often turn itself on and off at will. I fixed that by just using the manual AC controls when it starts to flip on and off instead of using the sensor

Of course the usual tires, brake pads, headlights, etc that needed replaced

Also, the car takes a special oil filter that you won't find at discount oil change places. Plus, places that do have it will charge you extra for the filter. You can get around that by buying a bunch at AutoZone and bringing one with you, and they usually give you a $2 discount on the change. I run synethetic through, did a bunch of research at the time I bought teh car and my uncle recommended it because of the turbo engine. It's been great with that - its about $50 a change but I go 10k instead of 3k so it all works out evenly.

The battery is also much more expensive than a regular car, I had to replace that last month - it was $100, a special international Die Hard was the only one that fit the car. So yes parts are more expensive. Normal hoses are much cheaper, filters are cheaper, batteries are cheaper, etc. Things under the hood are put together strangely, so it makes it hard for someone at home to fix it. Like replacing one of the headlights involves removing the battery!

Would I buy another one? I LOVE my car, but our family usually drives only Honda/Acura (I had 3 before this Volvo) and I've never even had a hose go bad or anything. Plus when small things did go wrong, it was inexpensive to fix. So we'll likely look at another Honda/Acura next time just for that =)

Good luck!

 

[suzannen]

I don't own a Volvo, but my sister and BIL in Vermont owned a 2004 Volvo XC70 station wagon. Last fall, my BIL was in a horrible accident when a 1,000 lb moose literally crashed into his car. The car was completely totaled and the moose was killed, but my BIL walked away with only a few deep cuts and a concussion. Both the policeman on the scene and his doctor told him had he been in any other car, he would not have made it.

Needless to say, our next car will be a Volvo!

 

[NCRedding]

I've driven a Volvo since 1990. My first car was the basis box: 240--I loved it. It served us well for 12 years and 130,000 miles, until we sold it to friends for their 16 year old to drive. That was 3 years ago, and I still see it driving around town. The problems with that car: the AC was pitiful; my brakes needed rotors fairly often, a computer chip went out, while still under warranty; it was tough on tires, and expensive to do body work on. But, I had 8 years without a car payment with it, and never spent more than about $1000 to maintain and repair it each year.

I then got a 1997 S90--very nice. The Consumer Guide said it was a used car model to avoid--I had one small problem with the AC, and still had brake issues (maybe it is the way I use them)

My newest is a 2005 XC90--bought it in April--no problems.

DH drives a 2002 S60, and has only had to do routine maintenance.

They can be expensive to maintain, but the repair costs are lessened with the maintenance. None of my Volvos ever stopped running on me. The battery died one time in my garage. I love them

 

[LoriKay]

My DH drives a 2002 S40 and loves it. We've had no problems at all with the car.

 

[jipsy]

thanks everyone!