Here’s why auto repairs are so expensive right now Zainal Abidin, 14/11/2025 SAN ANTONIO – If you’ve had to take your car in for repairs lately, you’ve likely had to dole out more money than usual.Car repairs are not a luxury; they’re a necessity, which is why spiking auto shop prices are hitting customers hard.“The cost of doing business and the costs of parts and the cost of labor, it’s all increasing in today’s market,” said Miracle Body and Paint CEO Manuel Rubio.Rubio first pointed out the general vehicle inventory issue that has been a problem for a while.“You can go back to inventory of January 2020. There were 4 million cars in America available for sale. Today, there’s 1.9 million. That’s half,” he said. “Vehicles in general, have increased in the past four years, from 2020 to today, 20%. So what was running $35,000 back in 2020 is now costing $44,000 or $45,000.”Rubio says supply chain issues lingering from the pandemic and current inflation have forced a spike in the price of parts, up an average of 15%.“Parts have also increased anywhere from 10 to 20%. Headlamps are going up, tail lamps are going up, sheet metal is going up, doors and hoods. Really in… Continue Reading
Question 4 pits automakers against local car repair shops Zainal Abidin, 19/09/2024 The way Dan Brooks sees it, small auto repair shops in Maine will struggle to fix new cars in the future — particularly as the push toward electric vehicles accelerates.That’s why he’s supporting Question 4 on the Nov. 7 ballot, the so-called “right to repair” initiative that would require vehicle manufacturers to standardize diagnostic systems and share that information with repair shops.The idea is to ensure that vehicles can be fixed outside of dealerships if a consumer wants to make that choice.“If you buy a car, you shouldn’t be restricted on where you get your car fixed,” said Brooks, owner of Capitol Car Care in Augusta.But a group representing most vehicle manufacturers says small repair shops already have the information they need to make repairs. They think the groups behind Question 4 are after customer data because they want to market directly to consumers — even going as far as advertising on the screen inside your car.“We’ve said from the beginning the information they are talking about is not necessary to complete a repair,” said Wayne Weikel, vice president of state affairs for the Alliance for Automotive Innovation.Voters in November will be left to… Continue Reading