In Wheel Time - Cartalk Radio

A twelve-year-old car can be a trusty friend or a looming money pit—and most of us don’t know which until a big repair lands in our lap. We sat down with RepairSurge CEO Jon Vorisek to unpack a clear, data-driven way to decide whether to fix an aging vehicle or sell it with confidence. Drawing on usage patterns across manuals for 10,000+ models, John breaks down which repairs usually pay for themselves and where to draw the line using a simple 50-75-100 percent framework tied to your car’s value.We walk through real-world scenarios—the “cheap” cabin filter buried behind a dash, DIY oil changes that aren’t worth the disposal hassle, and the stealth costs of design choices that turn a $20 part into a two-hour job. You’ll learn how the buyer’s “uncertainty tax” works when selling a car with issues, why repairing before selling can net more money, and how to compare total cost of ownership per mile if you’re eyeing a used replacement. John also shares the evolution of RepairSurge from a CD-ROM to a cloud platform