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Mike's Foreign Car
Category: Automotive Auto Repair Auto Repair [Edit]
2818 E Miraloma AveAnaheim, CA 92806
(714) 630-7113
- Hours:
Mon-Fri 7 am - 5 pm
21 reviews for Mike's Foreign Car
21 reviews in English
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Review from john l.
Cerritos, CA
7/9/2011
I have a interesting story on how I got to meet Mike and his repair shop.
About three years ago I purchased a VW Syncro Westy. It needed front cv boots so my friend and I decided to repair it ourselves. Well everything was going great but some how we lost one bearing on the Cv. We looked and looked and we couldn't find it. So here we were stuck, my van is helpless on the driveway, mess everywhere, and we can't put the van together because we lost one of the bearing. I frantically go to internet to find some VW specialist and I happend to call Mike's shop for the first time and shared my situation. Mike said just come on down and he'll give me the bearing so I could finish the job. When I went to pick up the bearing he gave me a smile and said no charge. WoW, I couldn't believe the service. I don't know any other shop owner that would've taken his time to be so courteous.
I made up my mind right there I would use his shop if I ever needed future work on my syncro.
Few months later I went back to Mike to have him do the rear Cv's and his price was fair. Since I didn't have anyone to pick me up they did the work while I was waiting.
About one year later I don't know how but the bolts that was holding one of the rear Cv broke. I was dead in the water. I called mike and he said thats under his warranty. Mike repaired the cv for free and I couldn't be happier. He stands behind his work as well. It's been about three years and so far all the work he has done has performed very well.
If you want a honest, friendly, knowledgeable, and reasonably priced Mechanic I highly recommend him. His wife and his son also work at the shop which says al ot about his chracter. -
Review from Peter N.
Westminster, CA
9/21/2011 1 Check-in Here
I brought my 2007 Gti here to see what was wrong with it. The check engine light was on. $90.00 for diagnostic test. A hour later, they told me it was the crankcase breather valve was defaulty. A PART THAT THE DEALERSHIP HAD A RECALL ON AND REPLACES ALREADY WITH A BAD PART!!!!!!!!!!! They replaced that part which took another 40 minutes. The part was $80.00 making the total so far $170.00, plus the extra 40 minutes of labor is $60.00. A grand total for $230.00. Being a first time customer got me 10% off saving me 22 dollars or so.
The place was legit, very knowledgeable staff, answered all my questions. When i was there, everyone there seemed like they were regulars and were treated very nicely. The place isn't cheap, but a lot cheaper than the stealer-ship. -
Review from Jonathan L.
Sparks, NV
6/21/2011
I've never thought of using Yelp to review a mechanic, but I google "Mikes Foreign Auto" and Yelp was one of the top pages.
I brought my 2003 Passat here Jan of 2010. Like others, I decided to come here because of the high ratings. I found out about Mike's from my sister, who had 944 she was going to bring here (but never did). Because of such a low rating, I'll share the details about my experience.
I had 4 issues that I wanted them to take a look at:
1) The Air Conditioner was working intermittently. Whenever the car idled for a few minutes, the vents in the car would make noises as if I had switched the positions, the compressor would kick off, hot air would blow out for about a minute, and then everything would go back to normal. It completed this cycle for as long as the car idled.
2) The steering seemed to be off and didn't feel right
3) The transmission shifted rough
4) The catalytic converter issue that others have mentioned
His findings:
1) The Catalytic Converter issue, per Mike, was due to the software version of the car. VW made the tolerances for the software too tight causing the CEL to come on.
2) The transmission seemed to shift normally, according to Mike.
3) The steering was okay, according to Mike.
4) They couldn't find a problem with the Air Conditioner, but they went through, cleaned out the Orifice and recharged the Air Conditioner.
My Findings:
1) I have yet to follow up on the Catalytic Converter issue. He indicated I would have to go to a dealer to get the software upgrade.
2) The transmission shifting rough and clunking didn't seem like an appropriate answer. I would have liked to have the Transmission Fluid changed (Which is what I told him to begin with, but apparently VW mechanics don't like changing the Transmission Fluid. I will end up doing this myself in a few weeks as my research indicates that this will help a lot, if done right).
3) At the time, I accepted that as an answer. I have steering problems now, but I'm not attributing any of that to my two star rating (The car has 120k+ miles on it now, for me to expect not to have these issues would be crazy).
4) The air conditioner is my biggest gripe. I don't live in Southern California at the present time. I live in Reno/Sparks. When I was driving my car back, I thought the air conditioner didn't feel as cold, but I attributed that to being recently recharged (I have had odd things happen with other car air conditioners after recharging them). However, it never felt right.
One summer afternoon last year, I decided to grab my Recharge kit, hook it up to the car - and low and behold, they didn't even give it a complete charge. This was probably a result of the compressor kicking on and off and giving a false reading (Sign #1 something was wrong). So, I figured out a way to charge the AC (feeding it a small amount of refrigerant, waiting for the compressor to kick off and on, and continuing to feed it more).
As time went on, I finally realized that the electric fan that I remembered hearing run so often wasn't running anymore. I finally did a google search today about the fan, and it turns out that it is the AC Condenser Fan, which will cause these same issues.
Why two stars?
Because they did fix one issue (Leaky valve cover gaskets) after I talked to my sister about oil on my spark plugs. I had an extended warranty which required me to pay a 75.00 deductible.
They were also nice people
But, they didn't fix half of my problems - the big problems I would have liked them to fix. And it was expensive for them to tell me there weren't any problems (Almost to the tune of 300.00 with the deductible).
Why have I waited so long to leave a review, and why didn't I talk to Mike?
I lived in Mission Viejo. I worked in Costa Mesa. Trying to get to drop my car off was not an easy task.
My guess is that this repair facility isn't a bad facility. The only way I can explain this experience is by a bad apple on the tree.
People have obviously had good experiences since I have brought my car there, which is a good sign. But, never the less ... I'm not happy that I'm going to end up fixing these issues myself 18 months later. -
Review from Jennifer P.
Tustin, CA
7/16/2011
I don't know what to make of my experience here, I'm confused by it. I towed my VW bus here because it was stuck in gear and Mike told me he had to yank out the engine and transmission to get it out of gear for $500.
But my friend who is also a mechanic, although not a classic car mechanic, told me that they should be able to get it out of gear by going through the oil hole filter and it was not necessary to remove the engine and transmission to do this.
So I told Mike I would have to think it over and I would call him the next day. What I was really doing was calling other VW shops to see if I could have my bus towed there instead.
So the next morning I called Mike in terrible distress because he was telling me I had to pay $500 to get my bus stuck out of gear and I didn't know if I should just do it or pay the money to get my bus towed out to another shop. But when I called Mike he told me that he was able to get my bus stuck out of gear by going through the oil hole or something or other.
But.....that's exactly what my friend told me so why didn't Mike know that to begin with?? Fortunately for me, I did not have to fork over $500 for nothing. -
Review from Angela C.
Placentia, CA
3/18/2011
I couldn't wait to come home to review Mike's Foreign Car.
I have a convertible VW new beetle and the driver and passenger windows both SUCK. My driver side window will roll down but not up, and my passenger window is supposed to lower a little bit when opened and then roll right back up, but it doesn't - thus giving any car theft easy access to the inside of my car.
I brought it in yesterday after work at around 3:30 - we had been meaning to do this for a few months but since it was very rainy this past Winter I didn't worry about it. However, it's starting to get really sunny and beautiful once again down here in SoCal so I was itching to get my window fixed.
I spoke to Mike who told me it was such a common problem with these windows and that it was the regulator. My husband told me the same thing - the door itself is so heavy that every door slam was causing the window regulator to break more and more. Anyway, Mike said it was no problem - he would order the part and it would be there by 8 the next morning and that he could have it done in a day.
My hubby and I returned this morning and dropped off our car with Josh, who was just as friendly as Mike. We asked him to also give our car an oil change, which was $40 less than what I usually get at EZ Lube! We left my car feeling positive about what was going to be done.
We got a call from Josh a little later, telling us that all 4 of my brakes were shot and that my passenger window also needed a new regulator, because it was about to break. Now, if I heard this from someone else I'd probably be like "Yeah right, he just wants to charge more" but not from Josh. As it is, they were already saving us hundreds of dollars! So now, our $370 quote turned into $1350! It sounded like a lot to me but my hubby said if they were to do this at the VW dealership, we'd be paying around $3500!! We told Josh to go ahead and do what he had to do.
We got a call at around 4:00 saying it was ready and I was so excited. Josh ran down the list and told us what went on. He also told us that the driver side window still needed a little adjusting and that he wanted us to bring it in when we have more time because it takes a very long time but he didn't want us to wait any longer since he knew we needed it right away. Considering that we tacked on an extra 4 or 5 hours of work above what he thought he was gonna have to do that day, I would said that was pretty awesome of him to do as much as he did!!
And the best part?
After Josh had told us that we were going to need about $1350 in repairs from our original $350, he felt badly about forgetting to tell us about another part we needed...a part that costs normally about $250. Any other mechanic would have called and told us about this or may not have even mentioned it at all. Josh? Well, he added it and DIDN'T CHARGE US FOR IT. The only reason he mentioned it is because he didn't want us to see an extra part in there that we didn't know about (well, not me, my hubby - I know nothing about cars!). That was awesome and so amazing and just so representative of the kind of quality and honest work they do. I read on here that they give 10% off for first time customers, but that was giving us like 20% more.
If you have a VW or any other foreign car and want to spend at least a fourth of what you'd pay for repairs at the dealership, please do yourself a favor and visit Mike's Foreign Car. I hope nothing else bad happens to my car, but if it does, I know where to go! -
Review from Crystal C.
Los Angeles, CA
4/22/2011
I have been meaning to take my car (Jetta 2002 2.0)in after finding out that I have a coolant leak. After my engine light came out, I figured I shouldn't avoid it anymore. I dropped it off at 10:30am and Mike told me to come back at 2:30pm since I was hitting lunch time. He was friendly and seemed knowledgeable.
He called me back about 11:20am telling me what's wrong with the car. He told me that the light was about the catalytic converter but I don't need to change it yet. But the bad news -- I need to change my timing belt. Yikes!
All in all, I came in to change my coolant flange and get my light check for around $250. With timing belt, it brings the bill to $750 -- then he also told me changed the air pump mount (which I saw was broken) and got an oil change so total bill came out to be almost $900.
Pros:
- Mike definitely is very knowledge about VW
- I appreciate him showing me the different parts
Cons (the reasons for knocking 1 star off):
- I don't think he is the cheapest mechanic around -- but I think he is fair.
- And I wished he told me that I didn't need an oil change since I haven't even hit 3000k yet after my previous oil change.
- Also, I wished he took the initiative to do a simple fix on my front bumper instead of telling me next time I come in, it will be complementary. (If he took that extra step, he would have been a definite 5 stars.)
All in all, if you have a VW and you need a good mechanic, I think Mike's is great. -
Review from Yvette P.
Santa Ana, CA
2/16/2011
This place came highly recommended. My parents suggested it and once I had my car actually being towed over, another coworker commented that I should have asked him where to take it before I had the car towed - and then he recommended the same place.
Mike was the best. I had a major repair. He explained things to me over the phone, ordered my part while my car was still on the way, and had it done by noon the next day. All for about $400 less than the nasty dealer wanted to charge me.
When I went to pick up the car, the place was clean and very unlike what I expect in a mechanic shop. Not that I want my car to break again, but if it does, I am going back! -
Review from Alex A.
Lake Forest, CA
3/25/2011
Mike is very honest which makes recommending him very easy. After being over-quoted at a VW Dealership for a new CAT that I needed in order to pass the annoying CA emission code, I found great reviews here on Yelp and figured I'd try Mike. One thing that is so amazing is he helps you from start to finish and he answers his phone all the time (probably while even being bent awkwardly under cars) with his nifty phone headset.
The price he quotes me was the price I paid. The time promised, was the time that I received my car.
I only wish he was certified to do CA smog checks. After going back to dealership I was told "I passed with flying colors."
Thanks Mike (Mike's Foreign Car)!
You will not be disappointed, but now that he's more popular he may get too busy for my next car repair. =( -
Review from Sinnary S.
Anaheim, CA
6/25/2010
Found Mike's on Yelp. Seriously, why did I not think of this before.
For me, the only downside is that I have a Mercedes and he doesn't specialize in Mercedes. All of the cars we saw there were VW's so I think that's what he specializes in.
But, I gave him a good rating because he provides the various services that the dealer provides at about $100 less than the dealer's price.
I also have a repair issue and his parts + labor cost totaled less than the part alone w/the dealer. So, I'm pleasantly pleased that I feel I can trust him not to further damage my car to give himself more work (which is what I fear happened w/the dealer) and his pricing's much more reasonable. -
Review from Amie Z.
Buena Park, CA
11/9/2010
PROS: Very helpful and friendly staff. Mike was very honest and sincere. I brought in my 2003 VW Convertible to have a window fixed and get the 40000 mile tune up. He was very honest in pricing. Gave me 20% off because I was a first time customer-trust me, that helped. Very clean place with alot of organization. Will go again.
CONS: none. Except that with a VW beetle you are gonna pay ALOT to get the window fixed, no matter what!
Located right by the freeway. -
Review from Lauren G.
6/8/2010
Found Mike's on Yelp! and I am very glad I did.
My 2003 1.8T Passat GLS had been rearing it's ugly engine light at me for a VERY long time.
Finally after experiencing a very "lumpy" motor and NO acceleration what-so-ever I limped into Mike's.
I was greeted by his lovely wife at the desk and Mike came out from the back to go over checking in my car.
Engine Light Diagnostic was $90 and is guaranteed for 12 months if it ever comes back on. He replaced my ignition coil and helpfully pointed out there was a recall on the part and once I receive my recall letter I can get the cost of the repair and the diagnostic fees refunded by VW.
Just yesterday I took it in for over heating and they replaced the coolant reservoir, thermostat, water pump and timing belt. I didn't have an appointment when I brought it in and I didn't even call (ask forgiveness and not permission). They fixed me up in one business day and I was on my way.
I feel like I can trust this business and the work they do. :) -
Review from Jenny P.
Newport Beach, CA
7/30/2010
After years of being frustrated with my mechanic I decided to turn to my ever so trustworthy Yelp in search of a better company. I took my Volkswagen Jetta to this place today and couldn't be happier.
My appointment was at 8 to get an oil change, fix a coolant leak and work on the breaks. After only 3 hours they called to say my car was ready for pickup! Wow.. great service! ....Everything that I got done was only $350 AND they gave me a new customer 10% discount. I've already recommended this place to like 5 people and will definitely be back! -
Review from Tatsunori T.
Fullerton, CA
3/1/2011
My review of Mike isn't as unbiased as others, however know this. When I speak highly of Mike it isn't out of a sense of obligation.
Being in and around the automotive business ourselves we've come to know good and bad shops. We incidentally own a Japanese auto repair shop on Orangethorpe, just one block north. We've been sending him our customers w/German cars for years and conversely he's been sending us his JPN cars.
What prompted me to write this is my wife's Jetta TDI. A year previous we had a service done at another shop, an ATF flush. Still didn't fix an intermittent reverse problem. Suspicious, this year we went to Mike to have another ATF flush done. I knew full well going in that this may/may not fix the problem, but there's something about Mike that you feel you can trust. Given the complexity of the VW automatic trans, well I didn't expect any miracles. Well the ATF flush was done, and he charged half of what the other shop did. Thanks Mike.
Well it didn't fix the problem. Looks like I'll be replacing the AT someday, but we know that Mike did his best and that's all I need. -
Review from Jo M.
Anaheim, CA
3/17/2011
I used to frequent Mike's when I had the audi... he did a spectacular job and charged a reasonable price. I made the mistake of taking it into a cheaper, but not specialized place which would've been a great deal if they didn't knock the turbo out. You can't take german cars to just anyone. Mike definitely knows his stuff--- he's honest and a fraction of the cost of a dealership. Worth every penny!
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Review from Heidi H.
Whittier, CA
Updated - 2/22/2009
Went back to Mike's recently to have my brakes checked. Dropped my car off early in the morning and it was ready way before I got out of work. Same friendly, efficient service at a great price. I also used a handy dandy coupon that I found online here @ Yelp. They happily honored my coupon giving me 10% off my services. It's good to know that trustworthy car repair shops still exist in these difficult, economic times.
1 Previous Review: Show all »
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1/23/2009 First to Review
I've only been to Mike's twice to have services on my '99 VW New Beetle but both times have been… Read more »
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Review from James H.
Irvine, CA
6/10/2011
These guys are honest, excellent mechanics and a pleasure to deal with. I would give them more than five stars if I could. If you are in the market for a mechanic, look no further, you are not going to find anyone better.
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Review from Lisa J.
Lakewood, CA
4/28/2009
Took my 2005 Touareg here for its 40,000 mile service. Mike and Frank are very friendly and helpful. They went the extra mile and replaced a bulb that had burnt out for no extra charge. I will be back.
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Review from H V.
Rancho Santa Margarita, CA
3/30/2010
Thanks for great Service.
Eurovan at 115,000 with timing chain/sprocket issues.
Estimates were dead on with final outcome.
Very good turnaround time, great updates throughout the repair process.
Looks like we will be able to keep our van for a while with a shop like this around!!!
First timers, Mike offers 10% discount for new customers!!! -
Review from nick w.
Mission Viejo, CA
8/6/2009
Mike and his son are the best. They have gone out of their way for me several times. I cannot recommend them enough!!!!
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Review from Adnan H.
Anaheim, CA
8/9/2011
My 2003 VW Gti 1.8t died on me on a drive back home from San Diego. Found Mike's on Yelp and thought I would give him a shot. From the very beginning I felt confident in their ability and that they were honest hardworking guys. Although we had a ton of trouble getting my car back into drive able condition, (every time I picked it up it would drive for a few days and then die again), Mike and his son Josh were always there to help. After I ran out of free tows from AAA they even paid for my towing back to the shop from Irvine twice! In total I paid around 1500 for a new timing belt and fuel pump which is a great deal considering it went back into their shop at least 4 times after the initial break down and after the first part installation they never charged me another dime even though they replaced the fuel pump at least twice after and threw in some new relay wires. Mike and Josh are not only great mechanics but great people as well. I would highly recommend them to anyone with a VW or other german manufactured car!
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Review from todd g.
Santa Ana, CA
2/19/2009
i have been going to Mikes for 3 years now and have never been unhappy with the servise. top notch repair shop ! thanx guys
