Arvada German Garage

I’ve been taking my e93 M3 to these guys for the last couple years. Mike (owner and technician) is a rare find these days — quality work and sometimes perhaps even more important — he understands the value of building trust with his customers through honest and direct feedback. Jared is amazing at customer service. Keep up the good work, guys!

Horrible experience. Will never give this place our business again and would advise others to steer clear of it as well. Long story short… they mis-​diagnosed the problem with our Xterra, charged us $ 500 to replace the shocks. Next day we noticed the same sound that we brought the car in for originally. Had to wait another week to get the car back in. Communication was horrible. After 2 days had to call THEM to see what the problem was. Was told the ball-​joint needed to be replaced… cost $ 350. Kept the car for another week (total time without car 2 weeks now). Called today to say oops, in fact we need a different part that will now cost $ 750! My husband said to forget it, just put the car back together and we’ll take it somewhere else for another estimate. Was told it would cost us over $ 200 to put the car back together in the state that we took it to them in the first place!!! So disgusted. No effort by Mike or Jarred to right their wrongs (was told we were getting a heck of a bargain to only be charged $ 200 for all the labor and diagnostics that they’d done). Then Mike had the nerve to compare diagnosing our car’s problem to finding out you have cancer?!? Something to the tune of «you don’t know what you’re going to find until you operate and see what’s inside.» Hmmm… I am a recent colon cancer survivor, so needless to say this reference was quite offensive and completely insensitive. Bottom line: they are short-​handed, they don’t know what they’re doing, and they have terrible customer service.

The guys at this garage are very experienced and treat their customers right. Jared the front desk guy is always in a great mood and always helpful. I trust any of the technicians with my VW Tiguan.

I wanted to love Arvada German Garage. Jared, customer service, is amazing and responsive. He even went as far as picking me up when I could not get a ride to the garage. However, after my 1^st appointment (where the car had a simple coolant leak), the garage recommended upgrades that I agreed to have done. They damaged the axle in my car causing a massive oil leak. I called them and Mike, the owner, took responsibility. I came in immediately only to learn that they ordered the wrong part. I came in a few days later and they repaired the axle… or so I thought. They installed it incorrectly and a few days later, I had transmission fluid ALL over my garage. I called and left messages at the garage and no one responded. Out of desperation, I had my car towed to Mini of Loveland. Mike promised that he would «do right» by going up to the dealership to look at the car, in addition to calling them. He said I would not pay a thing.
Weeks later, after my car was repaired correctly by Mini of Loveland, Mike called only to rant about about the dealership work and costs (really? they fixed his garage’s mistake!). He said we could discuss a fair price (I wasn’t expecting him to pay the whole thing) and avoided my calls soon thereafter. He sent a check for ¹⁄₆ the price and suddenly became unavailable.
I commute a lot (100+ miles a day) and I own 2 German cars — a mini and a MB. Do NOT take your car here. What started with a simple coolant leak ended up costing 3 separate visits to Arvada German Garage, a tow to Mini of Loveland, and over $ 3500 in repairs many of which THEY caused. They promise lower prices (which in fairness, they do offer) but their work is questionable. Find another garage!

I’ve taken my car there on three separate occasions and each time he missed the promise time to have it ready anywhere from three to six days. I kept calling on the six day late repair and heard nothing but whining about his help or he had more expensive cars to get to first to pay the bills. That was the final insult. I’ll never go there again, he does need to tweek his people skills. If you can’t have it done when you say it will be done… then look to get into another business where you don’t have deadlines. There will not be a fourth chance for this business. Dependability is lacking here.
J A.

The whole car thing totally stresses me out, like whoa. I don’t know about cars so when I get a diagnosis on mine I can’t decipher if I «need» it or if the mechanic «wants» it to be done. With Mike I am stress free. He is honest and, though, I don’t know him personally I am confident in his work and totally trust him. Big plus in my book, he gave me his cell phone number and actually answers it. Bring your car to Mike, Arvada is not that far.

I have had mixed experiences here — in the four times I have brought my Volkswagen here, the work has been completed on schedule only once. One of those times it was over three days late. It’s also of note that the given estimate has always been at least $ 100 lower than the final price.
The pricing seems standard (in line with what I have paid elsewhere), and the service is very friendly, if not the most communicative. I have had unauthorized charges and difficulty getting in touch, but these were fairly minor problems. What I disliked about my experience is that I never come here just once — unlike at other shops, I’ll always have another issue come up within a day or so of driving away from Garage 5601.
This is probably just bad luck on my part, but I will no longer go to this mechanic, and I would not recommend it to my friends after the slew of issues I have had, especially considering that some of those minor issues were «solved» only to come back within hours. Not the worst mechanic I’ve been to, but far from the best.
Apparently everyone else has had a great experience, so your mileage may vary.

Mike Solis and the crew at 5601 Garage are simply the best mechanics I have dealt with.
I recently bought a used 2003 Mini Cooper S that I got for a great price but had a couple of minor issues with the service engine light was on. Mike didn’t just blindly start replacing expensive parts but really took the time to get to know my car and would only charge me when work needed to be done. For one repeating alarm, I fully authorized him to replace a moderately expensive fuel diagnostic pump, and instead he took a closer look, found a crack in my exhaust, and referred me to a fantastic muffler/​welding shop, saving me hundreds of dollars and fixing the actual root cause of the alarm.
When work does need to be done, Mike’s rates are infinitely reasonable (especially compared to the dealership), his crew is fantastic at scheduling time for you (despite a lot always packed with customer cars), and he always walks you through what he’s seeing and the best way to get the job done right without having to waste time or money.
I live on the other side of town, but it’s worth the drive in rush hour traffic to have the peace of mind of working with a mechanic that you can really trust and won’t break your bank.

Mike is GREAT! Fair, knows these cars inside and out and does a great job! We’ll use him again and again!

I love this place and highly recommend it to other German car owners.
I brought my 1996 BMW 318ti there last week. Mike and Darrell were able to quickly and efficiently identify the location of my oil and power steering leaks. Everyone was helpful and took the time to clearly explain what needed to be repaired, as well as outlined the pricing to me. And of course their pricing was fair, but just as important to me, they stayed on schedule with their repairs.