Keith’s Auto Service Center

I have been taking my car to Keith’s for years. This is hands down the best, most honest mechanic you could hope to find. The staff is helpful, kind & courteous. I’ve searched online for repair prices, and Keith’s will more often than not beat those online estimates by a mile! Further, I’ve taken the car in & they were not able to fix it (need to go to the dealership). They didn’t charge me a penny for trying to fix it! I will never take my cars anywhere else, and I recommend them to everyone. They are very busy, so you might not get your car seen the same day. But I promise it is worth the wait!

Keith is the best mechanic around, I went to master wrench and spent 600 on an axel that they kept doing over because it wasn’t fixed the first, or second, or third time right and they kept charging me to re-​fix it. I then got frustrated and went to Keith the 4^th time. He fixed it and all for under 200, changed my oil and filter too for free! So glad I finally went to Keith. He is the best mechanic ever. AND BTW FORD’S are built using inch measurements, ie all the bolts and nuts require american tools. All other cars from every other country use metric units so the reason he probably does’nt work on fords is because he is a volvo mechanic and has metric tools. DUH

Keith is the most incredible, kind, funny and honest mechanic I have ever met. I am so grateful to have found such an amazing shop! I have recommended his shop to everyone I have met who is looking for a great place to get their car fixed.

I just called to schedule an appointment for a tune-​up and asked for a price quote. I told the woman on the phone I have a Ford Van, she said the price will vary depending on type of tune-​up, and then she put me on hold to get the price quote.
When she came back she said, well Keith doesn’t work on Ford’s. I seriously doubt he doesn’t work on Ford’s! If by for some odd reason he really didn’t work on Fords, then why did she put me on hold to get the price quote. It sounds more like a weird lie. I understand if he is booked, or I guess just didn’t feel like working on cars today, even though that is apparently his job, but don’t lie to me and say he just doesn’t work on Fords.
A mechanic that lies about something so simple sounds like a mechanic that can easily lie about other things.

Keith is an awesome guy! He was really honest with what I could do with my Honda — he was a funny guy, too!

Love this guy already. I just moved to Portland and was trying to find a good, trustworthy shop to take my car to for regular maintenance. I was so sad to not have my old service guy anymore, but Keith’s Auto Service Center was such a find! It’s exactly what I was looking for. Keith is hilarious — but more importantly, he’s extremely fair and trustworthy, which explains how he’s owned the shop for 30 years. He spent an inordinate amount of time replacing my stupid headlight that was being very stubborn, and he did it all even after he allowed me to come as the shop was closing. I felt so bad and wanted to pay him extra, but he said, «I don’t charge labor — Never have, never will «- direct quote. Coming from California, that kind of statement was like a foreign language. You mean you’re not going to charge for something you could charge for? Say what? And just like that, I found my new guy. :)

My truck died passing in front of Keith’s and so I parked it in his yard and was there the next day when he opened up at 9. Keith checked me in, asked what was wrong, and then said it would take 3 – 4 days to get to it. His vibe was definitely not enthusiastic — seemed like he really didn’t care if he got a paying customer that morning or not. OK, maybe he’s booked, and I really didn’t want to pay to have it towed — so I left it there. Karen (nice lady) calls a couple hours later, and said that they didn’t want to work on it, and that I should get it towed it to the dealer. The reasons for not wanting to do the job were fuzzy, and Karen sounded embarrassed to have to relay the message. Riight… so I arrange for a tow (and man, Handy Andy is EXPENSIVE) back to my usual, favorite car repair business (Master Wrench). They get it diagnosed and repaired the next day by 3PM and earned nearly $ 650 for their work. I should have had it towed to Master Wrench straight away.
What can I say? I’ll give Keith’s credit for not trying to charge me anything, but it really did seem to me that they didn’t want the business.

I’ve been taking my cars to Keith for 6 years… sad I didn’t find him sooner. He’s picked me up at the grocery store for a flat tire, given me rides back & forth to the shop, loaned me vehicles, done COUNTLESS itty-​bitty things for free and counseled me when I’ve let things go too long. He’s honest, fair, just-​right quirky and an extraordinarily decent human. There’s a reason he’s been at the same location for years: he’s The Stuff. If you don’t get him, you need to loosen up. ps: Love Karen, too!!!

I regularly service my Ford Focus at the dealership, and decided it was high time to make the switch and save myself a little bit of money and find a good local mechanic. I live in SW portland so Keith’s was on my shortlist merely due to convenience and the solid reviews listed on
and this site. My car has never had any major service needed, (knock on wood whoever is reading this review!!!), but when the creaking sound starting coming from my front end, I decided to have it looked at. I called up Keith and he was ready to see me right away. Now having been used to the cattle call service at the dealership and delays in service, I fully expected to leave my car a day or two. Not at Keith’s! Keith himself drove me around the block to diagnose the problem, put the car up on the lift, had a few looks under the carriage and was able to determine that the noise was just some parts needing some lubrication (which he applied at no charge). He was busy that night with customers in and out, but still took the time to help a new customer out. The service was extremely personal and I felt like I knew Keith, and his lovely wife Karen, for years! I was in and out of there in an hour, problem solved and peace of mind intact.

Growing up in Minnesota and Wisconsin, I spent most of my driving years battling the ice, snow and freezing rain. Unfortunately, some a*shat who doesn’t know how to navigate a slippery road used my car as a stopping mechanism yesterday. When I decided to emerge from a snow-​day slumber to see if I could cure my cabin fever, I discovered my rear bumper smashed in and left tail light not working. And of course, no note. Thanks for the early Christmas present, jerkoff.
My car warranty recently expired, so I was at the mercy of recommendations to find a good auto mechanic. I will admit that while I am nowhere near ignorant on the inner-​workings of a car, I prefer to keep my hands grease free. I also am reluctant to seek out a mechanic as I really hate being treated like a dumb girl when I need my car worked on. Since Keith’s recommendation sounded interesting, came from a female friend and is in my favorite old neighborhood, I decided to check it out. When I called to ask about getting an estimate, Keith informed me that while he didn’t do auto body work, he would be happy to take a look and see if he could take care of it, or else give me a sound recommendation. I stopped in after work around 4 p.m. Waited a few minutes and made conversation with another customer waiting to pick up her car. Keith arrived from the garage, and growled a gruff and surly, «What do you want?» in the most endearing way possible. I explained who I was and we walked directly out of the car. Now Keith appears to be a really odd guy. Not in that, «Hey little girl, want some candy» kind of odd. But the «I’m glad you live in Portland because you really do keep it weird!» sort of way. The short conversation we had was fast-​paced, fun and bizarre.
He quickly assessed that he wouldn’t be able to do the body work, then checked my lack of working tail lights. He asked if I had $ 2.00? I said I did. He then replaced the bulbs in my tail lights, gave me a glowing reference for an auto body mechanic, took my $ 2.00 as payment, and threw in a complimentary ’09 day planner to boot. True, I can’t officially give a review on the quality of work for a more complicated fix up, but I will definitely be going back when I do have mechanical work that needs to be done. Plus I will get to chat with an authentic Portland oddity.