Thanks for the link Mountainbike. If you page down to the “What do the Reliability Ratings mean?” Section, they sort of explain what they mean. There are 5 rating levels and they are all compressed into a 4% failure rate, or a 96% success rate if you prefer. That is how I prefer to look at it. I use that to my advantage when buying cars. I bought a new Silhouette for two-thirds the MSRP in 2003. It was among the lowest rated trio of minivans available at the time, but I just couldn’t bring myself to pay another $12,000 to buy a comparable Odyssey. I never regretted that decision after 12 years of ownership. There is no way to tell what my personal success rate with an Odyssey would have been, especially given the transmission and door problems that afflicted that generation of Odyssey. But if I paid an extra couple of grand in repairs, so what? I still saved $10,000. In 2010 we needed another car for one of the children to commute to student teaching assignments. This time I paid less than half of MSRP for a 2010 Cobalt LT. I could have paid $18,000 or so for an equivalent Civic or Corolla, but I haven’t paid anywhere near the more than $9000 I saved when I bought the car. These are, of course, highly unusual transactions. But wait! There’s more! In 2005 I bought a Honda Accord EX V6 for $3000 less than an equivalent Buick LaCrosse. I never regretted that decision either, despite actually losing the AC chRge after 9 years of ownership. In my experience, GM cars don’t lose their refrigerant charge, but I’m still very pleased I saved all that money when I bought the Accord. Even with the hundreds spent on the repair, it is still less expensive than the Lacrosse without any repairs. BTW, I got the Accord for invoice price.
@db4690, CR doesn’t exactly tell you that Range Rover and Mini are garbage. They say that the failure rate is at least 4% and tell us nothing else. We have heard anecdotally that those two are far worse than that, and I don’t doubt it. But don’t put too much emphasis on the CR reliability ratings. I would like it if they widened them or created another category or two to amplify the truly awful cars. I just don’t think a top to bottom rating of 100% success to 96% success is all that meaningful.
I never care too much about resale value when selling…because by the time I sell the vehicles usually have well over 300k miles.
Most wouldn’t either if they did research like you and made Highlanders and 4 Runners as part of their Stable of cars. The earlier Nissan Pathfinders were mechanical bullets…
@jtsanders CR doesn’t exactly tell you that Range Rover and Mini are garbage. They say that the failure rate is at least 4% and tell us nothing else.
I apologize for doing such a poor job of explaining why their failure rates seem so lowcompared to average which is calibrated to 0 percent. They are yearly failure rates on each component worse then average. Over time, they are added together each year for each component to give you a final rate that a failure could occur at least once, compared to an average '0" rated component.
If just one major mechanical component fails after 6 years, 60 k mile warranty period, that could make the car a very poor choice. That tends to happens with RANGE ROVERS and Minis and other poor choices. All those back marks may represent a low percentage singularly, but taken in total, they add up to a significant disadvantage in buying these cars. Just adding the black marks up in areas of concern will give you that much higher validation for their poor reliability. Even an average car has can have significant failures if you own it long enough. But, these cummulative black marks make poorer cars much more likely to have significant problems, earlier and more often.
What are the Reliability History charts?
A relevant section/. These small percentages are not actual rates of failure. They are rates differing from average. So if the actual rate for an average car was 2% for that year, then the actual rate of failure for a black mark car would be 2 pkus 4 or 6%. For that year.
CR does list the very worst cars every year and shows you how bad they are, in addition to having the categories for all cars. In recent years the worst of the worst have usually been Jaguars, with truly chilling numbers. Yes, cars in the lowest rating might only be a few percent worse than the median, but they can also be dramatically worse. It’s not necessary to find out how bad when there are cars that consiatently do well. I agree that it is possible to draw conclusions from other cars a company makes, and previous generations of the same model. I think CR doesn’t do that enough, though sometimes in their comments they’ll say they expect a new car to prove reliable based on brand history. They seem a little less likely to condemn models. Some of their recommended models do pretty well for a few years, but by give or more years start to fall apart. That is a sign of careful assembly and poor design. Most companies are pretty good at putting cars together with robots doing so much of the work. I’m much more interested in seeing how cars age than how well the robots are doing their jobs.
The earlier Nissan Pathfinders were mechanical bullets....
I’m extremely disappointed with the new Pathfinder design. It’s now a crossover like the Highlander…but the highlander is a more capable vehicle. It’s no longer an SUV like the 4runner.
“If all you do is own GM products, you have not experienced the difference.” - dagosa
Dag, that’s an excellent point. It was going from my '72 Vega to my '76 Corolla that woke me up. I suddenly realized that my assumption that all cars had problems and occasional recalls was wrong. The Corolla just kept on running without a glitch day after day, month after month, year after year. I was hooked.
Conversely, it was after owning Toyotas for years and then getting a Saturn in '95 that I realized that GM still had a lot of catching up to do.
"If all you do is own GM products, you have not experienced the difference." - dagosaDag, that’s an excellent point. It was going from my '72 Vega to my '76 Corolla that woke me up.
My sister-in-law and her husband were HUGE Ford fans. Bought nothing but Fords for 30 years. My wifes sister couldn’t believe how many miles we were able put on our Honda’s and Nissans and not have a ton of maintenance like they had. When our niece went to college we gave her my wifes 96 Accord with about 240k miles. Her dad thought it was going to be a maintenance nightmare. It had more miles on his Explorer and wifes Taurus combined. After 2 years and NEVER EVER needing any repairs while each of his Fords were in for repairs for a few thousand dollars…it got his attention. The following year my sister-in-law needed a new vehicle (the Taurus needed too many repairs)…so she bought a Honda Civic. Two years later when her husband needed a new truck…he bought a Honda Pilot. He’s no longer on a first-name basis with the service writer at the dealer. In fact neither vehicle has been in for any repairs (besides normal maintenance).
He did not know how much more reliable other vehicles were. He thought they all had repairs like his did. After 30+ years of driving nothing but Fords…he’s now a Honda guy.
@MikeInNH Good post. Although the first few years there is little difference in reliability and durability, by year 10 only 65% of Toyotas need repairs (65 repairs per 100 vehicles) while 175% of Volkswagens (175 repairs per 100 vehicles) are in the shop. Ford is somewhat “better” at 124 repairs per 100 vehicles.
Analyzing True Delta statistics shows the same trend, with the Toyota Corolla as one of the least repair prone.
And those repairs on US cars are pricy since they almost always cover transmission problems and other pricey items.
Although I have owned some “:good” US cars, the repair frequency of my Toyota and Nissan were a fraction of my Caprice, Impala, Olds Delta 88, Granada, Chevelle Malibu, and others.
After 8 years the only “repair” on my Toyota has been replacing the serpentine belt which was starting to show cracks.
Although the first few years there is little difference in reliability and durability
My sister-in-law and her husband were only keeping their vehicles for no more then 8 years…and less then100k miles. Sister-in-law Taures had more costly repairs then all the Honda’s, Nissans’s and Toyota/Lexus COMBINED…with combined mileage of over 1 million miles. It was absurd the amount of money they were putting into those vehicles every year…And then there were the repairs that were needed under warranty.
"It’s no longer an SUV like the 4Runner."
Yes. I Feel Nissan felt that the XTerra filled that roll. The Pathfinder and XTerra seem to compete with the Highlander and 4Runner. I don 't wonder why the FJ bit the dust. Too many ladder frame SUVs from one car maker is redundant. The XTerra may not compete directly as they are in different price range but it’s hard to see how each will hang on with the proliferation of crew crew cab trucks.
Most people’s subjective experiences fall in line with CR surveys. There are Fords and GMs that last a long, long time with little maintenace and there are Toyota/Hondas that are a nightmare. The chance of each occurring is very small though.
The XTerra was a cheapened Pathfinder. Rougher ride with a rear leaf-spring suspension. They did share the same drive-train…although the XTerra was a couple years behind adopting the latest. And last I knew you could still get the XTerra in a standard.
A friend of mine traded in a worn out Dodge minivan for a new Ford Escape ecoboost and is happy with her purchase. She helps me transport musicians and their instruments to rehearsals. She is a cellist and can take another cellist and a violinist with her. Once in a while we have to have another driver and vehicle that we didn’t need when she had her minivan. I think for the OP that a small SUV may be sufficient to carry the passengers, camping gear and pooches.
1966 Plymouth fury best car I ever own. nothing sound sweeter than a finely tune Plymouth.
@dripper I agree, except for the very poor rust protection, these were sturdy and good handling cars.