I agree with you. I think longevity, not short-term reliability, is what really distinguishes a well-made vehicle from its competitors. You aren’t likely to find much of a difference in the quality of most vehicles until you get out past the 150,000-mile mark.
Toyota didn’t get a reputation of being good for over 300,000 miles by building junk, and Americans didn’t choose to abandon American cars and put Americans out of work in spite of being the best built cars available. Reputations are earned, and if UAW built cars have a reputation for being poorly built...
...After 64,049 vehicles tallied, the brands with the highest percentage of models with over 180k are…
1. Honda
2. Toyota
3. Lexus
4. Acura
and a surprising 5th…
5. GMC
The first four have 20+% of their trade-ins with over 180k. GMC is at just over 17%.
Now for an even bigger shocker…
13% of Mitsubishis are now traded in with over 180k. I happen to finance an awful lot of them these days with a clear conscience. So this is no surprise from where I sit.
Meanwhile, Mercedes tallies a mere 6.9%. BMW yields 5.9%. Audi barely hits the mileage pedal with only 4.5%, while VW does little better, even with dozens of TDI models, at 4.9%.
To further crown the European propensity for penurious plentitude when it comes to all things mileage related, the two absolute worst marques for mileage are Jaguar at 2.6% and Land Rover at 2.8%. Porsche is even worse at 0.52%. But since a Porsche daily driver is an exception rather than the rule, we gave it a bye.
On the homefront, we have one other surprise. Cadillac is barely beating the bad old Kias of the 90′s and early 2000′s. 3.8% for the former Northstar division vs. 3.7% for a company that brought us shitboxes such as the Sephia and the early Kia Rios...