The most frequently asked questions our team receives are questions surrounding the reputation and reliability of vehicle manufacturers as a whole. This question is usually asked when one is considering trading in a vehicle to finance a replacement one and research is being undertaken to make wise and informed decisions around the best and most reliable brands on the Australian Market currently.
Before getting into our answers to this question we should address the issues surrounding the costs of motor vehicle ownership and the financial ramifications of some of brands over others.
We addressed the ongoing costs of vehicle ownership in this highly controversial article.
Car ownership: You can’t Afford it!
We also covered the vehicles most commonly owned by the worlds wealthy in this article.
The Most popular car owned by Millionaires.
Which brands do we advise as the most reliable and cost effective to maintain. This list does not take into account the options, features, drivability or the needs of the consumer. This list is purely the list based on financial costs of upkeep and reliability. This list is based off one mechanics opinion and over twenty years experience in the automotive industry. This list is in order from our opinion of worst to best.
At the bottom of the list are:
Land Rover/ Ranger Rover
Jeep/ Dodge/ Ram and Chrysler
GM/Holden/Opel/Vauxhall and Chevy
Citroen/ Fiat
Next up comes
Nissan
Renault
LDV
BYD
MG
Mitsubishi
Coming up in quality now are the European brands.
Audi
VW
Mercedes Benz
BMW.
All of these vehicles are costly on parts and reliability takes a dive as they get older. The main reason for this is these manufacturers uses a lot of plastic components where other brands use alloy. This causes reliability issues as they get older due to the plastic breaking down. When new these brands are highly reliable, however they can be very costly on parts and servicing.
The second best category are most of the Japanese vehicle manufacturers.
Mazda
Toyota
Suzuki
Subaru
The top pick in our opinion are the Korean vehicle manufactures. Kia and Hyundai.
