After real estate, cars are said to be the second most important investment purchase a person will ever make. It's really important that the vehicle you buy gives you the best value for your money.
Fortunately, Forbes.com did some research and released a list of the worst cars on the road today--at least in the United States.
To accomplish this daunting task, Forbes.com took the lowest-rated vehicles from six reliability and performance studies from 2011 Consumer Reports. These are: The Most Reliable Cars Report, Best and Worst Values Report, Highest Cost of Ownership, Best and Worst Safety Performance Survey, Best and Worst Fuel Economy, and Consumer Reports’ overall scores for 2011 vehicles.
For Forbes.com, any vehicle that gained the worst mark in at least three of the six Consumer Reports studies is automatically in its "Worst-Made" list, and these are:
1. Cadillac Escalade
2. Chevrolet Tahoe Hybrid
3. Dodge Nitro SLT
4. Dodge Dakota
5. Jeep Wrangler Unlimited
6. Mercedes-Benz S550
7. Chrysler Town & Country
8. Chevrolet Colorado
9. Chevrolet Aveo
10. Jeep Liberty
11. Nissan Titan
12. Smart ForTwo
If you're surprised to find a luxury vehicle like the Mercedes-Benz S550 above, Forbes.com explained that it was included "because of a high cost of ownership, low fuel efficiency and a low rating for overall value," and not because it was unsafe, unreliable and underperformed, which is what affected every other vehicle on the list.
Fortunately for us, only four of the 12 listed vehicles are available in the Philippines: the Dodge Nitro, the Jeep Wrangler Unlimited, the Chrysler Town & Country and the Chevrolet Aveo. The first three are locally distributed by CATS Motors. The lone vehicle that made it to the list that isn't distributed by CATS Motors is the Chevrolet Aveo, which may soon be phased out following the American carmaker's unveiling of its renamed replacement, the Sonic. The Chevrolet Sonic was displayed at the North America International Auto Show in January.
Now for the fun part: What do you think are the worst cars on Philippine roads today?
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