Top Cars For 2014

Monday, 26. May 2014

Auto Express have just published the results of their driver survey to end up with a top 150 cars as voted by the 50,073 car owners that took part in the survey. The top car manufacturer, up one place from last year was Skoda, who regained this position after losing out to Lexus last year. Not only were they voted top manufacturer they had the top three cars with the Yeti, Citigo and Superb.

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A truly excellent company, according to their customers. At position 2 was Jaguar, up a place from 3rd last year. Ride and ease of driving scored highly with Jaguar owners. Reliability and running costs were not so good, enough to prevent them from taking number one place. 3rd place was a new entrant, MG.

The revived badge was somewhat of a surprise. The MG6 was top of the pops for handling and a creditable 6th place in the overall model chart. It shaped up well for running costs although fuel consumption wasn’t so good, servicing costs did well. With only two models on sale MG have done well. In 4th place, dropping 3 from last years number one slot, is Lexus.

The score achieved this year is actually higher than last year but because of strong competition Lexus has been demoted to 4th. Nothing has actually gone wrong for Lexus who are still number one for reliability and build quality. It was also number one for in-car tech and runner up for ease of driving.

Very low places for practicality (always a problem when you only produce 4Dr saloons) and high running costs dragged the prestige car down. This was surprising as Lexus have become synonymous with hybrid technology these days. Another newcomer stormed in at 5th place, the Dacia brand.

However it is thought that this was due to very low expectations and the cars performing better than expected. Areas such as affordability and running costs helped the car up the rankings. But it wasn’t all about low costs as the cars came a creditable 3rd for reliability and 4th for practicality.

3rd place for in-car tech probably had more to do with the fact that some items included as standard were not expected in a budget car. Time will tell but well done Dacia. In 6th place was Porsche up from 13th last year. Impressive improvements have pushed them up a deserved 7 places with a score that would have pushed them up to 3rd last year.

High scores in performance and handling were obvious reasons why they did well but they also scored well in build quality putting them in 2nd place. Running costs and practicality didn’t help the manufacturer although ease of driving and seat comfort scored highly. 7th was Kia, staying in the same place as last year.

Kia cars are above average and scored well in all categories without excelling in any particular section. Consistent is the word to describe Kia. In car technology scored well as did running costs helped more by servicing costs than fuel consumption. Performance and ease of driving scored not so well and prevented Kia from doing any better.

At 8th was Mazda, down from 4th place last year. Generally the drivers of Mazdas are no less happy than last year, it’s just that other manufacturers have improved pushing the bar higher. Running costs were a little disappointing but there were no major deficiencies, the report should read, not a bad effort but could do better.

Mercedes dropped from 5th to 9th but still managed to see off its main German rivals. The results reflected a general satisfaction although owners were not exactly blown away. Ease of driving and build quality helped it past BMW. Running costs scored badly as did practicality. Finally at 10th place was BMW, up from 15th.

Good scores for performance and handling contributed to the improved position and with the 5 Series considered to be the best executive saloon the 10th place wasn’t surprising. For the positions of all 33 manufacturers please refer to Auto Express Driver Power results. By Graham Hill

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Survey Identifies Best & Worst Car Dealers In The UK

Tuesday, 20. August 2013

Possibly not but it might be useful to know what you are likely to face in the future. I can help there because Auto Express has carried out a survey amongst 46,000 readers to come up with the best and worst dealers by manufacturer.

Thinking of a change but unsure as to the best way to finance your car? Then you need a copy of my car finance book, Car Finance – A Simple Guide by Graham Hill. Click on the link below to buy the best car finance book on the market, available as a Kindle Book and Paper Back.

I can’t reveal all but I can give you a rundown of some of the best and worst dealers. In the best category Lexus heads the list for the second year running. Suburu and Toyota come in at positions 2 and 3. Honda was 4th and Jaguar 5th. Porsche, Skoda, Mitsubishi, Renault and Kia finished off the top 10.

Strangely not many Germans achieved a top 10 position. But what abouth the bottom of the list, the last 10 places. At the bottom was Seat at position 31, Chevrolet was 30, Ford at 29, Fiat 28, Citroen 27, Peugeot 26. Next up the list were a few Germans, at 25 was VW, just above was BMW at 24, Audi 23 and Chrysler/Jeep at 22.

A few surprises there and very interesting. Probably won’t influence too many buying decisions but interesting to know all the same.

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New Technology Becomes Legal Requirement In The US

Thursday, 21. July 2011

Lexus CT200h en el Sal�n de Ginebra 2010.

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The US is making a piece of technology a legal requirement by 2014 and yet there are very few cars fitted with it in the UK as standard or have it available as an option. The technology provides images picked up by reversing cameras to be displayed in your rear view mirror. Will it be the next big thing in the UK and become a legal requirement? Time will Read more »

See Which Cars Are Selling Most

Tuesday, 31. May 2011

BMW Logo in Düsseldorf Hellerhof: Hans Branden...

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April saw an increase in the sale of premium cars such as BMW and Audi. Whilst new car sales suffered during the month the premium brands all saw growth. The companies that showed growth included Mercedes, Audi, Lexus, BMW and Saab. Jaguar was the only make to suffer with sales down 60%. BMW even got into the top 10 car sales with its 3 Read more »

Graham Hill Reveals Cars Most Likely To Be Vandalised

Saturday, 28. May 2011

Lexus IS250 AWD

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Insurance company Swiftcover has revealed which car is most likely to be vandalised. It listed the top 5 vandalised cars with the number one slot being taken by the Lexus IS. They suggested that this could be down to the Steve Coogan character Alan Partridge who was linked to the car in his series. The top 5 cars in its Vandalism Index are: Read more »

Top Cars For 2011 Voted On

Sunday, 8. May 2011

What car do you think drivers voted their number one in this years Auto Express Driver Power survey? Wrong! It’s the Skoda Superb. The poll ranks the findings of 23,000 readers. It takes the top 100 models revealing what drivers love and hate about their cars and ranks them in order. For the third year running Skoda has topped the manufacturers list Read more »

J D Power & What Car Survey Results

Sunday, 13. June 2010

The 2010 What Car and J D Power Ownership Satisfaction Survey is out now and available in the July issue of What Car. The survey arrives at its findings after analysing returns from 17,200 motorists travelling a total of 300 million miles in their cars. 104 models from 27 manufacturers have been rated with every aspect of owning scrutinised. The satisfaction percentage score is made up of four sections. Read more »

Graham Hill, Car Finance Expert, Announces Changes In MOT Checks That Will Increase Costs

Saturday, 10. April 2010

the EU is planning stricter rules on MOT testing. This will immediately increase the cost of the MOT as more items are to be checked. This has resulted from the European Union passing a new set of stricter rules on minimum road worthiness. The EU ministers agreed that ‘modern electronic systems be included in the list of items to be tested’. This change along with others already planned will be introduced in Read more »

Graham Hill Reveals Top Dealerships For Service

Thursday, 26. November 2009

A couple of weeks ago I told you which manufacturers and which cars were the most reliable. This week it’s the turn of the dealerships. The survey was carried out amongst 34 of the UK’s top leasing companies with 27 voting for the dealers in the top slot. Whilst Lexus often takes top honours amongst retail voters only 2 lessors put Lexus in the top 5 dropping them just off the top 10 dealers. The Germans seemed to Read more »

Are Drivers Really Thinking Green?

Monday, 28. September 2009

We keep hearing a lot about green issues and the need to improve our environment. The warnings are there, each year we see more extreme weather conditions that are blamed upon global warming but what are we actually doing about it in the cars we drive? Have I sold hundreds of hybrid cars? No. Have I seen a strong move from big gas guzzlers to city cars or even just mildly more modest cars? Read more »