Our trusty 2007 Honda Civic developed a cracked engine block after 11 years. I was ticked off because this was due to a manufacturing defect that made Honda extend the warranty to 10 years. While I fought with Honda to cover the cost of it, we decided to lease a Mazda 6. I've driven a 3 series before, and I was surprised how close in comfort the Mazda was. We've had the Mazda (and the fixed civic) for a while, and I have to say, I'd have a hard time justifying buying a BMW or Mercedes because the Mazda 6 is fancy enough for me (we also ended up getting a Honda Odyssey minivan and that is even fancier).
If feels like the luxury car brands have lost ground to other car manufacturers and instead of adding value they are nickel and diming their customers for features that other car-makers include at a lower cost.
I do find the only cars I lust after are either the Porsche Boxster or 911.
Prior to COVID, I was using a car pool app to get to work. I’ve rode in Audi A4s and A5s, BMW 3 series, Accords, Civics, and even a Model 3.
A buddy of mine picked up a new Mazda3. The interior felt pretty much equivalent to a BMW 3 series or A5. I don’t know much about car performance and so presumably the major difference is just the brand name and engine power.
Personally I don’t own a car and view cars as a utility to get from point A to point B. I can see spending a bit more on a car if you commute or drive a lot.
The vehicle industry blows my mind — not only the buying process itself but also the pricing model. It’s crazy how Americans are willing to drop $30-40K (that’s average?) for a vehicle. But I digress.
In America I’d only lease any of the European brands. Parts are harder to come by, fewer people want to mess with/repair them (you can always get shafted at the dealer, but that’s pretty much universal) and reliability on them is not the best.
Give me a good used Japanese car (except for Mitsubishi) any day.
In countries and cities with usable public transit and density its naturally far less of a thing.
Market segmentation means you don't have a lot of choice.
A Toyota Camry (a quite basic mid-size car) starts at $25K. Even some of the cheapest cars sit at almost $20K and their safety ratings at US freeway speeds are often not great combined with being underpowered.
The fact that people have to drive on US freeways a lot means that you can't just engineer a small, slower speed car and call it a day.
Then again, god bless them. If it wasn’t for all of them there wouldn’t be so many good used cars for me to choose from :)
Edit: yes of course there’s better performance parts throughout - I was mostly commenting on the feel of the interior whilst driving the car. And part of that is Honda moving up in quality over the last 5 years. Still, as someone who would like performance it’s really hard to justify paying 2x for something that doesn’t even feel 1.5x.