Our B5 Passat (as new) had a superior features/interior quality/fit and finish than my Toyota Corolla but guess which one spent the most time at the dealer not for regular servicing ???.

2 x coil packs, Tie end rods, Vacuum pipe to the intake manifold, A/C heat exchanger.

This was all before 60,000 km.

They are showroom queens. I loved sitting in the stitched suede seats of the RS7 and making vroom sounds while my wallet was getting shredded in service.

This has been my experience with late 2000's BMWs too. Man they look gorgeous. You can pick one up for under 10 grand now... There's a reason why.

My wife had an Audi as company car for a while - which kept breaking. Meanwhile I've had VWs and now Skodas for years and never had a problem.

For VWs, it's always the electrical systems.... If it's 10 years old, I can almost guarantee it's going to have problems. With that said, you'll always see the rouge 1999 Jetta tooling around town, and either the owner got really lucky, or they've worked on it.

Sister in law had a ~’04 Jetta. Mechanically it was sound, but it did have a continuous stream of electrical problems. My nephew had an ‘09 CC that blew a fuel pump and then blew up an engine. Nice car otherwise.

The only car we've had that had electrical problems was a Toyota - where the instruments would keep cutting out. Turns out this was caused by the sunroof...

Edit: Sunroof leaked, water collected at lowest point inside car where Toyota had decided to locate electrical connectors that fed the instruments.

As long as they keep it simple they do OK. Audis are rolling wiring harnesses.