New Car Buying Guide 2004 (Consumer Reports New Car Buying Guide)

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Summary: THE best car-buying guide for 95% of us
Review: Unless you're into super-performance or the finer points of car technology, Consumer Reports is your best resource, and probably the only resource you need. On any car that you want to check, Consumer Reports tells you clearly what type of car it is and who it's for, how reliable it has been, how satisfied its customers have been, and how much it holds its value. There's also data and commentary on performance, plus other "specs," definitely enough for 95% of us but not as much as in the "harder-core" car publications. So if you're an extreme car enthusiast, you may be disappointed. But Consumer Reports does an excellent job of including the things that the great majority of people are likely to want to see -- and to be able to understand! Much of the material in the "harder-core" publications is Greek to us, right? And in fact, some of the technical material in Consumer Reports is likewise, but not so much that it's intimidating. I think it's just enough to help you stretch your technical knowledge, without turning your brain to mush.

Consumer Reports is renowned for its "reliability" ratings, and indeed this information is probably the most valuable and most distinctive part of what CR does on cars. The ratings are presented in a form that's easy to learn and easy to grasp at a glance. A good reliability rating doesn't guarantee that the car you get will be good, but it definitely stacks the deck in your favor.

An aspect of the "reliability" system that Consumer Reports doesn't get enough credit for is how excellent are its criteria for defining and determining reliability. Some other organizations (including very well known ones) use criteria that have little to do with what most of us mean by "reliability" -- their surveys focus mainly on "number of complaints," regardless of how significant the complaints are. For example, complaints about rattles, or radio reception, or about wishing the car had more power, get counted as problems and count against the car. (Often those organizations don't use the word reliability but some other term like "quality," but the media and the public usually don't get the distinction.) Consumer Reports focuses on problems more related to the basic functioning of the car, which is what most of us are more concerned about.

Consumer Reports is also renowned for being perhaps the most objective and neutral evaluator of products, beyond the influence of manufacturers and other interested parties. From what I've ever been able to tell, the reputation is well deserved.

The one quibble that I have with their car ratings is that they seem perhaps to lean a little too much toward practicality and don't show enough appreciation for certain kinds of upgrades. For example, they tend toward the idea that paying extra for a Mercury Mountaineer over a Ford Explorer is a waste, likewise an Acura over a Honda or a Lexus over a Toyota. But once you realize that apparent bias, you can just take it into account in making your own decisions. And besides, there's a lot to be said for practicality.