June 20, 2013—New vehicle buyers ranked Porsche highest in initial quality, according to the recently released J.D. Power & Associates Initial Quality Study.
The survey tracks owners complaints about problems in manufacture or design in the first 90 days of ownership and rates the brands by average problems per 100 vehicles.
Porsche led this year’s list with 80 problems per 100 cars, below the industry average of 113 problems per 100 cars.
For the first time since the survey’s inception, all four of General Motors’ (GM) U.S. brands were ranked above average, with the GMC truck brand coming in second.
GM was also the only manufacturer to average less than 100 problems per 100 vehicles, ahead of Toyota and Honda, manufacturers that have been traditionally viewed as quality benchmarks.
Rounding out the top five were Lexus, Infinity and Chevrolet.
At the bottom of the list was the Ford brand, with its Ford C-Max hybrid landing in last place on the list. The C-Max had 222 problems per 100 vehicles in the survey.
The study also revealed that the quality of this year’s cars, trucks and crossovers declined slightly from 2012, largely due to design-related problems.
Two out of every three problems reported by the owners were tech-based problems that could not be resolved at the dealership.
Issues with infotainment systems were the largest source of problems for consumers, according to the study.
