New Car Comparison - Importance of Comparing Apples to Apples

By Steve Simpkins

Okay, you want to do a new car comparison. Well, it is important to do an apples to apples search. By that I mean that you should be comparing similar vehicles rather than looking all over the map. Narrow down the type of vehicle you are looking for and then make a new car comparison based on that kind of car.

We'll start with the coupe market. We'll consider 4 vehicles priced between $17,000 and $19,000: the Volkswagen Golf, Dodge Caliber, Kia Soul Exclaim and Mazda 3S Sport. Here's one difference: the Golf has a 2.5 liter engine while the 3S Sport has only a 2 liter engine. The Exclaim Soul and Sport have lower displacement than do the Golf or Caliber. The Kia is the only one without front side airbags.

There are similarities and differences at the other end of the spectrum as well. Two very similar cars are the Rolls Royce Ghost and the Mercedes Benz S-Class. But, the prices of the two cars are not very similar. The Ghost starts at $245,000 while the S-Class starts at $133,000.

The small SUV market also has similarities and differences. We'll look at four vehicles here: the Kia Sportage, Suzuki Sportback, Nissan Rogue, and Mitsubishi Outlander. These vehicles range in price from $19,000 to $22,000. Some of the differences are apparent in horsepower. The Sportage has only 140 horses while the Rogue comes in at 170. The vehicles also differ in their highway miles to the gallon with the Sportage coming in last at 25 miles to the gallon and the Sportback in first place at 30.

Compare apples to apples when doing a new car comparison. Keep in mind that a Mini Cooper is not a minivan and these two vehicles serve very different markets. - 21393

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If you are looking for a cool new cars, I suggest you head on over to Edmunds.com for some great shopping.