Buick
When it comes to dealing with car companies you can expect Buick to have some serious knowledge when it comes to poor safe ratings in vehicles. If you found yourself in front of a 2007 Buick Rendezvous when it first released then you weren’t one of the lucky ones. However, a ton of people flocked to the four door SUV thanks to a great ad campaign that was headlined by Tiger Woods — who was supremely popular at the time. The biggest issue with the Rendezvous is that it completely fails in its frontal impact rating and the safety equipment on board was not up to snuff. Needless to say the Rendezvous was quickly shoved aside by the Buick Enclave in 2008. That showed that Buick was capable of fixing their mistakes.
Buick
Chevy
In 2008 you may have found yourself at the dealer ready to sign some fresh ink on a new car finance plan thanks to a sleek looking extended cab truck in front of you. While there were a ton of great trucks in 2008 the one you didn’t want to buy is the Chevy Colorado with the Extended Cab. This is going to end up as one of the largest vehicles on our list and also one of the most purely dangerous. According to statistics incidents involving Colorados tallied up 93 deaths per million drivers. The vast majority of these deaths, 54 per million, involved single car accidents. Those stats should terrify just about anyone who might still be driving the vehicle. Do your best to sell it off or trade it in and you’ll see your low cost car insurance immediately take effect. In fact, drivers of this vehicle right now are being punished with high rates by car insurance companies.
Chevy
Ford
While many people believe Ford to be one of the safer companies out there in relation to car brands we can’t help but shake our heads a little bit. When the Ford Ranger with four wheel drive and an extended cab was released it hit us pretty hard with poor safety ratings. As it turns out ‘Built Ford Tough’ wasn’t an all encompassing phrase. For the Ford Ranger a depressing side effect to driving the vehicle included an increased rollover risk in the rate of 30% during single car crashes, highest of any vehicle we have ever documented. The lack of side airbags and curtain airbags further stressed how much of a death trap the Ford Ranger was and as a result it garnered some of the lowest safety ratings we’ve ever seen. We’ll suggest passing on this truck and opting to find something that won’t cause your online auto insurance to go through the roof. Hey, online car insurance matters when every penny counts.
Ford
Nissan
You can make the claim that Nissan is one of the longer lasting car makers that hasn’t had a ‘wow factor’ in quite awhile. Yet, many car manufacturers can survive without the sparkle so long as their every day fare still brings the sizzle. This just wasn’t the case from 2005 to 2008 when the Nissan Versa Sedan showed up as one of the most dangerous cars being driven in the country. The Nissan Versa Sedan was listed in safety reports as one of the most dangerous vehicles to drive in the country due to its poor handling and single vehicle crashes that resulted in fatalities. The majority of fatalities with the Nissan Versa ended up in the 60 per million registered vehicle range and that number is just too high for what should have been a safer car. If you still have one of these vehicles and you haven’t wrecked it yet then we highly suggest moving on to something a little more adequate. Your safety is more important than how cool your ride looks.
Nissan
Hyundai
Hyundai is one of our favorite brands thanks to the gorgeousness that is their 2016 Tiburon. Yet things weren’t always looking this good and a string of poor quality Tiburon makes from 2005 – ’08 may have soured the brand beyond repair with many drivers. The ’05 – ’08 Tiburon racked up 96 fatalities with every million registrations which is equal to the Versa, while still in its testing period. Most of these fatalities again were largely involving just a single accident. In fact, you could get even more dangerous if you dug deeper into the Tiburon and chose to operate the two door version of the car. On the whole Hyundai has come a long way since this tragic string of poorly made vehicles but there is always going to be a part of us that can’t get over the blatant disregard for making a solid product back when they were building audiences with the Tiburon. A shame, that.
Hyundai
Scion
Scion is a brand that doesn’t get much name recognition because they are too often priced out of the lower tier but not priced up enough for the luxury end. Scion comes in on our list because they have such a disparity between quality and quantity. About half of the 2016 Scion releases scored five stars in their safety ratings however only 38% of their models were competitive with other non luxury brand cars. Add on to this fact that Scion won’t match competitors with equivalent safety equipment and you can start to see a growing problem. Scion lets over 85% of its models hit the streets without a pre-crash safety system and that number is a full 10% behind other non luxury brands made by the Japanese. When the company blatantly doesn’t care about its consumer, the consumer should stop caring about the company.
Scion
Kia
Despite a wonderful marketing campaign highlighted by pop culture icons and NBA stars (Yo, Blake Griffin), the Kia is going to always be on our shun list for a string of bad years in the mid aughts. From 2005 to 2008 Kia manufactured the Spectra Wagon which would turn out to be one of the most affordable death machines that drivers could get behind. Drivers of the Kia Spectra died at a rate of 102 people per million cars with the majority, over 63 million, coming in multi car crashes. With basement low safety ratings and a company that took half a decade to respond, there’s no reason to give these guys another chance.
Kia
Ram
Another well known manufacturer in Ram finds itself in the top 5 of our list of dangerous vehicles. With Ram products almost 85% of them failed to net a a five star safety rating from the NHTSA. When companies like GMC are rapidly out performing you, you would expect to see some quick improvement and safety turn around. There hasn’t been any and Ram continues to fall behind in the world of non luxury brands offering safe vehicles. 62% of Ram vehicles lack any post collision safety set up compared to the American average of 79%
Ram
Mini
You have to be reaching toward the bottom of the barrel to consider grabbing on to anything but the highest end Mini available. Mini has the lowest safety scores out of all the major brands and only 10% of its 2016 line up managed to bring in IIIHS safety awards. The average amount of safety awards for non luxury car brands is sitting at 31% right now — not a good look. A severe lack of blind spot attention as well as 90% of their cars lacking post collision safety means that we won’t be trusting our loved ones in this vehicle any time soon.
Mini Cooper
