Each year, J.D. Power and Associates release their findings on the overall dependability of three-year old vehicles sold in the States. The 2012 Dependability Study polled some 31,000 owners of 2009 model-year vehicles measuring problems they experienced in the past 12 months.
To understand the numbers you see listed below, the "overall dependability" is determined by the level of problems experienced per 100 vehicles (PP100), with a lower score translating to higher quality.
In this year's study, J.D. Powers found that overall vehicle dependability improved substantially as the industry average was 132 problems per 100 vehicles, representing a 13 percent improvement from last year (151 PP100), while it's also the lowest problem rate since the survey began in 1990.
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