My perspective doesn't come from many years of Volvo ownership, I'm a fairly new owner. Remember volvo is a luxury brand and when comparing to a toyota you can't compare it to the tercel which has almost no electronic devices and sensors. No car is immune from the inevitable little things it will need after 100K mi or so. Also I just read a wall st journal article about mercedes quality and customer satisfaction really slipping in recent years. Somebody else said it first, do the maintanence! Don't let little things become big things. And don't forget to take pleasure in driving a very safe luxury auto, you can't get that feeling in a Yugo :-)