Audi SQ7

The engine is both the reason and the cost. Two turbochargers in the vee of the block, in the hottest place, with a known factory problem in the oil gallery strainers. Replacing those as soon as the car lands is cheaper than a failed turbocharger, and the gap between the two figures is not small.

The gearbox is the strengthened eight-speed ZF -- the same school as the other S cars, which here means the transmission is not the weak link.

The front bumper hides a whole cooling system: extra oil coolers, intercoolers and ducting specific to the V8. After a frontal impact not one of those is in the yards here -- they are bought new by part number, and they are what inflates the bill, not the panels.

The front brakes are 400 mm and priced accordingly. That is a cost which arrives without any impact at all, simply from driving.

And the most particular part: most American cars come with the Advanced Suspension package -- rear-wheel steering, a sport rear differential and active anti-roll bars on their own 48-volt system. They are why a vehicle this size does not lean. But after a side impact on a wheel, the cost of the bars' electric motors and the specific arms is out of all proportion to everything else on the car.