Heading the list of this year's Automotive Lease Guide Residual Value Awards is Volkswagen of America with the Volkswagen Brand winning the Industry Brand Residual Value Award. Volkswagen also received the award for the Midsize Car Segment with the Volkswagen Passat.

Mercedes-Benz also made a strong showing in this year's awards winning the Luxury Brand Residual Value Award in addition to the Mercedes-Benz CLK winning the individual award for the Luxury Car Segment.

BMW of North America is a repeat winner of the Near Luxury Car Segment for the BMW 3 Series. MINI USA, a division of BMW of North America, won the Compact Car Segment for the MINI Cooper in its first year of eligibility.

Toyota Motor Sales, USA, Inc. continued a strong tradition in the Residual Value Awards winning three individual segment awards: the Tacoma for the Compact Truck Segment, Sequoia for the Fullsize SUV Segment and the Tundra for the Fullsize Truck Segment. All three are repeat segment leaders from last year.

American Honda Motor Co., Inc. received several segment awards, including: the Acura MDX for the Compact SUV Segment; the CRV for the Sub Compact SUV Segment; and the Odyssey for the Minivan Segment, a repeat winner for the past four years.

Another repeat winner this year is Porsche Cars of North America for the Porsche 911, which won the Sport Car Segment award.

ALG's annual Residual Value Awards honor those vehicles in each segment predicted to retain the highest percentage of their original price. This year ALG added awards for the brand with the highest predicted resale value of all industry and luxury vehicles.

"Residual value performance has long been considered the best way to analyze the health of automotive manufacturers' vehicles," said ALG's CEO, John Blair. "We felt that the introduction of the Industry and Luxury Brand Award rankings will provide consumers and industry professionals with a clear set of vehicle depreciation benchmarks and provide a yardstick for automotive brands to measure themselves."

The awards are arrived at after study of segment competition, historical vehicle performance and industry trends, according to Blair.

About ALG

Based in Santa Barbara, Calif., Automotive Lease Guide is a privately held company that has been forecasting automotive residual values for more than 35 years in both the United States and Canada.

Visit www.alg.com to learn more about the 2002 Residual Value Awards, or any of ALG's other products and services. For more information, contact Matt Walker, (805) 563-0777 x116, or email mwalker@alg.com.