3rd row.

I always say, if I'm going to buy an SUV with only 2 rows, why not get a car?

Unless you are going to do some SERIOUS off-roading you really don't need a Jeep. It's a great marketing tool, but who ever really goes rock climbing in their vehicle? It's like driving around town in your Ferrari. It's nice to know you can do 0-60 in <4 seconds, but your likely (almost) never going to do it.

 

I had two GC's, 02 and an 05. The 05 was my tradein. Test drove the D and Overland. The longer wheelbase in the D made the ride much better. MI roads in winter call for AWD a lot, but I never tow or use low range, so I didnt need the offroad capabilities of the Jeep. I haul around a road bicycle in the back a lot and the extra cargo room in the D is great. The V6 has plenty of hp for my needs. Bought the Durango Citadel.

 

(JRRF) +1 on that.

But really just buy the one you like best. I looked at both but wanted the 3rd row and liked the aggressive look of the R/T

 

One more vote for 3rd row seat . . undoubtedly our main reason for choosing Durango over JGC

I am a Jeep fanatic, and I still prefer the looks and offroad capability of Jeep, but in the end, the extra cargo and 3rd seat was going to be more useful than occasional offroading capability.

We drove the Jeeps, and R/T. Both my wife and I preferred the feel of the R/T Durango. It seemed to handle better, more sporty.

Third reason - -> we need something to pull a heavy trailer, and the longer wheelbase seemed a better choice.

 

I know lots of us are saying 3rd and I kind of kicked that off, but I don't want one thing major to get lost in the translation, and that is that the new Durango is just an awesome model.

I stated the 3rd row because as awesome as the new Durango is, if it had NOT come with the 3rd row, I would have been forced to look elsewhere. But I am glad that it did offer it because the rest of the Durango is also just a great balance of everything for the SUV. The styling is great. It's my favorite looking SUV from the outside. The inside is very "luxurious" feeling, they're finally using better materials. It's light years ahead of any previous durango model. And the features, at least our citadel, it basically got everything I could ask for. Remote start, cooled seats, heated steering wheel and seats, ACC, rain sensing wipers, rear side collision, etc, etc, etc.

It's up against the MDX, Explorer, and XC90. The XC90, what we had, is a very good suv, but it's a very outdated model now. The MDX is more like the XC90. If one doesn't need to tow or the extra space, the MDX will probably be very high on the list, great tech in the MDX.

For a lot of people it will boil down to the Explorer or Durango. Again, if one doesn't need to tow, doesn't care about performance, and wants the best mileage, fuel efficiency is the one thing the Explorer has over the Durango. Most durnago reviews, they love everything about the durango, and really only ding it for fuel efficiency, but it's fuel efficiency with the 6 isn't really that bad. The only other major thing the Explorer had over the durango that I would have liked was the ford sync. The durango UConnect is good, does what it needs to, but I would have preferred the sync. Although, its give and take. I got the garmin uconnect and I do really really really like that we have garmin for our nav, factory integrated. I guess my real favorite would have been a ford sync with garmin nav but that doesn't exist.

I guess we are just very very lucky that the ONE "crossover" that can tow what we need, gives us plenty of space AND a 3rd row, and has tons of features, just also happens to be so good looking.

 

The MDX doesn't even have keyless entry, which today is a non-starter. I imagine it might in the future.

As for the XC90, yes it's very outdated, but the 2013 is supposed to be worth waiting for, and will have all the tech stuff that other Volvos have.

 

I've had four Grand Cherokees, the first three were the ex's daily drivers. Perfect size for me and they offered off-road capabilities out of the box that would allow them to be a secondary vehicle so I would not have to use my truck 100% of the time. We bought the first one when I started fishing bass tournaments heavily so that if my truck ever had an issue I'd have a second vehicle that could pull a bass boat and get it up a slippery ramp.

Being the previous owner of a Jeep pickup ('82 J10) and two Wranglers, going with Grand Cherokees was pretty much a no-brainer. We didn't even look at anything else.

When the time comes to replace my '02 Overland (my current daily driver) I am actually considering going back to a Wrangler again, now that they make an Unlimited model with four doors and the room I need.

Nothing against a Durango at all, but I guess I'm just a "Jeep" guy, LOL...