How do you choose a car?

I picked my used Fiesta because there’s a Ford garage walking distance from my house and because it’s the right size for me and because I could afford it.

Sometimes we overcomplicate these things, IMO.

Years ago, I was siting in a pub with my husband eavesdropping quite a heated conversation about cars and what to do.

1 option was - to buy the cheapest brand new car which at the time was a 2CV, the insurance and running costs were very reasonable and you shouldn’t have any problems for 10 years.

Another option was to buy a three year old cortina, very comfortable to drive but a much more expensive way to go, engines in those days unless really well looked after needed replacing at around 75,000miles.

Another option was to look for the archetypal 20 year old car that only went out twice a week to the hairdressers, shopping and of course church on Sunday!

We actually bought an XR3 brand new in 1981 on very low interest finance, had it for nearly twenty years until it rusted apart sadly.

Coukf you go electric, because the Dacia spring if you look on AutoTrader, you can get a pre registered one for £10,000 and a brand new one for about £11,000. The batteries are guaranteed for eight years too and they gave a range of 140 odd miles.

If not, personally the way car market is at the moment, I woukd look for that archetypal car and they are around. A friend has just bought a 25year old Jaguar for £2,000. It hasn’t even done 60,000 miles yet and it is mint.

Another of our friends has a Renault Laguna 59plate and that had 25,000 miles from brand new and cost £2,500 three years ago.

Vauxhall Insignias are very reasonable but often high mileage.

Dacia Dusters seem nice too, as do Nissan Jukes.

Whst do u look at on the road and think “um yes please” - I have a Saab convertible these days which is worth a few hundred pounds now, and I woukd definitely get another, or if I wanted to spend £16,000-£20,000 I love the e class Mercedes Convertible - s really smart one of those makes me go like I do over the Saab and XR3.

look firward to your reply

Oh and also, filter out anything that is an insurance write off or part write off. So make sure you select “exclude” for the “previously written off” filter. I also won’t touch anything that is an import. I don’t know where you live but I would try and make sure the car is ULEZ complaint too.

I went to a car dealership and test drove a few of their cars around the lot. I found that I liked the way Hyundai, Toyota and Fiat drive, but I don’t really like Ford, Skoda or Renault. It’s something about the way the gears are balanced and the feel of the pedals.

After that it comes down to what I can afford to spend and how old a car I am prepared to buy. You can figure that out by looking online.

When you have your eye on something take it for a test drive. Open it up on the motorway. Do a three point turn. Parallel park. Have a google for common problems with that model.

You really are at a huge advantage if you’re not concerned about colour and brands.

Start by going onto Autotrader website.

Using the filters, set your budget. Then select your preference between petrol and diesel. Then select your preference between manual and automatic. Personally I normally select “trade” rather than private when spending that amount of money that you have said.

Run that search first without any other filters on. That will bring up all cars of all different makes.

Next, sort the results by mileage.

I always buy cars on my own and the following have never failed me:-

1.) Lowest mileage I can get for my budget.

2.) Lowest number of previous owners (I tend to buy cars that have only had one previous keeper from new)

3.) Always full service history (ideally full MANUFACTURER service history)

4.) Reliable make

5.) I then look at what’s fits within the above criteria and when I find something I like the look of I ALWAHS run an MOT check to see what faults or advisories that car has previously had. In an ideal world I’m looking for ones with a real clean sheet.

6.) Once I’ve found one I like I check the running costs eg mpg, annual tax, insurance category.

7.) Colour and gadgets are always last on my list. They are not as important but for resale value I do try not to buy entry level cars.

if you can find anything that is “manufacturer approved” (a filter on autotrader) you will pay a bit more for it but may get some things included eg 1 year manufacturer warranty, service plan etc

£10,000 is a decent budget for what you need so you shouldn’t have issues.

Good luck

I look at:

What's around £5k 😂
Low milage
3 month warranty

TIP: if you're looking for reliability, look at what your budget gets you e.g. a Ford X or Nissan Y, and then see how many are on the roads with the same year of registration. If there are loads, isld assume them to be liked and reliable.

I'd also pick something common for spare parts And low previous owners.

Dacia Duster all the way. No frills motoring, great reliability and the older ones are just as good as the newer ones. Mine does about 60mpg and is cheap for parts as well.

Go to a showroom, sit in loads of cars in your budget and see what you like/don’t like. Make sure car seats fit in the back with room to grow and that the boot is big enough.

If you do longer trips most weeks go for a diesel but if it’s just short trips with some longer drives mixed in then go for petrol. No need for hybrid (though always a bonus if you can get it).

Ask on the car buying forum of Pistonheads (I feel like I’m going to be kicked off MN for mentioning them 🤣) with your budget and what you want and you’ll get a fair few replies.

Good luck!

We have just bought the car we had as our hire car on holiday because it was so brilliant to drive (a Volvo). I wouldn’t have had a clue otherwise!

Buy a Honda.

Thank me later.

You can narrow it down on auto trader by putting in size of car, cost, mileage, previous owners, engine type, fuel type, number of doors, age of car, etc. Might there be some reviews of different size cars that you could look at from a reliable organisation like Which?

I’d recommend click-a-mechanic. Once you decide on a car, get them to go afterwards. They’ll do a check of loads of stuff internal and external engine stuff and cosmetic damage etc. We did this. They were great. A few things needed attention and the garage sorted them all out before we bought the car.

Start budget of course, then open Google lol and decide on your Model size (eg has to be super mini category for my needs and preferences), then an efficient engine size, then looks (I can’t abide an ‘ugly’ car 😅) and then last consideration is which out of all of those left so the most reliable brand.

I researched long and hard and test drove ALL the cars on my shortlist and then my preferred one, I searched throughout the UK tbh as there can easily be a thousand or two difference in price which sometimes makes it a viable option when you factor in petrol/train fare to get there and chances you’ll be driving the car park petrol - and if the maths makes sense then you should go further afield. One of my cars I bought took me from the West Mds to Yorkshire to an independent family seller and I remember having a tea in their farm house kitchen (a real farm btw!) whilst signing the paperwork whilst fussing over their gorgeous Border Collie pup. Was a really nice memory to have attached to a car purchase.

Btw my current car is a Mazda 2 (2017) bought from new and never ever had a days problem with it. Fantastic little car.

If reliability is your main issue (and it was certainly mine) then WhatCar Warrantywise and MotorEasy all publish lists of the most reliable cars based on breakdown data. Japanese brands like Toyota, Suzuki and Honda regularly top the lists but its worth looking at individual models. We have a 2009 Toyota Verso from new that's never needed any major repairs and a 2013 Honda Jazz bought second hand 5 years ago that again has been perfectly reliable.

You could ask the mechanic who looks after your current car for a recommendation.

I did think about leaving a bad review on Google but decided that might be a bit petty 🤭 there are a couple of very similar ones I think we'll look at but might revisit if it remains unsold (via the manager, with a lower offer)

If it’s reliability you want I would go for a VW or Toyota.
Might cost a bit more & might have to go for an older model .
Set your budget then mileage you are prepared to accept .
Automatic or manual ?
Insurance group ?
Boot size ?
Extras like parking sensors cruise control reversing cameras are very nice but to be honest you don’t need them .
Air con is a non negotiable for me but my mother never uses it on her car .
You can look up MOT history on line now & you can also do a check to see if any outstanding finance on the vehicle .
Are your children likely to drive it or learn to drive it ?
Again think about insurance for them .
After driving company cars for years I had to buy my first car .
Had a super VW polo SE for five years smashing wee car . Moved up to a Mini Cooper nice but expensive to run & insurance for teens was a lot
Audi A1 was nice mileage is now getting high so I am thinking about another VW or considering a Toyota as so many friends recommend them.
My partner has a BMW lovely car to drive and loaded with gadgets but super expensive for servicing however great mileage to the gallon .
All cars have positives and negatives it’s about compromising .
Good luck !

Good for you! Try ringing his manager on Monday. You might find they are oddly receptive. Unless you get a better deal elsewhere of course!

I am going to go electric and thinking Hyundai KONA because it has a £300 mile range which means I only need to charge it once every 10 days or so (depending on weekend plans).

If I wasn’t I’d be looking for a Mazda, Toyota, non-electric Hyundai or a Skoda, possibly a Seat but they being discontinued and I’d worry about getting parts, but then maybe I don’t need to as the parts are mostly the same as Skoda, VW and BMW.

Not successful unfortunately, the salesman was oddly rude and combative. The asking price was £16k, there were a couple of small issues so I asked if they'd take £15k today (as a starting point, thinking we could meet somewhere in the middle), he just point blank said no, we don't negotiate. I then asked if there was any play in the part ex value (and said we may sell it privately if not) but again he said no then more or less accused me of lying about quotes we'd had elsewhere for the car. I then asked if they would fix the issues prior to sale and he said no as they don't affect performance?? So we walked away. At least we know what car we want now but will buy elsewhere.

My DH is a mechanic and other family are in the industry - I went for a Madza 2. Google reliable engines, use CHATGPT to narrow down which year to buy.

Skoda are also pretty good.

Unfortunately individuals saying "I've had an xyz, they're really reliable, you should get one" doesn't really help. If you go to the WhatCar web site they have lists of the most reliable manufacturers. It's always the Japanese brands. Whatever people think VW, Skoda, Seat are no better than average reliability. Of course individual experience can vary. We had a Passat for years that never actually let us down on the road, but it certainly needed warranty work, whereas our Hyundai has never seen a workshop. Someone else may have the opposite experience.

Good luck! You just need to enter your details into webuyanycar etc to see what they would offer you so you have that information. You don’t need to show them or prove it. And you can always take your car out of the equation at any point should someone offer you more. I always like to push every angle of the deal. I once offered £1500 less (deliberately) for a car on behalf of a friend who was trying to buy it only for the salesman (who tbf did know what I did) to say ‘but we’ve only got £600 in this car’ to which I said ‘excellent, we’ll have that then’ if you chat loads to the salesperson, kill them with kindness and get to know them they’ll be more disposed to getting you a better deal from their manager. They also might let slip information useful to you. It doesn’t have to be combative 😉

I think you need to work out what your budget is and what you want.

Eg. Diesel, petrol or electric?
Hatchback, SUV or estate
What gadgets are a minimum. For me i do lots of miles and like cruise control, so that would be an essential.
Look at servicing costs and what you can afford. BMWs, VWs etc have higher part and servicing costs.
What type of engine you need. I have 1.5 tdci. Low roadtax, extremely fuel efficient, should go on for a long time as its a diesel.
I used to own VWs but have had a Ford Focus for 10 years. It's done 190,000 miles and failed its most recent MoT on a broken headlight clip. An easy and cheap fix. On she goes. I'm aiming for the 200k mark

It has to be quirky for me, and most cars these days have the appeal of a pair of elasticated waist, navy blue polyester trousers. I’ve had several classic minis, a Citroen 2CV, a slight deviation when DS was a baby with a Hyundai i10, more classic minis and now an ancient Smart ForTwo convertible.

I’ve no idea what I’ll do when my current car has to go to the scrapyard in the sky because I’ve not seen anything I really like for ages.

Thank you! It's a used car but under 3 years so no MOT as yet. We're buying cash and considering part ex. I'll try and get a quote for selling our car elsewhere, although might be too late for that. I'll try and aim for that £500 off and see how we get on 🤞