What car do you drive?

[PizzaPatel]

Hi all!

im looking to replace my car with something cheaper. At the moment my car consumes a lot of petrol, is in a high car tax and insurance bracket and servicing/tyres etc are expensive. We’re also still paying it off monthly and it’s a lot per month, though only 12 months to go.

would love to hear from you if you drive a car that meets the following criteria!

• relatively low fuel consumption. Has to be petrol or hybrid - no diesel.


• standard car tax rate (our current car is more than £500 a year so anything less is fine)


• good safety features for a family car eg isofix, brake assist and ideally things like lane assist and cruise control for comfort


• mod cons like Apple CarPlay and Bluetooth


• DP will want it to be fairly attractive too…


• 5 seats/doors. we have 2 kids still in car seats

thanks!

Mine ticks all your boxes however it is a diesel, went from a petrol ford Focus which was getting 30mpg to a 1.5 QashQai which is averaging around 58mpg, I've almost halved the fuel costs overnight.

Tax is £150 a year and insurance is £250 a year.

Budget might help?

Out Toyota Yaris hybrid is brilliant. 10 years old and still going strong. Barely uses any fuel. Nice and easy to drive, agile.

We have a Citroen C3 and a Kia Sportage.

I love my C3, but DH is 6ft 4 and cannot drive it when both kids are in the car in their seats as there isn't enough legroom. He can't get his knees past the steering column. But I love driving it and he just about fits in the passenger seat It has lane assist, reversing camera/sensors, cruise control, CarPlay, a dash cam, etc. And it's nippy and fun to drive. And it's bright orange

The Kia isn't as fun to drive but it's more spacious and is just a safe, family car, no frills but good warranty, and we've never had any problems with it. DH uses it for work as he often has to transport computer equipment and we use it for longer family trips. Unremarkable but reliable!

We've got a Skoda Superb - still think of Skoda as a really naff marque (hang over from Cold War reputation!) but it's a very good car and you get a lot of features for your money - I sometimes joke that it's so clever it cam almost drive itself.

Not sure about the tax/insurance (it's one of the bills DH covers)

Honda Civic here, 2013 version. 40-42mpg so not brilliant but not crap. £130 tax. Reliable so far, nothing apart from consumables (70k). Rear space good as long as your kids not mega tall. Huge boot. Does well in safety ratings, airbags all over the place. Pretty pleased all round.

good point re budget! if we could pay less than 22/23k we can clear the finance on the existing car and buy the new one outright so that seems like a sensible budget.

we can’t have diesel as we live in the London ULEZ zone. I will look into the petrol qashqai though if such a thing exists @QforCucumber so thanks for the recommendation.

Will also look at the Toyota Yaris, Kia sportage and c3. I really like the look of skodas and a few people have told me that they’re brilliant and very reasonably priced cars so that’s a great shout. Thanks!

@Lonelycrab much better than my current car… 30mpg!! Life was frantic when I bought it and I didn’t do my research as well as I should have… just wanted a safe family car. Also didn’t realise about the car tax til I’d bought it!

Ford Fiesta Vignale, which is Ford's 'luxury' version of the Fiesta. I get about 40-50mpg and about 400 miles from a tank. Has all sorts of safety features including front and rear cameras and parking assist. Heated leather seats and steering wheel. Easy to park. 5 Doors, lots of mod cons. I have an automatic and I love it!

Mine is also a Yaris, petrol though. Has all the things you mentioned apart from Apple Play- but mine is old. It show as an iPod when I connect my phone to it
My mpg average is very close to 50mpg (my own readings rather than the car’s), mostly country roads/town driving.

I drive the new a Toyota Yaris that wicks all those boxes - I highly recommend it

Personally I’d always buy something a couple years old with 10-15k on the clock and save a ton but that’s just me. You have a good budget and you’d get a pretty amazing car if you bought like that. But I know the s/h market is hot (as well as new cars having a long wait time now) so that may not be simple either. Good luck!

Do you mainly drive in town/city or do you do lots of longer journeys? What kind of annual mileage do you do?

Kia Sportage. It's a bit boring but we get about 850km out of a tank - but that's a diesel hybrid. There is a petrol or electric version I think, no idea of prices for those options though.

We can fit 2 dogs, us, a child and a couple of suitcases in if we do a bit of Tetris (one of the dogs is harnessed on the back seat as he can't behave himself in the boot).

S/hand Volvo v40 T2, 5 door manual. Cost £12k for 2yo with 28,000 miles.

Solid build, costs me £270pa to insure fully comp, does 40 mpg, car tax £165. Lots of cabin space, boot is slightly smaller than my last car (Saab).

My qashqai is stopping economical - is a 1.5 diesel and a full tank goes on forever.
Dh keeps talking about changing it bit why would l?! £20 a year road tax and low insurance too.

The Volvo has all the Lane assist, collision radar, heated screens, tyre pressure sensors, bluetooth, other electronic features.

I've had it a year and keep finding more nice features.

Audi E Tron, it’s so nice, I’ve never had a decent car before.

I have a Citroen C3 Picasso. It has a nice spacious boot, the advantages of the MPV type model but also small enough parking is easy!

Mines diesel but petrol models are available.

Mines £30 a year on tax too!

@MintJulia my current car is a Volvo and I absolutely love it for all the reasons you mention - however it’s an absolute guzzler, costs a fortune to insure and each new tyre costs £200+ (and it’s not even one of the big SUVs)

@NightmareSlashDelightful I drive approx 7k miles a year when working - now I’m on mat leave doing approx 3k a year.

@BoJoGoGo is that electric? I’d LOVE an electric car but don’t have a driveway. Plus I reckon it’d be nearly impossible to get my hands on one at the moment.

@Lonelycrab that’s the plan - not interested in a new car but a newish one. We bought the current one with 4k miles on the clock and it was 2/3 of the price of new. Would buy anything up to about 15k miles on the clock - preferably not more than a couple of years old for technology reasons.

I drive the new Toyota Yaris hybrid too (2021 model) and its a lovely little car, great fuel efficiency, we also in the ULEZ zone, and most our driving is from London outwards, it handles well in London traffic and on motorways. Big fan.

I have a Skoda Kamiq, with Apple Play, touchscreen, auto DSG, etc. The insurance is about £280 and it gets 50 mpg on a run.

Oh yes forgot to say - i mostly drive in the city with occasional (every few weeks) trips on the motorway

@Bluevelvetsofa I noticed that one today - tempting

OK how about a Lexus. The NX is the mid-size SUV (so around the size of an Sportage, ish) and the vast majority you'll find nearly new will have a hybrid engine. Lexus is truly exceptional for reliability — a family member of mine had an old GS (big saloon) that got to 300,000 miles before he sold it, and the guy who owns it now is still driving it. Lexus was making hybrids while everyone else was still flogging diesels so they know a thing or three about it.

Another shout, if you don't want or need an SUV, would be a Toyota Corolla. The new shape one is a really well-resolved design; interesting enough but also coherent and not too aggressive. Again, most of them will have hybrid engines. There's a five-door hatchback or an estate, depending on how much room you need.

Final suggestion — Honda HRV. Qashqai-sized thing. Not hybrid (the new one is, but your budget gets you into the last of the previous shape ones, which were petrol or diesel only). But Honda reliability is also really good, and they're nice inside.