NC'd for this. Looking for advice about cars on a limited budget. And I appreciate this is going to be a bit of a middle-class problem, and long! so apologies in advance.
Son is about to start his dream job as an airline pilot. He will be paid around £1200 per month take-home while he is still training, working from the last week in November but only being paid at the end of December.
He will be based around 25 miles from home for 3 months (on good motorways), so is going to live at home. After the 3 months he will be assigned a base which may be the same airport but more likely will not be - and could very likely be abroad.
I don't know much about cars. We have one car at home, an ancient VW Golf, aged 14 with 90K miles on the clock. It's been a great workhorse but is showing its age. He doesn't really want to use this car for commuting as he doesn't think it's quite reliable enough.
He is too young to hire a car (he is under 21).
Is he better to lease a tiny car for 3 months (£400 per month incl insurance for a Mini) or to take out a loan and buy a used car, in the knowledge that if he goes abroad he will have to sell it again? He has never borrowed money before (doesn't even have a credit card) - we bankrolled his flight training but now, with another student in the family, have no spare cash, so we couldn't buy him a car.
Whatever he does has to be very reliable, especially with winter coming on.
Anyone have any experience of this problem? If he were to buy a used car, what should he look out for?
If he were to lease a car, would he be better to pay out more money and get something bigger? I'm not sure I like the idea of him driving 50 miles a day in the winter in a teeny car.
Oh wise MNetters, please advise me!