Aibu to ask for your best car for teen recommendations

[Bluejeanjen]

My god son is learning to drive and needs a car. The insurance is mental! I’m going to help him out and he has savings. He has a max budget of about 4K (I know - lucky boy!) and I’ll be giving him £1000 but there will be about £1300 insurance to cover! I’m not very car savvy. Any one have experience in this? Is it better to go really old for the first one or a bit newer. The insurance seems as bad for all! Thanks so much

Most of the apprentices at my work have a Ford Fiesta

I'm not car savvy but I would go for something abit newer so it's more reliable.
I would say corsa, Astra, fiesta are good first cars.

Insurance will be high until his second year.
Get parents on as named drivers, also if he doesn't need to commute for work this can help. Also look into black boxes.
I would make sure excess isn't really high incase anything was happening.

My 2 had a VW Polo and a Renault Clio.

We used Ingenie for the insurance. They’re specialists in learner and new driver insurance. They put a black box on the car but there’s no curfew and if they driver carefully their premiums come down. We, also, put me and DH on as named drives as that decreases it too, however you must put the youngster as the main driver.

We got my dss one of the clios not the first one but not the new Renault clios. Cost us £700, like new inside (total bargain) insurance was just over 1 thousand for the year.

Toyota Aygo or Peaugot C1 or the Citroen equivalent. If you google lowest insurance for new drivers you will get a list but we've been really happy with the Aygo and he will pick up a nice one within his budget.

Jeremy Clarkson said that if all young drivers drove old Volvo's there would be no road deaths in young drivers. Why not look for an old volvo?

Best car is none until they have left school.

Hope you don’t mind, jumping on thread to follow, DS just started learning to drive and we need to get a car soon.

Engine size dictates the insurance so don't buy anything with bigger than a 1 litre engine

DD and her friends have a mix of Sukuki Alto, VW Polo, Hyundai i10, Citreon C1, Vauxhall Corsa etc

It’s likely that sometime within the first couple of years new drivers are likely to have a bump of some description so I would be looking for a sturdy car.

I was looking at i10 but they just seem so small. I worry they wouldn’t be very safe…..I’m probably letting my old age influence me as I just see tiny cars as being flimsy….I’m overwhelmed with looking to be honest

Toyota Aygo - a safe car and low on insurance.

Also WHERE do I look? Places like cinch and cazoo are out of budget. Do I go eBay classifieds or is there somewhere better like exchange and mart (is that even still a thing?)

Ours are still too young but when the time comes we'll be considering crash safety ratings over cost and style. I've seen some complete beginner youngsters in some tiny, flimsy cars 😢

We got our kids cars from garages.

The big dealer types, they have second hand cars in.

Car dealers.
Don't do auto reader eBay etc.
I remember my mum asking the garage where she took her car for MOT etc to recommend a car dealer when I got my first car.
They were helpful and we did buy from where they recommended

We got our son a Vauxhall Tigra. It's only got 2 seats as we didn't want him doing "lifts". Insurance was ok even though it's 1400cc

Exchange and mart is good - you can filter by dealerships near to you. Look at ones who offer a good warranty and then google those dealerships and search the internet for reviews etc etc.

As others have said ideally you want something with a small engine - around 1 litre for cheaper insurance. Polo, Fiesta, Picanto, anything like that (Kias tend to get overlooked but they have a fantastic 7 year warranty so if you get a reasonably new one it should still come with some of that with it - as a family we have had 2 Kia’s now, a venga and a Sportage and we love them, they feel very secure and comfortable to drive too- although probably not the “coolest” of cars for a teen)!

Oh sorry meant auto trader not exchange and mart I think!

In June we bought our teens a Peugeot 108 which I found on the AA website. It's a 65 plate and was £5000 with 30,000 miles on it. There are some great small cars around, it's a case of knowing what you're looking for.

Skoda Citigo is an excellent first car. Little but sturdy and insurance group 1

@Dmsandfloatydress

Jeremy Clarkson said that if all young drivers drove old Volvo's there would be no road deaths in young drivers. Why not look for an old volvo?

Unfortunately, because the kind of Volvos Clarkson was talking about are hot commodities. I learned to drive and drove for my first six years in a 1983 Volvo estate. I was hit from behind on a dual carriageway by a man-in-a-van who didn’t even hit the brakes. His van, destroyed. My Volvo, scuff on the huge rubber bumper. I had a bit of whiplash and that was it. I still love estates, because it lets some arsehole behind you make a horrible mistake (if you can’t drive to avoid them) with more room before the damage reaches the driver or passenger seats in your car.

Now there are only 2 of that Volvo model on Autotrader UK. One has 95,000mi on it and they want £4,000, while the other has 252,000mi (not a typo) and they want £2,500. And those are the only two of pre-2000s (when repairs started getting MUCH more expensive) models I could even find.

DS has a Skoda Fabia. The insurance was £1000 after passing his test. It went down to £600 after a year. I used a comparison site to find a good price.

@Bluejeanjen

I was looking at i10 but they just seem so small. I worry they wouldn’t be very safe…..I’m probably letting my old age influence me as I just see tiny cars as being flimsy….I’m overwhelmed with looking to be honest

No that'll be fine, it's not like the cars of yesteryear. Airbags and compulsory safety features all over it. I saw one of those tiny Hyundai's after colliding with an ambulance on blue lights, the 3 passengers inside were all fine.