To ask where the cars board is?

[XantheBreeze]

I’m looking for a small automatic car to suit a small (5’3) person and budget of up to £4500, low tax, probably 10 years old.
I’m hoping 10 year old cars can still be reliable!

I’d thought there must be a cars board on mumsnet but can’t seem to find one.

Can anyone point me in the right direction, or even better recommend a good car or website to look on?

Or tell me your positive or negative experiences of small, old (or high mileage) automatics?

Thanks!

Don't worry about mileage, high or low - just make sure that the service history is there, and commensurate with the age/mileage. Also check the service schedule for timely replacements ie cambelt replacements usually need to happen by year 10, regardless of mileage, that kind of thing. I also check the MOT history of potential cars - any lingering advisories put me off, as it shows lack of preventative maintenance imo. That has always worked for me.

You need a mechanic friend. Buying an old car can be a minefield as you never know how they've been treated. Some issues easily fixed and others could cost more than a car is worth.
We have 2 fords that are over a decade old now, dh maintains them very well and we drive to make stuff last. Our last family car was 10 years old when we traded it in for current one, the mechanics said the engine looked half it's age because of how well dh had looked after it.

Dh says Volvo, Honda or Toyota do well even if not so good with maintenance.

Seems to be a lot of love for the Honda Jazz on here .
We just sold ours and it was a brilliant car. Should be within your price range as ours was 2014 and we sold for less than £4K in excellent condition.
We're both short - 5'2 and 5'6 and it was a great size for us. Very comfortable and easy to drive (ours was automatic).

They're surprisingly good for storage as the back seats completely flatten. We upgraded to a Dacia Duster and there's not much more room in it, it's just higher. We only swapped because we will soon need room for 2 kids and we do a lot of shopping so didn't think the Jazz would be big enough. I've a feeling we'll still struggle with the new car.

@PissedOffNeighbour22 Your buyer was very fortunate! The cheapest Jazz automatic 2014 plate on autotrader is currently £5600 with 93,000 miles (excluding Cat S/ N cars)

Ahhhh, ours had less mileage than that too . We traded it in against the new car so knew we'd have lost a bit.
One garage offered us £2k and said they were offering more than it was worth which was obviously a load of BS .

I wanted to keep buy it off my DP for myself as my car is a 2003 plate but he persuaded me to stick with mine as I only drive it a few times a year.

One thing about Autotrader: if you're a cash buyer rather than looking for finance, there are far more options. So if you were thinking about finance, consider approaching your bank for a loan instead. I did that this summer, consolidating several debts and ending up on a much better interest rate. I managed to find a car for less than my budget, thanks to being able to widen my search to cash. The other thing I'd never done before is ordering a car from the other end of the country and having it delivered. Many garages were offering this for free/cheap during Covid, but most of those have stopped, and are now restricting free delivery to a certain radius. So I asked a local car transport company for a quote (much less than I expected!). Similar cars to the one I bought would have cost thousands more to buy in my area, so it worked out much cheaper to buy it and have it delivered.

@Trivium4all

One thing about Autotrader: if you're a cash buyer rather than looking for finance, there are far more options. So if you were thinking about finance, consider approaching your bank for a loan instead. I did that this summer, consolidating several debts and ending up on a much better interest rate. I managed to find a car for less than my budget, thanks to being able to widen my search to cash. The other thing I'd never done before is ordering a car from the other end of the country and having it delivered. Many garages were offering this for free/cheap during Covid, but most of those have stopped, and are now restricting free delivery to a certain radius. So I asked a local car transport company for a quote (much less than I expected!). Similar cars to the one I bought would have cost thousands more to buy in my area, so it worked out much cheaper to buy it and have it delivered.

What would have happened if you didn’t like it?

I can’t imagine buying a car I hadn’t driven.

My Mazda 2 is super reliable, I bought it new 13 years ago and she's never broken down on me. In all the years I've had it I've only had to change the brake disk and the rear engine mount after 10+ years (both parts cost less than £100).

She has never broken down on me, save for a few flat tyres as I used to forget to check tyre pressure, so my fault.

I've only every had it serviced 3-4 times

Oh and the Mazda 2 is London ULEZ compliant

@NavigatingAdolescence, you know, I'm not sure! But I have a friend with a virtually identical car, so I made sure I liked the make and model. So unless the car was completely not as advertised (in which case I would have had buyer protection), I knew it would be right for what I needed.

Almost all cars made since 2014 are ULEZ compliant.

@WouldIBeATwat

Almost all cars made since 2014 are ULEZ compliant.

My car is from 2008.

Suzuki are very reliable too, and cheap to run and maintain. A celerio or splash automatic would be affordable with your budget, OP.

My 2001 Yaris is still going strong, it’s needed a new battery and window seal in that time, but that’s it.

We own two Ford cars, one an 04 plate (under 40k on clock) and the other an 08 plate (70k on clock).

Both fantastically reliable and comfortable for me (5'2) to drive. Both sail through each MOT and parts are very easy to source and cheap as needed.

I had a similar brief to yours when I bought my Suzuki Swift about 4yrs ago. I love it. It was 11 years old when I bought it and I’ve had no problems with it.