2nd kid arrived & upgrading tiny car - Is a 7 seater the way to go?

[songsea]

Hello,
We have a foolishly small Honda Jazz, which was already bursting at the seams with one child (now 3 years old), which is now comically full since our second born arrived 6 weeks ago. The two child seats only barely spin around in the car now, and the parcel shelf is long discarded to fit the giant pram in. If we ever have to go anywhere on an actual trip with suitcases - god help us!

Have come to the conclusion that we need to upgrade the car, and we seem to be stuck on the idea that we should go for a 7 seater, instead of just say, a saloon.

Our reasoning was that while we don't want any more children, we often have either a Nana or Grandad staying with us, and we no longer have use of a middle seat - and its difficult to imagine that anyone could ever be comfortable in a middle seat between two ISOFIX swivle 360 things between two children.

Additionally, when we've rented cars on holiday I've been surprised how little boot space even large-ish cars seem to have - vis-a-vis the amount of stuff you need for children, of course.

So basically;

1. Is a 7 seater the way to go here? Or can you suggest an alternative?
2. I've heard (from Mumsnet, i think!) good things about the VW Touran as a 7 seater - is that the preferred, go to model for a 7 seater option?

We have gone through this with our second being born 9 months ago and a trip to Disneyland 6 weeks later (dont). We also have a golden retriever! What is your budget and I’ll send some recommendations from our extensive (painful) research.

We actually didn’t opt for 7 seater in the end and now have a massive car with massive boot space and an adult comfortably fits in the middle at the back (or we move both seats to one side as it has 3 isofix). It’s not our fave aesthetically but it’s been life changing!

We had a Touran for years with 2 children. It was pretty good. Definitely useful when transporting other kids or taking grandad etc on hols.

I upgraded to a 7 seater when second DC came along. It’s a god send. Easy enough to pick up cousins for play dates, friends from school if going to parties on a weekend, etc.

Having my back two seats up makes my boot redundant, but it is really handy to have those extra seats when needed. At some point, I’ll buy a roof box for storage for when we do need to have the seats up and need space for stuff.

Got a 9 seater Vauxhall Vivaro. A taxi basically. Even that's feeling a bit cramped at times!

We have a Kodiaq, so you can have two extra seats up in the boot or a have them down and have a massive boot. It’s handy having flexible space. We have a big roof box too for times we need to use the back two seats on holiday. You can also choose to have only one seat up so retain half the boot space if you are only having one extra person.

It’s not an exciting car but it’s a big solid family car that is great for driving holidays.

We got a 7 seater at thst point for grandparent transport - we don’t see them very often, but when we do we go out for the day and it makes rhe difference.

When we had our second child, we upgraded to a Subaru Forester. It's not 7 seat, more like five with three in the back, but it has a big cargo area, fold down back seats and is very reliable and fun to drive.

We have a touran and I find it really good. When the back seats are down there is a lot of boot space.Although if I'd known the difference at the time we were buying we would have gone for the Sharan (sliding doors)

We got a Seat Alhambra when we had our second. It’s the same car as the VW Sharan just a different badge and the bigger cousin of the VW Touran. The sliding doors are a lifesaver with little kids.

A good example of the Alhambra is very hard to find these days. They are all at least 5 years old and hold their price quite well since being discontinued

I bought a Zafira after 3 nights away with DH and our then young teens meant I nearly had to put a roofbox on my Toyota Corolla. I can count on one hand the number of times I actually used the very back row of seats but the boot was huge without them up. I know several people who have had the Citroen C4 7 seater (a couple of them have had more than one).

What size are the GPs? My mum is tiny, size 8 and about 160cm so fitted in the middle seat between two full 5 point harness seats and now completely comfortably between two boosters in our CR-V.

A jump to a 7 seater seems like a lot for 2 DC to me.

We bought a 7 seater after dc2 and it was a godsend in the primary school years. Brilliant for play dates as could bring a friend home each and a huge boot for buggies and bags etc

We have a Skoda Octavia which has tonnes of boot space. Nana (who is admittedly rather thin) fitted in the middle, between two car seats when we had them. There’s loads of leg room for all. And the fuel economy is excellent. We haven’t regretted it for a second. The 7 seater seems to be an awfully big jump with only 2 kids and much more expensive to run. Also, have you looked at the price difference and how many uber journeys you could book for nana to follow behind you to the soft play or wherever you’re going for the same cost?

If you're not quite wanting to bite the bullet on a 7 seater op then it would be worth looking at a Renault scenic and the Citroen Picasso range. We have a scenic and it's three separate seats in the back so car seats don't encroach as much as they do on a bench style seat. the boot is massive as well. It's certainly the same in the c4 Picasso, and the c3 version is fairly spacious too.

My 7 seater experience wasn’t great (Toyota verso). The extra back seats were very small, and not really suitable for adults imo, and definitely not for the gps who had some minor mobility issues, or the one who was overweight.

The middle seats were needed for the car seats. There was sitting room in between them for an agile, average sized adult. But when they outgrew the car seats stage, I wasn’t 100% comfortable sitting my dc in the crumple zone. Or anyone else’s dc really.

Maybe it wasn’t the best choice because it was on the smaller end of 7 seaters. I guess I needed more of a tank. Also I had to fold down the back row to have decent boot space, which was regularly needed. It was however easy to park, and lovely to drive.

Before that I had a Skoda Octavia which had the most enormous boot (double buggy, umbrella fold single buggy, two kids bikes and the shopping) and enough room across the back seat for two car seats and a booster. Much more practical car for my needs.

When I had DS2 we bought a Mondeo estate, massive boot, nice to drive, and space between the two cat seats for an adult (my ample arse fits comfortably!). Would definitely recommend.

We have a ford s-max with only 2 kids. Massive boot, can put seats up when needed to give lifts to friends or grandparents when needed. Perfect for camping trips and driving holidays. Very glad to have it but probably won't buy another when it dies now the kids are older and need less stuff.

Honestly.. unsure. Maybe around 15k. Hate spending money on cars as its an immediately declining asset that you never seem to stop paying for!

Id recommend to take a look at the Citroen berlingo, we have the 5 seater version which we have found massive, tonnes of storage, flexible with the 3 isofix etc. But we do only have 1 parent on each side so can manage with just 1 extra seat. They do also do a 7 seater version though. We paid under 9k for our 5 seater 2018 model, low mileage and high spec so I think you could come in well under budget even for the 7 seater.

Thank you to everyone for their experience and advice, I think i have somewhere to start. I never loved the little Jazz anyway so i won't miss it!

Now all i need to do is to convert all the awful car lingo when i look at specs into a beautiful excel spreadsheet that i can stress over the minor details of :)

I don't love driving a massive car, so we went for the 5-seater estate car option like some PPs. I wanted to add - it's tricky to squeeze in between two spin seats, but much easier (if you are quite small) if one of the seats is just a normal HBB or ERF seat. Your 3yo won't be in a spin seat much longer, so reconsidering DC1's seat might give you more options if you decide you don't want a 7-seater. We have a roof box for holidays.

We’ve had 2 Tourans. Loved them. The back row seats are really only for occasional use, they’re quite a squeeze but fine for short journeys. I really thought it would be too small for three children but we weren’t in a position to change it when number 3 came about and it was actually fine until we had three teenagers.

But then we got the vw Sharon with the amazing sliding doors. Sliding car doors are a life changer! (WTF has my life become? 🙄)

I think you will find that most 7 seater have much reduced boot space when the additional row of seats are in place. If this is just so that you can take a grandparent or child's friend on trips etc you might find you still have the small boot conundrum. We have 2 kids and had a Volvo v50 estate followed by an XC60 SUV both had plenty of space, especially if you add a roof box.