Tell me about your 7+ seater cars

[HereForTheLineEyes]

We currently have a Mitsubishi Outlander. It has 7 seats, but seat 6 and 7 aren't full seats and effectively take up the whole boot when up. This is impractical as even my 9 year old finds them small and uncomfortable, we have a dog and a buggy and so need the boot space, and to get into the boot I have to take out a car seat from the middle row first (car seats will only fit in the two outside seats on the middle row). Come the spring we will have 4 kids, 2 in bulky car seats, 1 in a less bulky booster type seat.

So ideally I'd like:

At least 7 full-size adult seats

5* NCAP rating
Big enough boot to hold large dog and buggy
Good fuel economy

We have been looking at the Ford Galaxy for a while, and recently at the Renault Grand Scenic Dynamic because it's fuel efficiency is so good.

I have looked at minivan type 8 seaters in the past but they seem to be very fuel hungry.

Budget isn't huge, about £8-12k

What have you got? What do you like about it? What would you change about it?

I have a Citroen Spacetourer (the XL model), because we have six children, so 8/9 seats is a must. It's my car/minivan, as I'm the one who takes the children to/from school, because of DH's hours. However, when we go somewhere as a whole family, DH and I take in turns to drive.

The whole minivan look takes some getting used to, and it's not the best looking vehicle to drive, but practicality wins for me, over aesthetics.

I see you said that's what you're looking at, and I can recommend the Spacetourer. It comfortably fits our brood, and our two dogs!

Oh and I think my Spacetourer is about 46mpg, which for a vehicle of that size, is pretty good!

Thanks cheese, always good to hear from someone who has one. I don't know if I will get DH talked around on it. For me a car is jusy something to get you from A to B and practicality wins every time, hopefully he will see sense!

Hihi, we also have a VW Transporter (or Multivan as they call the model that is used for transporting people instead of tools . My husband hated it at first but we tested all sorts of fancy seven seaters (Volvo, Landrover etc) but none of them were a match in terms of space. We also wanted to have a gasoline one instead of diesel as it will do much of the school run later and we had huge problems with the particle filter on diesel cars before. The Multivan was the only one with decent seats and with a lot of additional space for buggies etc.

Look at Toyota Alphard or Hyundai i800 for the seats plus boot space. Also a Toyota Hiace. They're huge and easy to drive, room for dogs too.
We've now got a Nissan Pathfinder, enough legroom for adults in the rear two seats and we can just about fit our pointer in the boot but I wouldn't do it for anything other than short journeys.

We have a Citroen. They are very cheap and very hardy but the suspension is rubbish if you sit anywhere but the front seats. Fantastic boot space, though. DH loves it even though it's just a van with windows!

Another vote for the Hyundai i800. We are on our second and love them!

Pros:
8 full size seats
Large boot space
5 year warranty
Very reliable
High driving position
Fuel consumption in the mid 20's on a run.
In bad weather just open the side doors and jump in out the rain, and you have space to sort the kids out without your backside hanging out the car getting wet!

Cons:
Crap in the snow
3rd row of seats don't fold down
Some may find it too big to drive (I personally love mine!)

We have an old ford galaxy and I love it. It's lasted so well. We need to upgrade soon and will be sticking with the Galaxy