Parents of 3 or more. What car do you drive?

[girlsyearapart]

Hi I am due in august with dc3. The dds will be 2 and 3 in September.Anyway we will struggle to fit into the car we have now so are looking to buy a new one.

I am not the world's most confident driver so I don't want a bus but would like a 7 seater so if dc4 ever makes an appearance we wouldn't have to change again.

Budget 5-7 grand.

Thanks.

We've got a Volvo V70 with the two seats in the boot and have been really pleased with it. You have to do without the boot when there are seven in the car, obvious I know but just to point out. Boot seats are fine for upto 7 or 8 years, but we've got a teenager now and will have two in a year or so, plus one in a booster seat, so we're buying a nearly new Chrysler Grand Voyager. It's huge inside, much more space than XC90, perfect for taking gran too. Off to France in the summer, all six of us, with luggage and can't wait.

neenz - you can fit 3 across the back of our CMAX but now they are out of the car seats with harness and in highback boosters it is a major PITA trying to get two seat belts done up.

With our new 7 seater I don't know what is going to be better have seen two rows of two with the middle seat taken out for easy access to rear and someone who had taken one of the window seats out for more space. I have to admit for the school run I put DD1 in the front in her highback booster

that's ok neenz glad to be of service.

DH still thinks we don't need a new car and that I'm being a brat for accepting money from my parents for it..
The car we have has a middle lap belt,not enough space to fit the dds car seats plus a rear facer in, only just about enough room for a booster cushion in the middle. Front seat has airbag. Asked about installing proper belt in middle and/or deactivating airbag. Said at garage will be very hard to add belt as our car is 2002 and doesn't have some reel or something (??) and they are no longer allowed to deactivate the airbag as illegal..

Even if I did either of them there still wouldn't be enough room to fit us all in- including dh on journies. Even though we don't all go in the car together much we still do it at least once every few weeks especially when weather is nice.

Anyway sorry for long rant! Am going to ignore him, gratefully accept money from my parents (coming off future inheritance) and buy a 7 seater.

I can't believe no-one's mentioned the Toyota Previa! Can't buy them new anymore but they are amazing. Proper seats in the back that are removed rather than fold down so are safer. I absolutely love it.

VW Touran is brilliant - 7 seater and can fit 3 car seats across middle row.
Good quality - when we took ours for an MOT (to a non VW garage) I was told that it would "sail through as it's a VW". It did!

We have child number four on the way, and bought a Renault Grand Espace when number 3 arrived. I really like it - the seats are 'proper' seats not flip up seats and we should be able to run it into the ground as there is enough legroom for 4 teenagers. A friend of mine who has 5 DCs and a 56 plate Ford Galaxy is having to think again because the flip up back seats don't have enough scope for sliding to give the older ones legroom. Downsides are that the seats are very heavy to get in and out, and it's not brilliant on fuel consumption around town, but it's an amazing motorway cruiser and we did a huge mileage in France last year with fab MPG. We do have parking sensors on the rear bumper (although they're not currently working!) but it's only 7 cms longer than our old Passatt Estate.

Toyota Previa 8 seater, 'tis the best car we ever had

another vote for the VW Touran - totally love it

Just saw your post Picante - I LOVE my Toyota Previa - the most reliable car I've ever owned, comfy bench seats, huge amounts of space inside plus mega boot space plus sliding doors. Also looks gorgeous in deep metallic red, silver, green or blue. No longer in manufacture so you have to buy 2nd hand but they NEVER break down and are all round 100% Purrrrfick

This is a great thread, thanks. Now I know what sort of car to aim for, will make list of possibilities for dh.

Would like to fit 3 dc across the middle row and maybe have back seats for occasions when grandparents might want to hop in too. Can't be too big a car though as live in London and have to park on narrow streets and don't use the car that much anyway.

someone earlier mentioned mercedes - my in laws have an E class estate which is huge and £££ but i don't think you could get 3 car seats across the back in it.

My bus was/is an ancient Toyota Lucida.
Good points;
Space-AMAZING
Slidey doors
Nice and high up
Could swizzle the back seats
Could fit a sofa from ikea in the back, plus the other bobbins you pick up!
We fit a christmas tree, rocking horse, pushchair & christmas shopping in the boot alone once!

Bad points;
Piss-poor visibility
Bugger to park (I'd park miles from the supermarket if no mama-baby spaces.)
Quaffed fuel(But so old you could put cooking oil in the tank.)
Couldn't hear when people were talking to you inthe back. We had a tin-can phone installed.

Ours was an import, so parts were really expensive.(£200 for a light swith, anyone?)

I want an xc90! Alas too poor.
Can the boot-seats in the Volvo estates be retro-fitted, grown-up ladies?

Another vote for the Galaxy - new style rather than old as this means the seats fold flat and don't have to be lifted in and out as they are needed. Bought ours a month ago as we're expecting number 3 imminently and would not have fitted 3 car seats in the Volvo V50! Originally were looking at a similar budget to yours but decided we wanted a car that was going to last a long time - i.e. whilst the DCs all grow into teenagers. So we've blown the budget but feel it was well worth it. It's a proper 7 seater - adults fit in the rear including my pregnant self and my 6ft 3" DH! (Tried the S-max but not so good on the headroom.) Very easy to drive but then I love driving! Parking sensors an absolute must though - hate not being able to see the end of the bonnet.
On a budget of £5 - £7 K we were looking at the old style Galaxy / Sharan / Alhambra. My uncle has the the Sharan and it is very roomy and seems better specced than the others. They are all the same car - just slight variations in what comes as standard. We also looked at the Renault Grand Scenic - okay to drive, depending on engine, mpg very good but the older ones do feel van-like. We did a lot of research and were put off in the end by the numerous bad reviews about things going wrong - whilst we may have got lucky with a reliable 2nd hand one I felt there was a higher chance that we wouldn't! Good luck - it's a minefield!

those q7 things are driven by a few of my friends - we call them 'inverse tardis' as they are huge on the outside but tiny on the inside

we have a kia sedona. its fab to drive with excellent visability, parking sensors help, bags of room for 7 people with individual seats and still room for double pram, two dogs and shopping.

downside, drinks fuel with 2.9L engine

would buy another one though.

I absolutely love our xc90. 7 full size seats and still plenty of boot space left over. Feels really safe too. Highly recommended. The built in booster is really handy too

Recently bought a Gran espace and i absolutely love it. Expecting DC no 5, but have long teenage legs and a double mountain buggy to accomodate too.
Everyone is very comfy in there, and loads of space. a lovely drive and quite short in the bonnet so easier to park than I imagined.
Expensive to fix though, but in our opinion worth it.

Five......
Would a double mountain buggy fit into an estate d'ya think?

My eyes are burning from looking at autotrader daily for the last 3 weeks!

my vote for the s-max. you only have to flip 1 of the middle rows seats to get in to the third row. My 10 year old and 5 year old are v happy right at the back but too squashed for 14 year old for a long journey. It's really safe too, which was a huge priority for me, curtain airbags go right to the back. My pal has a grand scenic, she loves it, same issue with third rows seats for shorter journeys though, but they
are safe and the cheapest 7 seater i think.
we had a zafira before, was pants cos you have to slide the WHOLE back seat forwards to let third row out, which means undoing seatbelts and taking out car seats real PITA!

I'm loving my Volvo XC90 - the inbuilt middle booster seat means that is can fit my 5 yo, 2 yo and baby int he back. Loads of room in the boot which can be covnerted into 7-seater mode if need extra seats for gp's and school run friends.

when they were all tiny - ds1 4yo, ds2 1yo, expecting dd at the time, we had a Zafira,which was ok seating wise but absolute pants for visibility with big pillars at the sides of the windscreen and big blindspots no matter what you do with the mirrors! OK for fuel economy but too expensive to justify transporting me to work and two dc to nursery, all in the next town - about 30 mile round trip a day. Now they're 4,6 &9 I fit em all in a Toyota Yaris The stage 1 seat's always been in the middle and the boys do their own seatbelts in high back boosters. These days ds1's allowed in the front on his booster if there's just me and kids.

whenw e had a shortlist we went to out local car supermarket and crawled over wach one. we looked at the chrysler voyager (no no no!), the espace, the grand espace, the galaxy, the fusion, the multipla, the previa....
only you know what will work for your kids. so you have to go and see/touch/play with each one. you will need a lot of boot space for junk, so 3 proper seats is essential for the second row.

and re the galaxy - i can sit very comfortably in the back (i am 5'4"), so may not suit tall men, but prob ok for kids for a while.

oh and we have got 3 car seats into the back of a fiesta since they were 6 months old.

We have 3 dc's and changed our car recently, we were looking at S Max which looked lovely and loved Nissan Qashqai, but we ended up with a totally unsuitable family car in the sports version - this is what happens when you send dh out to test drive cars because it's too snowy and icy to go out with him.
Think he's having a mid life crisis - and he only drives it once a week on the weekends I'm in it 99.9% of the time.

His argument is that older dc's will in the next year or so not need a booster seat and younger dc will go into a high back booster so we don't need a huge people carrier.

Yes I sort of see his point but still think we should have gone with the SMax.

we have zafira and you dont not have to slide whole row back - i just flip one seat - make sure thats the seat with the high back booster and not the stage one car seat that would prevent it flipping because its very acttached with isofix.