Which estate and Diesel or Petrol?

[PigeonPie]

I need to replace my lovely 10 year old Peugeot 307 estate after a tosspot chap drove into the back of me in Cornwall last week and has probably written it off as he's caused £3k worth of damage.

I have looked at second hand, 1 - 2 year old 308 SW and the Octavia Estate (the older model). I need an automatic and the DSs want electric windows in the back! I do about 10k miles a year.

I don't know whether the additional expense of the diesel is worth it or whether to stay with a petrol. I also would prefer a 1.6, but does anyone have experience of the 1.4 Octavia automatic?

All thoughts gratefully received.

How many miles do you do a year? What is the price difference between the petrol and diesel models?

I was told that you need to be doing 16k miles a year to make the better fuel economy of diesel worth the extra purchase expense and increased servicing costs.

Not sure how true that is but Dh agreed with the car sales person.

I do about 10,000 miles a year, round and about the villages here, but then also do quite a few long trips (Oxfordshire to Penzance) quite regularly.

The difference in price between the two Skodas (1.4 petrol auto and 1.6 diesel auto) I'm looking at is about £1,800.

That's quite a lot of petrol, but how do they drive? I haven't had a chance to test drive yet because they didn't have any autos in when I went this afternoon.