i need a 7 seater with wheelchair boot space?

[mymatemax]

Help! I need a 7 seater but I also need something with a boot big enough to take ds2's wheelchair (blade plus with big wheels & head support) even with the back row of seats up.
We have a motability vehicle due to be replaced soon but cant find anything without a low minimum payment.

Happy to come off motability & pay ourselves if the finance options are OK?
Any recommendations please

Anyone :)

would you be using all seven seats?

We had this problem until recently. There is no easy solution unfortunately. If you need all 7 seats in use the whole time with a large wheelchair then only something like the Hyundai i800 will do. However, if the wheelchair breaks down and folds then a galaxy would maybe help.

We have 3 children who are slightly older and so only need 2 booster seats with backs on and nothing for eldest. We also have a wheelchair that does not fold up and has a head rest and postural support on it. At the moment we drive a Peugeot 5008 7 seater but we don't use the 2 boot seats. This easily fits DS's wheelchair (with headrest taken off). However does not fit it with the back seats up.

We have just ordered (on motability) a Honda CR-V. This has a big enough boot to fit the wheelchair and is large enough to fit 3 kids on the backseat, but only because of the smaller car seats. The only other options for us on motability, were the Galaxy, s-max or a big van like i800. All of these have a down payment at the maximum end.

We have always leased/financed our own cars before now but finally decided it was silly not to use motability as we would have a much smaller car and use it a lot less if it wasn't because of Ds and his wheelchair. No finance option came even close to the motability deal.

Do what we did, check out suitable options on the motability site and then go round to those car dealerships with all car seats and wheelchairs and stick them all in to see if they fit. No dealership had any issue with us doing that, even though the wheelchair was particularly muddy in the lovely clean showroom cars!!

Sorry for the spiel, I hope you understood my waffling!

Thanks, yes we do need all 7 seats some of the time.
I'mstickingwithyou. Thanks you have confirmed what I feared... without a huge downpayment which we just don't have there is no easy solution.
DS2's wheelchair does fold but even folded it wont fit behind the back row of seats.
We only have two DS'S but ds2 doesn't travel well and cant cope without some space around him, he can tolerate ds1 next to him for short journeys but if we have anyone else in the car we cant take his wheelchair as he cant cope with anyone sitting close to him in the car.We can sometimes manage with 6 seats & have the wheelchair in the 7th folded seat.
I seem to spend my entire life putting the bloody seats up & down & shuffling the wheelchair about.
Thanks for the info, I'll keep looking!

Have you tried out VW Sharran. Not sure of wheelchair size but major and all kit fit with I seat down, leaving six. Folding seats is easy peasy and it's spacious all around cabin.

The Discovery has the best set of 7 seats and a bit of boot room when they are up. Very superior to a Chrysler which gets quite a bad press. You can use 6 seats on the Discovery and store quite a lot next to the 6 th seat but not sure how safe this would be if all fell over etc. I am sure you could secure the wheelchair if you needed to. There really are no cars that completely do what you want so I think you will have to compromise. For my money though, the Discovery is the safest, the most spacious, and the most flexible in that the 3rd row of seats are in the floor so you never take them out, you just fold them away. This takes virtually no time. This is far less effort than other cars and is a joy to own and drive.

Have you looked at the Caddy maxi life? It may be a bit van-like, though vw are trying to make it appeal to larger families as well now. It can be expensive though I think. It's certainly one we are considering for next car as we struggle for boot space too.

As a side note, Sharran seats fold into floor too and slidey doors are fab.

thanks all. I'll have a look at the other suggestions but just don't know where we will get the huge advance payment.
The more complex the needs the more expensive everything is :(

Have you phoned Motorbility? they were really helpful when we had to terminate our contract early because of a change in circumstances.
We have the cmax, ds is mobile though, he sits on the very back row with his wheelchair secured next to him in the 7th seat.
Hope they can help you x

Yes ring motability I was able to end my contract early as I needed a bigger car simply because I was pregnant with twins. We also got a grant covering the whole of the advance payment an eye watering 8k as we needed a car big enough to fit the wheelchair in he boot.

It's a Mercedes vito btw.

Oh, I'll give them a ring tomorrow & see if they have any ideas. Thanks again.

Be best if you ring the grant department direct, the number is 01279 632062.

Thank you!

We have a Honda FR V it's a 6 seater, 3 in front, 3 in back and has a reasonable boot space. Because it is wide your DS may feel like he has enough space? and the 3rd traveller could go in the front?
www.vehiclebros.com/18204-honda-fr-v-2.2-ctdi.html

www.vehiclebros.com/18204-honda-fr-v-2.2-ctdi.html

thanks I'll have a look, don't think I've ever seen one before.

Hi there mymatemax I thought I would register and let you know about my experience with this issue, So basically I have a little sister on life support with a wheelchair that we need permanently, this means she needs a team of four carers plus me and my mum, now the problem is we had a look at some 7 seater cars to see whether it would be sufficient for my sisters needs, turns out the wheelchair is far too big for a normal sized/family car but in the end we found through mobility a Renault Master (14 Plate) I know that It is a much bigger vehicle than the common "Family Car" but It's the ONLY vehicle that had the features to carry all my sisters equipment and her carers all at the same time and also the wheelchair, We got this Van from Motablility though I STRONGLY suggest you don't go for a Renault Master though as we have had the van down to Renault 7 times in the last two months for a Gearbox overheating problem that they've still not been able to fix..... So what I am saying is if you have no luck finding a suitable vehicle then going for a wheelchair accessible van may be your only option, (A non Renault Van) Maybe something like a Vauxhall Movano or something of Similar size, search the web for wheelchair accessible vans, I think Allied Mobility did the conversions for my sister and I think they work in Partnership with Motability (Could be wrong) We didn't pay any advance payment, Motability paid it for us as I'm not working due to health problems and my mum is disabled, I will post photos later, I just thought I'd post this as a suggestion because much like yourself with space and stuff we found it VERY difficult to find a Vehicle suitable for our needs, It takes a bit of messing around with Motability and Allied Mobility but in the ends it's really worth it, I just want to reiterate to you that I STRONGLY suggest you do not go for a Renault Master because we've had no end of problems with it but going for a similar Van size would probably help you out.

P.S. Our van has 8 seats and an isle/walkway for the wheelchair to be loaded onto the van inbetween the seats where Carers and Passengers sit, As I said I will post photos later and also private message you my personal number if you have any other questions or want to speak to my mum about how she got the van in place and got the funding....

Thanks Very Much and Hope to hear from you soon
David x

Wow, you must be a lot in the family. I suggest you talk to a supplier and converter of wheelchair accessible vehicles. They should be able to help you and suggest a suitable vehicle for you. I remember looking for our own WAV vehicle a few years ago, when my son was still alive. The WAV company was very accommodating and suggested that I buy a Peugeot Boxer. The price was fairly reasonable then and we were able to maximise its use for a couple of years.