Because you are on such a tight budget, you'd really be best looking at what is available within the distance you are willing to travel and ask about specific cars you have seen. Unless you happen to live in a highly populated area, your options are likely to be very limited indeed. It is probably going to come down to your taking a chance on the best available in your area rather than anything else.

At this price, your best option is probably going to be whatever has been looked after by previous owners best, rather than a specific make or model. As for mileage, I wouldn't be nearly as bothered about that as the service and MOT history. Unless either or both of them throws up potential problems the mileage doesn't really matter, and looking for something with lower miles is just going to reduce an already small pool of possible buys even further.

Re Korean options, at this price the car will be old and older Korean cars weren't that well protected against rust, so tread very carefully here and pay close attention to the MOT history.

Edited by badbusdriver on 04/11/2022 at 13:21

Everything at £2k is a gamble.

Your best bet is to avoid any newer dual clutch systems. These all have names that make them sound more interesting than 'automatic', including DSG, DCT, EAT, Powershift etc.

You choice is going to be extremely limited, but you could look for Japanese (Honda, Mazda, Toyota, Suzuki) and Korean (Hyundai, Kia, Chevrolet) options. There are a fair amount of older Fords and Vauxhalls that might do the job - avoid the Ford Powershift. Look for something with relatively low miles, lots of history and a private sale.

Don't forget to avoid the Honda i-Shift or single clutch 'automated manuals'. The other Honda autos and most CVTs (though Nissan/Renaults have been rather patchy in terms of reliability because they use Jatco gearboxes, which generall appear not to have the best reliability.

If the OP is lucky, then perhaps an older Toyota Corolla or Auris, or Honda Civic or Jazz (sans i-Shift) would probably do nicely if they (preferably) had one or two careful (often retired) owners. A CVT version in these would also be more economical to run than a traditional torque converter (TC) auto.

Whilst my car (Mazda3 gen-1 and if they were lucky, an early gen-2 car) does come with a perfectly decent TC auto version, there aren't many around, plus rust on some gen-1 cars can be an issue (fine on mine) if not kept in check. They will be, however, cheaper to buy (for the same spec/age) than the Toyota and Honda equivalents.

A Ford Focus mk2 1.6 or 1.8 petrol TC auto would be fine if well cared for, as it is closely related to the Mazda3 at that time. The Powershift gearboxes only started appearing on them in the mk3 cars (2011+) onward after the 'divorce' from Mazda.

I think their best bet will be buying a car privately from an elderly owner who is giving up driving but who has looked after their car well and owned it for a long time/since new. With second hand prices being 30%+ higher than the historical norm, the OP may find it difficult to source a good'un unless they are lucky enough to be in an area with this sort of owner.