I'm a fan of "unsung heroes" and the Baleno very much fits that description. Haven't owned one so no actual experience, but Suzuki's are very reliable in general. The Baleno offers usefully more rear seat and boot space than the Swift, so if that is what you need or it appeals, go for it. They are light cars too, so the 1.0 Boostejet will offer strong performance as well as good economy.

As for the Sandero, I quite like the Stepway version but I'd still take a Baleno Boosterjet over one of them.

As you are interested in extra space, another option you may want to consider is the Skoda Rapid and Seat Toledo. These are the same cars (barring badges and some minor trim differences) and are based on the Fabia/Ibiza/Polo platform. But they have a much longer wheelbase and a truly massive boot. Not sure if your budget would stretch to the later 1.0TSI, if so I'd certainly be looking at those. Otherwise, you'd be looking at the earlier 1.2TSI which came with either 85 or 105bhp. You just got the one body shape on the Toledo, but the Rapid also came as a sort of halfway estate called the Rapid Spaceback. Weirdly, it's boot is some way short of the Rapid/Toledo, but still nearly 100 litres more than the Baleno. The Spaceback is arguably a better looking car but horses for courses and all, plus, the extra boot space (550 litres!) of the Rapid/Toledo may swing it.

Edited by badbusdriver on 17/05/2024 at 06:20

Criticism? The boot is quite small for the size of car, but that does translate into good space for passengers.

Hmm, that comment is both unfair and inaccurate.

The Baleno came out in 2016 and had a 355 litre boot capacity. The only other contemporary car of that size category which could equal it was the Jazz, everything else (Fiesta, Polo, Clio, Yaris, Fabia, Ibiza, 208, etc) had smaller boot capacity. And apart from the Yaris and Jazz (both of which were exactly the same length as the Baleno), all those other cars are (slightly longer). Even if you look at current versions, only the Ibiza equals the Baleno's boot capacity, the rest are all smaller (albeit not by much), including the Jazz who's boot has shrunk to 300 litres.

A lot of the Suzukis registered in my town five years ago were imported by an unofficial dealer from Belgium after he identified a price differential.

He did great business after Skoda dropped him as he didn’t have the finances to build a glass palace. Sad because he helped Skoda increase their market share from the days of the rear engined models and once they had VW based cars to sell the small dealers disappeared .