What you want here is either a hyundai ix20 or its kissing cousin the Kia venga. Both fit your requirements with torque converter auto's, petrol only (for the auto) raised seating position and a 440l boot (seats up). They are mechanically identical with a 123bhp 1.6 (n/a), and at your budget, you'd easily get into a 2015 version with plenty of warranty remaining. The Kia comes with 7 years to the hyundai's 5, but I believe the hyundai's is more comprehensive. Both have a good reputation for reliability though. My wife gets a motability car, and we were seriously looking into both, but were put off by reviews of its performance on the open road (we live in a rural area) and disappointing fuel consumption. But with your usage, neither of these should be any concern.

You may also consider the Kia soul, which uses the same engine/transmission (though you do also get a 1.6 diesel option) along with, I think, an even higher seating position. If memory serves, the boot is slightly smaller, but I don't remember the actual capacity. If you like the look of it, avoid examples with larger wheels, as they give a very harsh ride.

What you want here is either a hyundai ix20 or its kissing cousin the Kia venga

Both the above are decent cars as is the Kia Soul (if you can live with its appearance) but the old school petrol engines used by Kia/Hyundai are way behind the times. Most buyers have the diesels which are as good as anything out there but no use at all to low mileage people like the OP. Not tried an auto 1.6 but the manual 1.6 was less than inspiring, back to the early 90's in feel and performance. Our 1.2 Micra would have slaughtered it.

Really don't want one of these small capacity turbo cars that seems all the rage at present

We are now on our 2nd small capacity turbo (VAG 1.4 TSi) and I would never go back to a turbo diesel or large non - turbo petrol. Try one and be amazed.

As for ex Motability cars be very careful. Kia require receipts for all servicing before accepting a warranty claim and its unlikely even if the car has been serviced they will have them. if there is a dispute no receipts mean no warranty. Stamps in a book mean nothing. Never believe a trader who tells you all will be OK, they are liars. In our are there are loads on Kia's on Motability (probably because the only garage in town is a Kia dealer) and most seem to be driven by fat, idle, stupid inbreds who would not have the intelegence to follow simple servicing instructions if they were tattooed on the foreheads. The chance of these cars having a warranty after they are handed back is zero.

Edited by skidpan on 04/07/2017 at 18:56

My wife has a motability car, she also has severe weight problems due to a variety of underlying issues. So thanks for that little gem of compassion an D understanding skidpan.

Skidpan - surely if the cars are on Motability the driver is disabled? - in which case they deserve our sympathy. Or are you saying that able-bodied people are getting Motability cars to which they aren't entitled?

You only have to go into town late on a Saturday afternnon and watch locals park outside Ladbrooks on double yellows in their Motability cars and run in to collect their winnings before going to the newsagents across the road to invest some of it wisely on the idiot tax and then into Asda to invest the remainder in a few slabs of beer. They are not disabled, they are just milking the system and many deserving cases are refused due to lack of funds.

On the street where we lived there were 2 families with Motability cars and in both cases they fully deserved them. One case was where the son was knocked off his moped when he was 16 and was paralysed from the waist down, in the other instance the wife had a degeneragtive disease.

Where we live now our neighbour had a "companion" who got a Motability car yet it was clearly obvious there was not a thing wrong with his mobility. They went to tea dances most afternoons and onto local clubs dancing most evenings.

The people next door to the MIL had a Motability car due to the wifes mobility issues all of which were caused by her severe obesity. She never actually left the house yet the car was still provided. When she died he told my wife he did not miss here since she only sat in the house eating and reading but he would miss the car when they took it back.

Then you should consider my mother. She broke her first hip in 1980 which left her with some issues due to her leg being shorter but these not severe at the time. Then 16 years later she had a car crash which damaged part of the replacement hip which had to be replaced again and following this her leg was even shorter and mobilty suffered. Then in about 2002 she fell (probabaly as a result of her mobility issues) on some uneven block paving in the town centre which fractured her other hip requiring a replacement. After this she could not walk unaided out of the house which had to be modified to suit her needs. It also mean't that holidays became difficult due to access onto planes and busses and after trying once or twice they gave up.

The final problem she had was a thrombosis in her knee which trebbled in size and even after the clot had been treated the swelling remained and her knee locked.

So she applied for DLA and was turned down since they felt her disabilites were not severe enough. For feks sake how severe did they need to be, she could only walk for short distances with a frame, the furthest was from the house to the car, any further and it was a wheel chair.

So the genuine deserving cases get my sympathy. The fat, idle and scroungers should be prosecuted. If the powers that be had a brain they would be outside Ladbrooks videoing the runners on a Saturday afternnon but no doubt they would say there is a rule to prevent such activities.

The system is a total joke.

As regards seat heights, you could have a look at www.rica.org.uk - the site includes a car search facility.

Seat heights are of course important but you also need to consider the angle of the seat base and the distance fron the cill externally to the seat base.

Dad had a Jazz and the seat height was fine but since the seat base sloped back mother found it very difficult to got out of the car.

When he replaced the car we included on the shortlist the original Nissan Note. But the distance from the cill to the seat base was too big and mother was in danger of missing the seat altogether.

The last car we bought that needed to be good for mother was the wifes current model Nissan Note. Access was perfect and even though the car had a high list price huge discounts mean't it was cheap to buy. With the supercharged engine its quick enough and pretty economical but then the idiots at Nissan fit the Auto with a CVT that destroys the performance and economy and gives you all the hideous driving charisteristics of a CVT.

If it had been fitted with a propper auto I would have recomended one to the OP

A slightly disappoinitng thing is the boot space is not as big as the Tino despite them both being quoted as 440 litres.

We have learned over the years to take a tape and physically measure the boot to check that it works for us. Some manufacturers include the spare wheel storage in the boot capacity, when you only have a bottle of glue I guess that space is available.

When we bought our Ceed SW I measured the size and it calculated as 530 litres which is exacly what the Kia figures suggested. Others were not as accurate, seem to remember that the Avensis was nowhere near as big as suggested. One notable exception was the Qashqai, Nissan said 440 litres but excluding the spare wheel well I measured 480 litres.