"economical, small, low insurance group, and a car that if need be I can maintain it/ service (oil,filter, plug change) myself."
How about a Ford Ka?
Fairly economical (over 40mpg), definitely small, definitely low insurance group, fairly simple mechanically, with parts and repairs pretty cheap, and parts easy to find. Also a good record for reliability.
You'll get a 5 year old one for that money.
|
|
Citreon Saxo/Peugeot 106 Diesel - a very basic engine to work on, very little to go wrong on them and they give around 65mpg.
|
|
|
Some Pug 306 HDi ?
- - - - - - -
I am the only Pole over here.
|
Ka, 106, Saxo etc are worthy cars but if you're doing a lot of miles, the next class up will give you a much more comfortable seat and suspension set up.
|
|
|
Some Pug 306 HDi ? - - - - - - -
You'd struggle to find a 306 HDi for anywhere near £2k. Any that are close to that figure will be in a bad way or very high mileage.
|
|
|
106 diesels well maintained will do 100k + miles, cheap spares/insurance and not complex.
What you do NOT want is a cheap to buy but expensive to repair car: so rule out anything complex/big - and by that I mean Mondeo size. A 306 HDI is I think too expensive.
At your mileage you should budget £250-£500 for brakes/tyres or exhaust 'cos if not very good you will wear them out very quickly.
ANY car with reliability issues is a nogo.
A 1.1 petrol 106 is also very economical 50 mpg on long runs.
Ditto a Ka. Or a 1.25 Fiesta.
madf
|
Several Possibiliies come to mind here.
Diesel, reasonable mileage, economical and above all a good genuine service history.
As usual it seems to be a buyer's market out there if you shop around and do your homework.
HJ recons the economic gap between diesel and petrol is narrowing, I think for this sort of milage it would still be significant, otherwise I would highly reccomend the Nissan Almera 1.6 auto. The wife has one and it is a brilliant car for all roads. Unfortunately it's petrol but then she only does a few thousand miles a year anyway.
Others have mentioned the Peugeot, Citroen varients.
The other way around this would be to try to find a deal on a new vehicle with 0% finance. You often have to put down a sizeable deposit, which you said you could stretch to £3k anyway, you have a job so could possibly entertain the repayments. You would have a 3 year warranty with a generous mileage allowance.
Hence, general servicing costs anyway, which you DON'T need to get done at the dealer provided servicing schedules are used and the OEM parts are used, but you KNOW you're not going to get huge repair bills for items covered in the warranty. In addition, no MOTs to worry about for the first 3 years.
At the end of the 3 years, if it's been good to you keep it. If it has had a troubled childhood, trade it in for something else.
I was never struck on the idea of finance for a new vehicle, until I needed a replacement van. The vehicle cost just over £4k for the deposit and around £370 per month over two years. I could have stumped up the full amount on the spot but I thought "why bother?" The deal was with Nissan Finance rather than the dealer, who got paid straight away for it. So I basically went to screw the dealer down on the best price in the country then signed up for the 0% finance! Best of both worlds.
Check some of these out I would.
|
£2000 will buy you a 1999-2000 model Nissan Almera with less than 50k miles on the clock. Look for a low owners one with FSH. They are pretty economical, fairly safe and the handling and comfort are OK. They won't set the world on fire, but you don't need that on the M25. Shouldn't let you down though.
Any garage can service them and there are plenty of 'pattern parts' available at low prices (no more than for a Ford).
|
If you want small, with low running costs and this is likely to be a long term arrangement...
I'm going to obliterate your budget here, but what about a Hyundai Getz. There's a used diesel on a 54 plate for £5,695 in Watford.
Over 4 years, without a deposit, that runs to £130 per month if you shop around on the finance.
However, you'll be getting the remainder of a 5 year unlimited mileage warranty, 60 mpg, and reasonable safety (including ABS) plus performance that, whilst hardly startling, is really quite good alongside an older small diesel.
It's certainly going to be cheaper than buying a new banger every year and running it into the ground over the next 40k miles or so.
|
With that huge mileage (at least 30k per year), you'll need a diesel. Whilst you say you want a small car, you will need comfort as i'm guessing a minimum of 4 hours every day will be spent sat in it. Many small cars have offset pedals and poor seats which would become extremely uncomfortable on long journeys.
To be honest, the prospect of 130miles a day on the M25 would make me seriously consider moving house. Elsewhere in the country, with higher average motorway speeds, that mileage is perhaps do-able, but if you work 'normal' hours, that is going to take an extremely large chunk of time out of your private life.
My suggestion would be a Citroen ZX 1.9D or TD. Cheap, and with a simple, trustworthy engine capable of large mileage and good economy (around 45 realisticly), but comfortable too. I haven't checked, but i would suspect that £2k would get you into one of the latest ones, with A/C etc.
|
|
|
Have a look at new Fiat panda
Highly rated car
range starts at 6500 list price but fiat offer no deposit and 3 yrs interest free finance
£180 a month or so
|
Found this on Autotrader by searching up to £2k up to 40,000 miles and chosing diesel. It only searched 40 miles from my Manchester postcode , but a W reg Felicia looks a fairly safe bet on paper.
javascript:more_info(200527198772141,36,'CARS',1,200527198772141,490,5
60);
|
Don't assume a small car is cheaper to run than a bigger one. Bigger cars can be cheaper to service and repair since there's more space under the bonnet. I remember years ago going into a Renault dealership with my Dad and on the wall they had a chart of the comparative service/repair costs. A clutch on a Renault 5 for example was more than on a Fuego since on the 5 the engine had to come out.
In this price range I would look for a nicely kept, privately owned ZX. They have pretty much descended into banger territory now, but some nice ones are still out there on 'N' and 'P' plates. And that engine is one of the best diesels ever made considering it's technically basic.
|
thank you all very much for your quick responce and good advise/ suggestions, I'll start to do some paper research and read up on a some of the cars that you all have suggested.
This is a really good forum,it's the people and their contributions that make up a good forum, so if this puts a smile on your face to all those who read this, or in some way help to make this forum the way it is, then thank you.and smile away it's your forum....
metso
|
|
Metso - do tell us what you decide to get.
|
|
Ka, fun, nippy, economical, cheap to repair and insure.
|
|
And the Ka is surprisingly unstressed at 70-80 mph (if you ever have the chance to do that on the M25), even on a long run, and the seat has never given me backache.
|
|
|
|
|
|
