we are talking buying, insuring, fuel,repairs and tax.insurance is the main thing tho as i may want to teach my kids to drive in it so its all round dirt cheap motoring.I also dont have loads of money up front so suggesting a new vw polo blue motion or simular that runs on freash air isnt an option cos i cant afford to buy one!
looks and speed dont matter at all!

get insurance quotes first…

ok well off peoples insurance experiance give me some feedback.the driving lessons is a minor thing.transport for me on the cheap is the priority.im 34 btw.

A motorbike.

CG125 will do 100mpg without trying (shudder to think what it would do if you actualy tried to get the mpg up).

Tax is peanuts (either £15 or £35 IIRC)

Insurance even at 17 was only about £400.

He'd do well teaching his kids to drive on a motorbike.

OP I'd be looking at insurance for learners as a major expense – get some quotes. An idea of your budget might help, size needed, when kids might be learning (not that I'll know the answer).

something small and unpopular – Hyundai Amica?

Second getting quotes first, it will probably be the largest cost. Young lad I know is paying £1400 for an old 400 series rover which isn't uncommon. Looking in motor magazines at the list of cars in the back as they usually give insurance group, mpg etc.

had thought of a bike (to commute) but i think if im paying out to transport i person id be better to pay a bit more to transport four in the dry or step ladders, weekly shop,furniture,bikes etc etc

forget the driving lessons lets just go for me driving only .

fiat panda perhaps?

That's what I went for when looking for cheap and cheeful. I've no complaints.

With no idea of your budget its kinda hard.

You could buy a car for £5k and not have to spend any money other than petrol, service, tax, MOT and insurance for 5 years.

You could buy a car for £1000 and be lumped with £300 extra in fuel, £150 extra in tax, £300 in breakdowns/spares, etc etc for 5 years and be worse off than buying a new more economical/relaible car.

+1 for looking at insurance first. Then look at something like Honest John to check reliability and running costs.

Remember THE most expensive part of running a car is usually the depreciation – you just don't see it every month

no we are taklking CHEEEEAAAP here!

depreciation-doesnt count, next owner will be the scrap yard.
reapirs wise..im a mechanic of sorts so i could suss out a good car to start with (i like to think)
fuel. diesel would be good but a super small engine petrol could work.
so cheap insurance and tax are the only things i cant change so to speak.

Cheap kit car.

Easy to repair, don't rust. insurance reasonable through specialist brokers (so long as it isn't some fire breathing V8)

Depreciation will be zilch if you buy right.

Car share club?

Skoda Felicia. Most expensive thing will be the gaffa tape to hold it together.

Costs about £40 to hire a car for a long weekend, cheaper if you do it regularly. Assuming you're over 25 I think that could be cheaper if you don't use a car that often.

Fiat Panda was my first and worked out OK, I bought a CL version which as far as I could tell stood for clock and light.

J

daewoo matiz- contender perhaps?

bangernomics is what you need

buy anything off ebay with a long ticket – 12 months is ideal, skip anything under 6. Cost should be, at a maximum, £300. obviously small engine is better, diesel more so – you should be looking at things like 106, zx, and so on. Get aa membership. If it goes wrong (it might, but you'd be surprised just how reliable stuff like this can be), work on the theory that if its going to cost more to fix than you can withdraw in cash in one go, scrap it (£100 back) and start again.

http://www.bangernomics.com/Bangernomics.html

If your buying a really cheap car i'd steer clear of diesels. You might get lucky and get one which goes on for years but your more likely to get problems IMO and when you do they are very expensive. IIRC there was a recent thread on an old passat diesel and he had no end of problems. If you get an old petrol with carb you don't have to worry about injector problems, diesel pump etc. If your not doing a lot of mileage in a year then the difference on fuel is small. Had a 1.1l pug 205 which did 50mpg was easy and simple to fix when I had a problem (which was never anything major).

pug 106/206/306 were all low insurance groups. easy to fix with a hammer if you go for non-turbo diesel or 1.4 or 1.6 petrol. nice to drive. recent enough to at least have options of ABS… easy to learn in (make sure you get one with power steering). CHEAP to buy!!!

old diesels are dead reliable – its the modern ones which have expensive pumps, injectors, etc

You'll probably find that any carb fed car is of the sort of age where reliability is on the downside, compared with more modern injected cars

A lot is the luck of the draw on an older car. But with basic mechanical skills you can do rebuilds on carbs, heads etc but diesel pumps repairs/timing, injectors etc often need specialist equipment to check if their running correctly or repair and if you have running problems where do you start without throwing a lot of money at it? I used to think the same buy a cheap diesel but myself, my brother and my dad have all had older diesels go wrong which had to be scrapped due to not being able to fix without expensive specialist repairs. I've got good mechanical skills, my brother was a mechanic for 15 years and my dad was a diesel fitter for 20 years, what does that say to you?

it says a lot of things, but I don't want to be rude.

An insurance group cheaper than the pugs are the rovers and they are daft cheap, avoid the 1.4 K series though.

I've had 3 of the L-series diesels (86, 101 and 105 bhp) and so far I've gotten 390K miles out of them in 10 years – had to scrap one when I had a frontal impact at 50mph with someone cutting across in front of me (217K miles) I walked away with only injuries from the airbag, had to sell one when the irish gov wanted 3200 yoyo import back tax and the last one is still churning out just under 50mpg after 138K miles.

it says a lot of things, but I don't want to be rude.

Your point being?