After looking in vain for the last week for a decent first small car, i have found a mint condition 1.2l '02 Corsa which comes with all wizzy gadgets and is very clean. I have to check on the service history, but would 112k on the clock be a bit too much for a small engined car or should i take a punt on it as its only £1795?

I know this is a very generalised question, so i guess i am asking is my kneejerk 'anything over 80k miles' is going to explode mindset wrong?

Is there a decimal point in that price! Madness!!

8 years old with over a 100k, bin it.

As a general guide my first car was an n registered Astra, then 6 years old with 65k on the clock. bought for £2k autotrader.

You can do a lot better.

Hi

IMO it depends on how those miles have been clocked up (although I'd be trying to haggle on that price regardless) – look for tell tale signs, like seat wear, steering wheel wear, etc that may hint towards a lot of round town use. If it looks like it has been up and down the motorway I'd be less bothered, so long as it have FSH of course – particularly the oil changes.

On another note – have you considered an older car with less miles? I got a polo for £850 with 69,000 on it and FSH, its now 15 years old and has 110k on it, still going strong – my girlfriend is using it now! Bargain I think 😀

Is there a decimal point in that price! Madness!!

To be honest i think i am only considering it as my mind is just frazzled from looking at so many heaps of shit over the last week. Unfortunately i am having to work to a budget and a engine size due to insurance reasons….

*back to the drawing board*

112k miles doesnt sound that much 16k a year, is a bit high but not massive.

Depends who has had it. Many corsa are driven by new drivers or boy racers, so find out if its been trashed (especially with the small engine),and if the cambelt needs changing, etc..

£1795 sounds high. £1200-1500 sounds more reasonable. 1000's or corsas about

Blame the scrappage scheme for pushing up prices on cars like this….

There are better deals out there, I've driven Corsas and in the main they're very ininspiring to drive and Vauxhall still hasn't mastered the art of putting the steering wheel in the right place.

I did the same as Jamie and bought a 12 year old Peugeot 105 for £600 and its great 70k on the clock.

If your on a budget,i'd say buy a good 10 year old car, with a small engine, 12 months mot for less than £1000, and put the other £500 away for maintance. Brakes, exhaust etc.

Cheap to buy and insure

Its old, high mileage and a corsa.To justify anything over a grand it needs to be in mint condition.

Also small engines are not great high mileage. Still its normally other bits of the car that go first.

Note that engine size is not the only issue that insurers look at. A bigger engine without any turbo may actually have a smaller output and a more reliable engine.

Not worth it IMO. As already said, there are loads of Corsa's and similar about, so there will be another (lower mileage) one round the corner. Buyers market and all that.

I put 185k on my '93 Corsa 1.5TD inc 35k in the 1st year…

Engine finally rusted to bits, but the body work was fine.

Big mileage – small engine, I'd move along to the next one

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

Waaay too many miles on a small engine. I would think twice at that mileage even on a larger deisel.

ps. My daughters Nissan Micra Ally 998cc is for sale. '98 52k good nick MOT/tax til 2011 £900ono 😉

2001 Ford Fiesta here, still going strong(ish), just under 130 000 miles. Am getting rid of it in a couple of months, don't expect to get more than a couple of hundred quid. Corsa looks way overpriced.

1.4 Astra 160,000 still going strong after 16 years!!

Large diesels do 200,000 + miles easily 112,000 is not lots for a seven to eight year old car .I am looking for a diesel Mondeo estate and an 02 plate with that mileage would not be off putting at all

Large diesel this is not. Youd have to be mental to buy it for 1800 quid….. Ill sell you a w plate hyundai lantra 1.6 with 75k and a new clutch ,brake pads tires and mot for half that. Thats spent most of its life just going long distance with a bike rack on ..

Agree it's to much for a small car as you can buy big stuff for that age and mileage . Has the op though about auctions? Take a friendly mechanic with you and a bargain may be found

Seems a bit steep but then this scrappage scheme does seem to have pushed used prices up. I had a 1999 corsa which I ran to 115000 miles and it was still going really well when I sold it – but got £950 for it which I thought was a fair price. I've no idea what the going rate is just now but 1795 does sound quite a lot.

Don't get hung up on mileage, it's the condition of the car that counts not the mileage. There is mileage and 'hard' mileage, but the price does sound high for age etc. If your after a small car and you can find a £300-£400 motor with a good mot and can do a bit of diy I think its always worth taking the risk as you can buy 5-6 cars for the money you are looking to pay.

trail_rat:
Large diesel this is not. Youd have to be mental to buy it for 1800 quid….. Ill sell you a w plate hyundai lantra 1.6 with 75k and a new clutch etc etc….

The problem is that due to this being my first car anything over 1.2, 1.4 at a push, is going to sting me for insurance. At least for the first year. There are a ton of bigger cars out there with less mileage on that i could get but can't. To give you a taster, a Fiesta 1.3 01' plate is £668 fully comp…and that is with Carole Nash mirroring my 7 years motorbike NCB.

At the moment it seems that due to credit crunch, scrappage schemes and people just wanting smaller cars the amount of decent small cars is reduced so the prices are getting inflated. The end result is i find myself considering a 1.2 Corsa with 112k on it until the hive mind of STW shakes some sense into me.

I am off to look at a 1.3l Fiesta LX tomorrow instead for £1390 at a dealer with a paltry 91k on it and FSH so hopefully that will be a better choice. Unless i get beaten to it by the hoards of psychic **** car buyers that seem to be patrolling these days.

My son is 19 and his Fiesta costs nearly 2 grand to insure .They must be accident prone in Chatham

My son is 19 and his Fiesta costs nearly 2 grand to insure .They must be accident prone in Chatham

I should add i am 30, so i think that helps.

As a rule, small cars seem not to be built to handle mileage. The mechanical bits are normally fine, although it is easier to thrash a small engine to bits trying to make a bit of progress. The interior bits are normally screwed though.

My advice as for anyone starting out in motoring is to consider the car as a package – the cost of the car is what you have to spend to buy it and insure it. It's very easy to get a few ballpark figures with confused.com for a range of 10 or 20 cars. Some of the stuff is bizarre – 106s tend to be cheaper to insure than mechanically identical Saxos. Same goes for ZX / Xsara against 306s. A larger car that's faster and will do more damage in an accident is often cheaper to insure than a small group 1 car.

The other thing to remember is that insurance groups are based on how expensive that car is to repair. But your TPFT insurance is based on the damage you're likely to do to other people's vehicles. The result is that insurance groups have almost no bearing on the premium (unless you're fully comp), and the likelihood of that car being purchased by a div has a huge bearing on the premium.

At least the mileage is probably genuine, and if it has a good service record then its an honest car.

There is no reason why a small engine shouldn't be any worse/better than a big engine in clocking up miles – its how its been looked after that matters.

I've done up to 40k pa, even a new car is second-hand very quickly. My 'record' was over 150k in 4 years – any car is pretty much scrap after that kinda constant hammer.

as with others, I'd not worry about the milage, but the prices is off

I got a (just under) 6 year old diesel mondeo estate with similar milage for under a grand

Not everyones idea of fun but…

Look at a brand new car? It may be possible to get a brand new car with 1 years free insurance on one of these options type schemes.

I got my first car this way, was driving around in a brand new fiesta, with free insurance, and no maintenance costs for £120 per month for 2 years.

For 2k you can buy better cars IMO.

If you think its a punt then go for a 7series Beemer or a 5 series diesel estate 😀

How about this? Offer him 2.0k if good?

http://www.singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/fs-ot-vauxhall-meriva-16-life-2350