Sorry I never thought I would ask such a question, but I will soon be moving home, and my commute to work will be 100 miles a day !!

I've currently got a sports car and don't want to put mileage on it, and its hardly economical at 20-25mpg, so it will become a weekend car.

I want to spend as little as possible on a car to get me to and from work on the M1, safely, economically and cheap insurance. Hopefully I will find a new job so it will be a temporary measure, so therefore I dont want to loose much money when I sell, so in that way if I can get a car for £3k and sell it for £2.5K in 3 months time that will be better than paying £1.5k and only get £500 in 3 months time.

What would you recomend?

Cheers

diesel with 6 gears? 🙂 My friends Audi estate is more economical than my 1.4 Peugeot.

Well obviously diesel and small to maximise mpg. Look at skoda fabia maybe or for a real budget option a peugeot 306 1.9td? Very reliable engines and lots around so wasy to get parts for.

Or £4k for my 55 plate, 59k miles diesel mondeo. 50-55mpg all day long, rep car so designed for motorway cruising too.

I've got a '51 Skoda Octavia 1.9TDi, 110ps. Lovely comfy car on long journeys, yesterday I did a run up the M4/ M25 from North Wilts to South Mimms. Stayed at indicated 70 except in the roadworks, and the computer said mpg was 63.8, and by the time I got back home which entailed going back onto the A4 at Newbury and it said 61.0 by the time I got home. It's got an enormous boot, and it's quiet and stable and handles pretty well. £110/yr tax, and my insurance this year with Churchill was £155 full comp. Really nice car, tried a W plate Bora when I bought it four years ago, which was £6000, £1000 more than the Octi, less powerful, soggy handling and an awful gearbox. If you can find an Octi estate even better.

Mx5

MTT I've got an MX5 🙂

An Audi diesel Q7.

Economical, they're going for next to nothing these days and it gives you that fantastic invulnerable feeling.

Traffic just seems to melt away and it feels like you have right of way everywhere.

MTT I've got an MX5

I thought you said you had a sports car?

🙂

An LPG conversion.

Well, I used to do 100 miles/day in a MkIII Fiesta 1.4. But it wasn't that economical.

Now I do 120 miles/day in an Ibiza 1.9TDi. It's got 130bhp & 310Nm of torque so is plenty quick enough – IG 7, does between 55-60mpg. Basically a Fabia VRS in different clothes.
They also do 100 bhp version that'll get you a few more mpg.

Only issue is road noise & the suspension is a bit crashy.

Do you have a motorbike license? You can have a fun bike which is economical and it will get you there faster. May be worth considering.

MTT I've got an MX5

Alright, an Exige then. You can get a bike in if you have a quick release frame.

Mark 4 Turbo diesel golf, I'm driving the 130PS and it's reasonably quick and pretty economical, top speed is getting on for 130 (so I'm told) and it'll do 45-50 MPG if you drive sensibly.

Edit:

Forgot to add, spent four years doing an 80-100 mile commute in it and am going back to doing a 120 mile commute in it next month (I get no choice over where I am sent to work), now has 125000 on the clock after six years and has so far been trouble free (apart from when I hit a hare at 90 and destroyed the rad but what can you expect). Hold their value too and you can fit two bikes and all your kit in the boot.

if you're selling it in a few months drive slowly and keep your current car.

Theres always a risk buying a 2nd hand car, especially for 3k and buying in a hurry. Coupled with the fact that people aren't buying stuff much at the moment means you could lose more than you'd spend on petrol, not to mention all the hassle of driving round to look at 'great condition' cars only to discover they've lost the service history, or the mileometer and MOT readings don't match up. how much do you value your time?

106 diesel or saxo type car they will do 65 to the gallon and you may be able to pick up a cheap low mileage one,run it into the ground then bin it and get another one, do not buy anything new as you will be doing 25000 miles a year and you will render it worthless in a short period of time.reliability should not be too much of an issue if you have a decent second car you can use if needed

I'd go for a Volkswagon diesel of some kind.

Passats seem to be cheap. How about this one?

I bet a ford diesel would do you fine but if you want to have a nice car to drive in, try an golf or a passat. Audi's are very nice, we have an A3 2.0Tdi which is great to drive, stinky quick but it's a bit harsh on the suspension. very stiff.

My honda accord is extremely comfortable, probably the most comfortable car I've ever been in. It does 55mpg even if I push it. It looks a bit old inside but it's a fantastic car. Slightly slower than the Audi but great for long drives and insanely torquey (2.2 cdti). I've driven from ours down to south london then back again in a day (a journey of around 500 miles) and felt entirely comfortable all the way. Get one of those.

Second the Mk4 Golf TDi. Lovely cars. Or, you could consider buying an ex-lease Saab 93 TiD. My dad had one and it was both nippy and economical. Call it about 50 mpg on long runs.

Do NOT buy any sort of Rover. I was doing 140 miles a day in a Rover 620 SLDi and in a year it needed:

New gearbox
Service every three months
New cambelt
Sunroof fixing. Repeatedly
Driver's side window fixing. Repeatedly. Then just giving up on it.

Then it died.

MY mechanic was really honest with me. Said he would dearly love me to pay for the repairs and a new clutch, but he really didn't think it was worth it.

Another vote for a bike – get something relatively sensible with a 750cc+ engine and you can have fun and not get stuck in traffic.

I've got a 2004 ZR-7s for sale if you're interested 😉

On a morbid note racking up those miles ups your chances of being in a smash… You'll feel loads fresher in something built for rep-mobile mile-munching.
With that in mind I'd want something like a Mondeo / Vectra / Avensis etc. My mate used to commute a lot & went for a TDCi Mundano. Not pretty, not flash but for big commuting they're ideal. Also have a bit of room on a Credit Card for repairs as it seems recent diesels are prone to various faults (injectors/turbo's/DMF's). £1k+ bills not being un-common. Goes with the territory I guess.

Failing that a VFR750…

i have a 206SW (estate back)
03 plate, 50k on the clock (so not that young) but i get 55mpg out of it easily.

2.0L TDHDi, 90bhp, 220T
chug chug chug
great for moving bikes too (as hatchbacks go)

selling near you for around 3k!

6 gears isnt a consideration, your gears will just be closer together, they go no higher.

personally, ide move, or get a new job.

MTT I've got an MX5

Hairdresser? 🙂

Interesting on the rover….

217K with only the CV joint dying in that time due to a massive pothole, it only died at 217K because some twunt pulled out in front of me. Still returning just under 50mpg, would give it a minor service every 6k miles and it would have a full service every 24K, admittedly I was doing approx 8k miles a year less than you but even so.

35K miles a year is heavy on anycar, but sunroof/window are incompetent repairs, the cambelt (I presume you mean timingbelt and the associated waterpump belts) would have been good for another 60k miles, yes you had a bad experience but rover now are almost the perfect car for cheap motoring if you don't car about the name.

Avoid the 1.4 because the engine has 3 serious flaws and even if you fix one, you'll probably get nobbled by another. The diesels are simple and economical.

We've got an A4 Avant 1.9tdi – fair bit of room in the back once the seats are down, I'm guessing around 50 mpg. Used to be the OH's company car – 120 miles a day. Now at ~150k at about 6-7 yrs old and no real indicators of mileage other than disk wear and patchy alloys…first clutch lasted 'til 110k -odd. I think we paid about 4.5k a few years ago.

As it's STW: bike+train?

Actually, I'd consider that. My dad did 80 miles a day by car for years. When he eventually switched to the train, he said it was like having a part-time job.

Whatever you get, choose a car that is at it's most economical at 70mph. Some smaller cars may have a better combined result, but as yours will be mainly motorway driving, a bigger car geared to be economical at 70 may be cheaper to run than one geared for town driving.

In March 2008 I bought a V reg Pug 206 – 1.6 petrol. It cost me £1300 and was only ever designed to be my temporary car. Well over a year later it is still going strong, has needed no work and never misses a beat. Nippy enough for decent acceleration, yet does about 40mpg. Easily get 2 bikes in the back. On a long journey, it is actually more comfortable than our family car which is a 3 yr old Merc estate! I reckon that even if I sold it today I'd still get about a grand for it so £300 for well over a years motoring is brilliant. It also costs £199 per yr to insure fully comp.