So my sample of 2 says C1 is the perfect car
I can see the attraction – I have driven the Aygo version a few times. They have great all-round visibility, are nice and small and the wheels are pretty much on each corner so much less risk of accidents when parking, manoeuvring etc (ie, not much risk of being caught out by a bit of overhang bashing something).
I thought Fiestas/Corsas were best avoided as they are what every young driver manages to crash therefore silly expensive to insure
Also why get such small cars?
Junior had a 13 plate BMW 114i and now an Alfa Romeo Brera - both relatively cheap to insure for a 20 year old.
£4k will get a late model MK1 facelift Aygo with super low miles, or a higher Mileage early MK2. It's still going to be a 10 year old car though.
The main issue I have is that it will need to be reasonably 'cool'
If I were you I'd drop this requirement. "A car" is inherently cooler than "no car." My first car was a 13-year old Fiesta with more rust than steel. It was cool, I had a car!
Today my primary metric for a new driver would be insurance. You can probably google something like "lowest insurance cars for new drivers 2025" and get a top 10.
Kia Picanto for my son, also known as Guido Ferrari 🤣. Really good car to be fair, cheap, simple and Ferrari red!
One point that I think has been mentioned in one of the comments above, if they're a young driver then get yourselves (parents) or even grandparents added as named drivers. Brings the quotes down a bit.
The speeds I got out of my 1.3 Escort Popular in the 1980s where epic!
I had a MkIII with a 1.6 CVH engine - it was essentially a detuned XR3. It was a paradigm shift from the grotty Fiesta but it was a Friday Night Special, anything that could go wrong did. The week I bought it it was vandalised, all four door panels kicked in (by my then-girlfriend's bitter ex (last I heard of him he got banged up for armed robbery)). Pretty much set the tone for my entire ownership. I eventually got rid after stuffing it into the back of a Mitsubishi Colt because I was too busy checking out the legs on a lass across the road to look where I was going.
I did find him a nice 218i but at £5.5k it’s more than he wants to risk on his first car.
This is a good point. Get the car you want - the "cool" car if you will - as your second car. Your first car is a beater, it's where you learn how not to mistakes again. If it's your pride and joy dream motor and you throw it through a hedge you'll be devastated.
Incidentally,
I have a friend whose day job is penetration testing (ie, hacking) vehicles. Someone asked him how they could get started in this field, he replied "go to a breakers and buy a dashboard taken out of something French."
- Hyundai i10
- Volkswagen Polo
- Skoda Fabia
- Kia Picanto
- Toyota Aygo X
- VW Caddy
- Fiat 500
- Dacia Sandero
- Renault Clio
- Seat Arona
I see it as a balancing act while trying to avoid the obvious choices - Fiestas, Corsas, etc. The aim being to find something obscure enough that not many young drivers have them, but not obscure enough for spares to be an issue, while also not being uncool. My eldest still hopes to drive my MINI Cooper SD in 5 years or so... good luck with that.
-
Dacia Sandero
This would be a great choice if it wasn't for:
(actually a good option although probably fails on the uncool bit)
I followed a car yesterday with this sticker on the back. Hate to think how my driving as a 17yr old lad would've coped with a black box for insurance purposes...
- Hyundai i10
- Volkswagen Polo
- Skoda Fabia
- Kia Picanto
- Toyota Aygo X
- VW Caddy
- Fiat 500
- Dacia Sandero
- Renault Clio
- Seat Arona
Is this the cheap insurance list? You can get a van?? Hmmm this might change things.
Buy my Fiesta from the classifieds and have 3.5K left over for insurance and some cool mods. Run for a couple of years without issue and then use the money saved to buy something cooler and have much cheaper insurance by then too.
Are you sure you're a farmer? I've just checked the MOT history for your Fiasco and there's not a single mention of bailer twine anywhere...
We've just helped youngest find a first car, albeit two years after he passed test.
Currently he's 20 in a fortnight. On a multicar policy. His mum and I on the policy, commuting, 12k miles a year.
We found that a Honda Civic 1.8ivtec was cheaper than Fiesta, Fabia, Ibiza etc.
£678....
He's already discovered that a slightly larger car is ace when heading out for a ride or going climbing with his mates. And he's discovered that 138bhp of VTEC goes bwaaaaaaah....
I forgot to add:£1400 + 2 new tyres gets you a one owner, FSH (all with Honda), amazing condition, 2006, with 48k miles on the clock, top of the range Civic 1.8 .....He and pals all agree it's so totally different from most other first cars, it's in the cool category.
renault twingo. ours was very reliable. That said, we just bought a 5k 2016 fiesta with a FSH and 85k miles for more coolness.
Got to say the KA and Picanta are both great cars for money.
We inherited both. When we inherited the Kia it the it was worth about a grand. It did 7 years with one track end and minor sensor fault in relation to a belt. Even better for a learner the engine was gutless
- Hyundai i10
- Volkswagen Polo
- Skoda Fabia
- Kia Picanto
- Toyota Aygo X
- VW Caddy
- Fiat 500
- Dacia Sandero
- Renault Clio
- Seat Arona
Almost all good suggestions. As noted above, Caddy might be an oddity. And you're unlikely to get an Aygo X for the budget, as that's the current model and only been on the market for a couple of years.
If you are going for the Eco-Boost check the service history.
Ensure it had the correct oil used, the wrong grade of oil will eat the belt in a shorter timescale or sludge up with similar catestophic results.
This will point you at isurance group 1 cars https://www.finder.com/uk/car-insurance/insurance-groups/car-insurance-group-1
What age does the insurance cost go from insanity to realistic?? My eldest is 14 and this is looming but given that we live about 500m from a Manchester tram stop the licence might be obtained and not used for a few years
What age does the insurance cost go from insanity to realistic?? My eldest is 14 and this is looming but given that we live about 500m from a Manchester tram stop the licence might be obtained and not used for a few years
I don’t think it’s all loaded on the age. Age+length of license+postcode+car make up the big risk factors, then add in mileage, SD&P/Commuting/Business, occupation, other drivers etc and with the right shopping around you may not be as scared. That said, I did an experiment with fake details for my daughter, 17 driving a £1200 Picanto, with black box and wife and I as name driver etc, 8k miles SDP, £500 excess - and given the damage she could cause to other vehicles never mind harm to people the quote £1500 for someone who just passed their test didn’t seem crazy to me.
And just like you – a Mk1 MR2 – I test drove one, but was put off by it not being a T-Bar and was still looking when a massive financial change happened – I had to bail my parents out and got that 'car loan' to stop them from having their house repossessed 🙁
The one I was going to buy was a T-Bar with the side intake ducts. 1987 model with the 1.6l supercharged engine. Needed a lot of work though as this was in 2001 and it had been driven with spirit.
I still wonder what my love life would have been like in the sixth form had I bought that car (this was in the Isle of Man where you could take your test when you were 16). 😏
I still wonder what my love life would have been like in the sixth form had I bought that car (this was in the Isle of Man where you could take your test when you were 16). 😏
You'd need to open the T bar roof to get much action in an MR2
I have nothing useful to add but this.
Gutless Skoda Fabia 1.0 here. Colour edition so it has some visual pizazz but at 60 bhp it looks better than it goes.
BUT so long as I’m paying for it and insuring it I have the final say. Luckily for her my 18 year old daughter likes it.
I also drive to ‘save the posh van (California)’. Cheap, easy runaround on the narrow roads of Holmfirth - I love it!
The main issue I have is that it will need to be reasonably 'cool'
If I were you I'd drop this requirement. "A car" is inherently cooler than "no car." My first car was a 13-year old Fiesta with more rust than steel. It was cool, I had a car!
Oh I completely agree!
Gutless Skoda Fabia 1.0 here. Colour edition so it has some visual pizazz but at 60 bhp it looks better than it goes.
After seeing one of those in the classifieds on here, I immediately added it to my imaginary list for when the kids are old enough to start driving in 5 years or so. Perfect first car IMO.
I have just run insurance comparisons for skoda fabias. And a post 2015 Fabia hatchback with 90ps comes in at c£1400 for the first year with black box and me as a grumpy old git named driver and the youth as the main driver. But a post 2015 Fabia estate with 110ps comes in £1350. Bigger and faster = cheaper! Anyway, my neighbour who has a youth in a Ford Ka says both those are great as the Ka came in at £2k insurance!!! Oooof.
As we are going to look at a car today with the intent to purchase I had my lad re-run the quotes last night just to be sure.
Corsa 1.4T Black Edition, 8k miles, 25 year old with 0 NCB and 0 Experience as main driver, 55 year old with 35 years experience and 2 non fault accidents in the last 5 years as a named driver. £738 with Hastings Direct YouDrive which includes a tracker. To lose the tracker nearly doubles the price.
Excess is £545 for him, £345 for me.
Car is 118bhp and group 13E.
I don’t think it’s all loaded on the age. Age+length of license+postcode+car make up the big risk factors, then add in mileage, SD&P/Commuting/Business, occupation, other drivers etc
100% this - if, say, 200 Fiestas were involved in claims in AB1 2CD, and only 50 identical Fiestas in EF3 4GH were involved in claims, then the insurance would be cheaper.
Another thing you can do is try ticking and unticking options – for example, I added business travelling to our insurance policy for my wife (she is an attendance officer at a school, so does home visits) and the insurance went down! I assume it comes down to that specific statistical model.
Another thing you can do is try ticking and unticking options
A word of caution here: I did this last renewal time and the cheapest offers on comparison websites suddenly disappeared. I rang one of them and they explained that multiple quote requests with slightly different parameters in quick succession can trigger their 'fraud' warning. I explained what I'd done and why, they accepted my explanation but still refused to insure me because Computer Says No.
What age does the insurance cost go from insanity to realistic?? My eldest is 14 and this is looming but given that we live about 500m from a Manchester tram stop the licence might be obtained and not used for a few years
Youngest is 20 in a couple of weeks. Passed test at 17 and 5 months.
It's suddenly gone from £1350 to below £600.
Eldest is 22.5. Passed test at 17 and 4 months. He's about 30% more than Mrs_oab and I who are both 51, decades of NCB, clean license and good area so without kids would be under £300.
I have just run insurance comparisons for skoda fabias. And a post 2015 Fabia hatchback with 90ps comes in at c£1400 for the first year with black box and me as a grumpy old git named driver and the youth as the main driver. But a post 2015 Fabia estate with 110ps comes in £1350. Bigger and faster = cheaper! Anyway, my neighbour who has a youth in a Ford Ka says both those are great as the Ka came in at £2k insurance!!! Oooof.
Cool kids do not drive estates and thrash them with a pop and bang map. So less data, and the data there is says 'boring old fart car'. So cheaper.
We've a gold Fabia Estate 1.0 for added Werther's and stretchy waist belt trousers effect. 😎
But, as I have said above, our Fabia is £890 to insure. The Civic which is faster, larger and more schporty is £580...same drivers, same address, same use case. The value does differ too.
We've a gold Fabia Estate 1.0 for added Werther's and stretchy waist belt trousers effect. 😎
Our Fabia is officially listed as "beige" on the V5. It's actually an off-silver metallic.
If you can convince her to put function and reliability above fashion, the right answers have surely got to be
-Aygo
- Yaris
- Jazz.
They'll of course never realise to thank you for not being broken down at the side of the road at 1am when it's raining.
160,000 without an oil change what a tight git but I don't believe it
No? I had an Octavia. It had around 80k miles on it and was four years old. I gave it away after owning it for 15 years, with 160k miles on it, and in that time I’d topped up the oil, and had replaced whatever consumables as required by the MoT, and it had never been serviced in the time I owned it. It was the 1.9TDi engine, and the turbo was showing its age, though. One of the blokes in the workshop took it on for his son, in Poland. Last I heard, it was in somewhere like Estonia or Romania.
2015 aygo here and I reckon it's worth 4k privately, 5k dealer. Only 35k miles and fsh.
Bulletproof, no advisories and costs 125gbp for annual mot and lube service. I do wipers, cabin filter and air filter. Decent tyres are 75 gbp a quarter. 50 mpg easy.
Tax was zero but 20 gbp now.
I reckon it's the cheapest car to run, never missed a beat.
So, in my car hunt/insurance cost balancing act.. it appears that I have searched 1 too many times on a comparison site...and now all the quotes are £400 more. Rubbish. Shopping around isn't permitted much anymore it seems. So how do I undo this? Different computer? IP address? Different contact email? What a load of rubbish.
Also whilst I am ranting, the current insurance company for the car my son learnt on took an extra £100 from me to put him on as a learner (fair enough) then when he passed it was either another £2100 (nope) or take him off for another £78. An actual cost for removing him from the policy! And whilst £15 of that was an admin charge, the rest is a premium increase. Money for what exactly??? Gonna lose my shit over all this scammy behaviour so will sack it off for today.
Yeh, they've got you there. It'll be in the t&c and while the premium changing up is weird, maybe things have materially changed since, for you or in general.
At least when they tried that on me, charging a cancellation penalty on a learner policy that automatically ends on passing, I managed to argue it's an entirely foreseeable outcome and hence must be part of the costing of the admin fees. I threatened to fight that as far as necessary suggesting if I did and they lost I'd be looking for them to also refund any other policies they had charged it on. They refunded "out of goodwill"
Ok good tip. Will write to them and request a refund on that basis. Thank you.
I don't think you'll have much joy, if you put him on an existing (your) policy as a learner.
I was talking about a specific standalone learner policy, that automatically cancels when they pass the test. To charge admin and a cancellation on that I argued was unfair because 1/ it's designed to end at that point, should not be an extra cost to cancel; 2/ likewise there's every chance it'll get 'cancelled' in the life of the policy therefore charging you admin (for pressing a button marked 'Has passed test' and an automated email getting sent) is unfair in the sense of no chance to avoid it, hence should be priced in at the start rather than a 'hidden' extra.
They can argue on yours that they now do have to do some admin to recalculate the premium, etc., you haven't been charged a cancellation (because you haven't cancelled) - the bit that seems odd is that that your premium has gone up as a result. But on that point; maybe another material change to you / in general; secondly I reckon learner drivers are probably statistically one of the safest - they are ultra careful, they have someone sat next to them being equally careful, and other drivers are ultra careful around them. Hence why as a learner my son's insurance on his own car was about £400, immediately you remove me from being in the passenger seat and the L-plates from the car and he's now an £1800 risk.
