My car, a ten year old 4×4, is showing its age and, unfortunately, its mileage. Despite having a good strong engine at 225k, other bits are starting to fail, mess up and generally weird out (alarm randomly going off, heater matrix leaking etc). My wife hates it in any case, givent hat it frequently has bikes in, bits of bikes in, kayak kit in, shooting kit in and smells of dog, straw and coolant, so she’s keen for me to get something newer and more economical.

I’m really suffering for what to go for though. On the one hand, I need something that is economical (but with a bit of go if need be) so a diesel seems to be the way forward, on the other I need something that is big enough for the dogs, bikes or kit in the boot (meaning an estate car), but on the gripping hand I’m not allowed to have anything “chavvy” or boring looking.

Wife has expressed a liking for Audi A4s, despite my objections on cost, but has accepted the STW issue Octavia as a possible option. I might even be able to sneak an Octavia vRS into the equation, but part of me still wants to be sensible.

So, what are the options? Should I even consider a Mondeo or a Vectra estate? Saab? What about going Japanese and looking at an Avensis or a Mazda 6 or an Accord? Should I really learn th art of frustration by going for an Alfa?

I do want something that inspires me to drive it. I’ve bought one car based on economy before, and it was shit. I’d rather not make that mistake again, but have something that is comfortable, relaxing and makes me feel like I could drive for hours.

Mondeo Estate 2.0 TDCI

Mondeo or Vectra worth a look. Personally don’t like the interior of the Vectra as much when we were looking so got a Mondeo instead. Saab 93 was extremely pretty to look at but the dash is weird. Smaller than the two above too. Avensis, people will be trying to hail you to stop whenever you drive anywhere or jumping in when you stop at the side of the road. Mazda 6 of £5k budget, fugly. Accord, bus-like but very well built.

Personally for that kinda money I’d either be going Octavia / Passat / Mondeo.

My wife hates it in any case, givent hat it frequently has bikes in, bits of bikes in, kayak kit in, shooting kit in and smells of dog, straw and coolant, so she’s keen for me to get something newer and more economical.

Whatever you get will have these same items in it, no?

Honestly depends on what you like. A Mondeo estate is a good bit of kit; get a 3-5 year old and it’ll happily run for 5 years. A Passat is also good – I have one which is now past 130k, and almost nothing (a parking brake switch and a rear parking sensor) has gone wrong.

Or you could go for something quite nice – a BMW 525/530D Touring from around 2004-2004 should be available if you look carefully, but they’ll have 120k+ miles on them at that price. I had one and loved it, thought it ate front suspension bushings every 30k.

A4 = small boot for the size of the car and newer ones have plenty of gadgets to go wrong. I’d personally head in the Seat/VW/Skoda direction if you’re buying a ‘utility’ car from teh VAG group.

Otherwise have you looked at Volvos?

Fiat doblo? We have one and it’s enormoose!!
2 people, 2 kayaks, 2 bikes, 4 dogs +camping kit is regular 😀 1.9multijet diesel gives about 45mpg and it go’s well too
Not cool though….If your bothered about such things get a Audi

Advice/suggestions needed

Search for the million or so other ‘what car?’ threads? 🙂

Economical doesn’t have to mean crap btw.

Thanks for the suggestions so far. It pretty much goes with what I thought about Audis, and the Mondeo does really seem like the sensible choice. I think it’s time to go to the local Ford and Vx garages and have a sit-in, even though my heart says Octavia vRS (cheapest I found was 7k unfortunately.)

Oh yes, I did consider the Prius at one point, but then managed to shake myself out of it!

Ah come on, give it a chance 🙂 You at least get to feel really smug once a year when your road tax is £15 🙂

Hush your tongue!

If I wanted to feel smug, I’d by singlespeed and wear sandals

Dammit.

Just heard back from the garage. They can’t find the source of the fuel leak, or the cause of the alarm going off the whole time. New fuel tank is well over 300 quid, plus the labour to fit it (assuming it’s not a fuel line that’s gone either).

Looks like the plan to buy a new car has added urgency, well, it will have urgency after I get back. In other news, tonight I will mostly be breaking the power sounder with a pair of wire clippers.

Did I say that the Prius was the most reliable family sized car? 😉

do they do an estate version in diesel?

going though this myself and although the budget is bigger I was sorely tempted by a 2006 Accord Estate up at 5990 with 46k on the clock. Petrol and manual. It had sold before I got the garage…

Other than that a previous generation Mondeo

I was just being silly 🙂 Old one not big enough for dogs (unless small) or bikes with the seats up.

Better than diesel tho unless you need to tow.

Mazda 6. Superb reliability. Bought mine @ 65K. Now done 135K. Can’t tell you what parts cost as it never needs anything apart from an annual service. And I can fit my bike in the boot without having to take the front wheel off 😆

Mondeo – cheap parts and easy to fix and great handling.

Has odd quibbles (as any car) so keep a grand spare to put things right.

Not boring looking but she likes A4s????

does she actually mean buy something the neighbours think is expensive?

i took the 5 series route, next time its a Doblo.

I was in this position a few years ago and test drove a wide range of diesel estate cars. The ones I really liked were AudiA6, BMW 525, Mondeo 2.2, Octavia VRS and Mazda 6. The Octavia would have been my choice but it had a stupid lip on the boot which would have made a pain to use. The Audi and BMW were good but that good to deserve the price premium over the over cars so in the end went for the Mondeo due to wider choice available and happy to report no major problems.
The cars that I didn’t like were the Vectra due to it’s agricultural engine, A4 just too small and Volvo V70 didn’t drive as well as the others.

Just noticed the budget so some of these cars wouldn’t make the list without been a wreck.

Mazda 6 – if the DSC goes wrong it is expensive (£800+) to fix. I think it effected circa. 2008 models. Ours went wrong in our Mazda 3 and it shares the same fault 🙁