Recommend me a car?

SealBeard

SealBeard

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Rob
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Ok I'm fairly up on the photography thing these days... but I can fully admit to knowing NOTHING about cars... well, not that much anyway.

I'm at the point where I just need one, for work/travel etc... I have no idea which to look at though...

I would prefer something:

Cheap ish (1-2k s/h)
Easy on the insurance... this will be my first car since passing 5 years ago.
Economical - fairly cheap to run maintain / reliable

Could someone who knows cars give me some advice on what would be good to keep an eye out for?

I really fancy one of those older chunky BMW's but I don't think it's to practical lol :nuts:

Thanks! :thumbs:
 
Insurance is going to be the killer if you have no driving history or NCB, so that pretty much rules out anything BMW.

The cheapest "decent" car to buy/run/insure imo would be a 2001-2006 Corsa 1.0 Litre. they're surprisingly nippy, decent to drive, GP1 insurance, economical and there's not a lot that breaks or fall off them.
 
Best bet for that sort of money is to visit a local auction house, you would be surprised what you can pick up.

A lot of Manufacturers are still running some sort of scrappage scheme where cars are being passed to auction for relatively little money so mayb e able to get something better than expected...

Japanese cars will get you reliabilty if looked after and as suggested Micra & Corsa are very cheap to run and reliable...

Don't expect to much for that budget though...
 
Best cars to cheap insurance would be in the 1L to 1.2L range. Anything more and you will be paying the price of insurance.
 
saying that a cars in the 1 litre to 1.2 litre range is cheaper to insure than bigger engined cars isnt strictly true. I had a 1.1 peugeot 106 which was a group 3 for £1500 TPFT. I then changed in the same year to a "E30" BMW 318iS 1.8 insurance group 13 (or is it 15, i can't remember!)which was £1200 fully comp - a chunkier older bmw ;) Im a bit of a bmw fanboy but the engines will go on for starship mileage and beyond with a decent service history - a must if you are looking for a high miler!
 
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Cheers for the advice guys - cars are pretty much another language to me If i'm honest...

I'v been driving a 1.5 corsa up until now - granted its not mine I'm just on the insurance, I have no problems with it, I could always stick with what I know :) Just fancied a change!

Funny you should say that Paul - thats the model I was checking out on auto trader :D... actually I tell a lie the one I was looking at was more modern :)
 
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Depends what you want for you money in terms of age and size really.

5 year old 5 door Suzuki Alto falls within your budget, cheap to tax and insure, Japanese version of a metro, quite nippy and very economical.
 
Hmmm maybe have to up my budget a little... I could stretch to 3-4k I think. I wouldnt mind something not to old age wise, I'm not to fussed about power or size, as long as it moves :D
 
Theres loads of decent second hand cars out there, any of them will probably be fine !

The hard part is something that no one here can help you with, and thats finding a good one !

My recommendation would be a Peugeot 306 diesel. They're about group 3 for insurance, and a nice "Meridian" spec will give you half leather, electric everything and air con !

I had a D Turbo which was the engine before the "modern" HDi engines came out. Either are fine and will go on forever if maintained properly !

Nice looking too !!
 
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