First car choices - ideas?

No 1 daughter is looking for her first car. Being tall, she needs plenty of room for knees below the steering wheel, so many of the smaller cars she’s sat in just don’t feel comfortable (Fiesta, Clio, Polo to name 3). Looking a bit further afield, she has realised that going up to a 1.4 won’t make insurance too much more and that brings lots more choices within reach.

Current shortlist looks like Golf, Focus, the legendary Astra and, somewhat from left field, the Audi A2. She doesn’t want to spend much above £2k so we’re looking at cars from about 2000 (Audi) to ~2007 (Focus / Astra) - any comments, experiences or suggestions?

I’ll get in early…

Brown Volvo :+1:

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Over budget but it’ll be insurable under a classic policy which will save a lot of money and balance it out.

https://rover.ebay.com/rover/0/0/0?mpre=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.co.uk%2Fulk%2Fitm%2F122792179321

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Vauxhall Corsa, I’m 6ft and it has plenty of room.

A bit of a left-field suggestion but maybe a Saab. They’re not your typical boy-racer choice so insurance shouldn’t be too bad on them (relatively) and you can get them for £500, leaving plenty in reserve as a bork fund.

Skoda Fabia.

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vauxhall corsa is fine for tall people and cheap s/h . audi will be shockingly expensive to insure i would think . corsa is very cheap indeed and plentiful .

we run a 1.0 ecoflex corsa which is fairly nippy and nice to drive . if you put shell 99 octane in these cars it makes a huge difference in performance .

In what way does it make a huge difference to a 1L engine’s performance?

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Foo petrol is a thing :flushed:

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LOL.

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So for a first car, either buy a £500 Saab or stick premium fuel in a 1 litre Corsa.

Sound.

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This is why car threads are pure shit on here.

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Thanks all! I really like the Volvo 244 (thanks @ciderpig) and I’m sure she would too, but all the classic car policies we’ve looked at have ‘over 25’ and ‘over a year with a a full licence’ requirements so she will have to wait a bit (we’d thought a Triumph Herald or similar would be a good start :frowning_face: )

She’s sat in a couple of Corsas too, but her long legs don’t fit comfortably under the wheel unfortunately (she’s 5’11 but all leg) - there was even a little more room in the Clio.

We’ll look out for a Fabia she can try - thanks @chelseadave!

Foo petrol - fantastic!!

Another way of thinking:
I’d consider any car with at least:

  • ESP
  • 6 airbags fitted
  • 4 or 5 stars on Euro NCAP: puppets need to be green or yellow
  • decent tyres with sufficient thread

Active safety is in your own hands, passive safety for driver and passengers is needed for unforeseen situations.

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Citroen C1 ?

Whoever you are, stop using Rob’s log in… He would definitely have recommended an RX8.

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A RX8 only counts as a 1300, right?

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Some form of Fiat 500?

She likes those, they are cute and v. economical, but there’s very little in our budget - most are damaged or already Cat C or D. Just for peace of mind, we will probably go for something a little older or cheaper :cry: