Insight, Prius or Diesel
Discussion
Just investigating potential replacements for the wife's car. The qualifying criteria for the car is that "it must have a good quality 'feel' about it, not too embarrassing to look at and be available with <50k miles for about £9k".
Interested in looking at Prius and Insight models but her current leanings are towards a Volvo V50 1.6 DRIVe, as it appears to tick many of the boxes and has none of the concerns over electrickery and batteries. I've said that a Zoe or Leaf would be suffice but she struggles with remembering to put a mobile phone on charge, so sadly full electric cars are not 100% wifeproof, a hybrid seems to be a viable option though.
Her routine journey profile is the school run (6 miles round trip twice a day, medium traffic), general domestic use of about 20 miles a day on A roads/Motorways followed by town centres, with the usual garden centre/bike rides/shopping trips at the weekends. A supermini probably won't be big enough for all given circumstances.
The wife has generally driven German/Swedish and isn't enthusiatic of any offerings from Ford/VX/French - I've tried to reason with this as this is writing off a large chunk of candidates.
Any thoughts on whether the economical diesel is the most viable?
Will the hybrids be cheaper to run (given the profile above)?
Your comments/opinions would be appreciated.
Interested in looking at Prius and Insight models but her current leanings are towards a Volvo V50 1.6 DRIVe, as it appears to tick many of the boxes and has none of the concerns over electrickery and batteries. I've said that a Zoe or Leaf would be suffice but she struggles with remembering to put a mobile phone on charge, so sadly full electric cars are not 100% wifeproof, a hybrid seems to be a viable option though.
Her routine journey profile is the school run (6 miles round trip twice a day, medium traffic), general domestic use of about 20 miles a day on A roads/Motorways followed by town centres, with the usual garden centre/bike rides/shopping trips at the weekends. A supermini probably won't be big enough for all given circumstances.
The wife has generally driven German/Swedish and isn't enthusiatic of any offerings from Ford/VX/French - I've tried to reason with this as this is writing off a large chunk of candidates.
Any thoughts on whether the economical diesel is the most viable?
Will the hybrids be cheaper to run (given the profile above)?
Your comments/opinions would be appreciated.
We ended up buying a Honda Civic Tourer diesel...
Our budget crept up to 15k as we looked around. The hybrids failed to draw enough support in the end and Volvo V60s were the initial favourite due to previous brand allegiances, but the Honda just seemed to be the better car across all competencies (and generally 2 to 3 years newer for the same price). A test drive sealed the deal and we're more than happy with the performance/tech/economy/space the car offers. Free road tax was an unexpected bonus and high 60s mpg so far.
Thanks for the advice above.
Our budget crept up to 15k as we looked around. The hybrids failed to draw enough support in the end and Volvo V60s were the initial favourite due to previous brand allegiances, but the Honda just seemed to be the better car across all competencies (and generally 2 to 3 years newer for the same price). A test drive sealed the deal and we're more than happy with the performance/tech/economy/space the car offers. Free road tax was an unexpected bonus and high 60s mpg so far.
Thanks for the advice above.
Value drop was quite considerable.
The car I bought is ex-Honda management, with a retail price of £26k 11 months ago. It was the cheapest in the country with SE+T spec but I thought £14.9k was a reasonable price to pay for a car with 11000 miles and 2 years Honda warranty remaining; PX deal was better than WBAC.com as well.
The 1.6 diesel is 'good enough' for normal domestic activities and there are several reports that the 70+mpg is achievable if driven well.
The car I bought is ex-Honda management, with a retail price of £26k 11 months ago. It was the cheapest in the country with SE+T spec but I thought £14.9k was a reasonable price to pay for a car with 11000 miles and 2 years Honda warranty remaining; PX deal was better than WBAC.com as well.
The 1.6 diesel is 'good enough' for normal domestic activities and there are several reports that the 70+mpg is achievable if driven well.
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