What car for 20k (NZ$, that is)

[AlexKing]

So, there's a good chance I'll be naffing off to New Zealand for a year come June. The plan is to live a bit more economically as far as motoring is concerned, so I'm casting about for something that I can pick up for about 20K NZ$ (about £10k), that won't bore me to death.

The market is obviously a little different over there, being dominated by GM, Ford and the Japanese makes. BMWs and VAG stuff is starting to make inroads, but they don't seem plentiful, and you are restricted to VW and Audi stuff on the VAG side (rather than Seat and Skoda). Likewise, french stuff exists, but not much of it and I'm not really predisposed towards it anyway.

My recent car history includes an XKR, and RX-8 and a '74 V6 capri - so you can see I have a tendancy towards RWD coupes - though I'm not averse to trying other configurations as its only for a year. Ideas so far are:

Holden HSV Monaro V8
Ford FPV Falcon XR6 or XR8
Subaru Impreza STi 06-08 models
Mitsubishi Evo 6/7/8
Ford Focus XR5 (The Mk2 ST over here)
Honda Integra DC5
VW Golf GTi Mk5
BMW M3 E36
BMW 330Ci E46

Leftfield opitons would be a UK, US or Jap classic from the 70s, as they seem to keep well in their climate, so any bonkers ideas along these lines will be considered too. There seems to be a thriving Jap import scene as well.

I'm particularly interested if anybody on here has a views on the Falcon, as there's no equivalent over here, and I'm unsure of the relative merits of the turbo V6 to the NA V8. I'm quite taken by the idea of this or the Monaro on performance grounds, but their interiors look absolutely gopping, compared to the XKR i'd be coming from. I'm picking up a bit of a redneck vibe from the ads I've seen too...

No 2-seaters please - there will be a 2-year old to accomodate - but 2+2s are OK as she's only small!

Over to you!

[JREwing]

Are you sure those will be within budget there?

I thought that New Zealand was relatively expensive for buying cars, although I could be wrong.

[AlexKing]

JREwing said:

Are you sure those will be within budget there?

Yep, I've found examples of them at various vintages in some of the classifieds sites for NZ. Cars seen as "premium" are rather expensive, but it doesn't seem to be universal.

[chrisw75]

Here's an idea; if you're going to be there for just under a year, take a car over with you.

The shipping costs aren't too bad, you can take something from the UK that they might not have many of in NZ, and then ship it out - or sell it, paying import taxes - at the end.

[AlexKing]

chrisw75 said:

Here's an idea; if you're going to be there for just under a year, take a car over with you.

The shipping costs aren't too bad, you can take something from the UK that they might not have many of in NZ, and then ship it out - or sell it, paying import taxes - at the end.

I'm planning on doing something similar - shipping out my XKR - as I could near double my money. But I may need to sell it at the start rather than the end of the trip, depending on how the taxes and duties work out. Just trying to work out what I would drive instead...