What car - 'cos you love 'em.

[JeS10]

Its everyone's favorite type of thread, surely?

Anyway - I'm 20, driving a year, 1 year NCB. I'm currently in a SAAB 9-5, 2.3LPT. Paying £1500 P/A insurance, and lots for petrol. Its just silly. The car is not remotely fun, and motorways are about the only highlight of a journey in it. Its just chucking money away.

So, I'm wanting something lightweight, with a revvy little engine, that will thrill on B roads, and be cheap enough to run so I can go actually do such driving at weekends. I'm partially deaf anyway, so not bothered too much about motorway noise.

I can't spend over £2k, and I can't spend over £1k on insurance. I'm thinking an average condition, average to high miles, Suzuki Ignis Sport? I obviously couldn't afford a Panda 100HP, but you see the sort of thing i'm looking for? I fear I might be overlooking something that might tick the boxes, especially from the markets that don't get a lot of notice over here.

It'd be good if they had a strong Owners Club too

[insanojackson]

saxo vtr?

[Chas88]

In typical PH fashion, how about an MX-5?

[Tsippy]

106 quicksilver? GTi?
Mitsubishi FTO?
Citroen Saxo VTR/S
Mazda Mx5?

[YBTurbo]

Ford Puma 1.7

Can be got for a grand easily and spend another £500 on tasty mods to make it better.

[JeS10]

Fast responses! Always expecting from a what car though, eh?

Thanks for the suggestions; i'll work my way through them properly. Think SWMBO mightn't like the MX-5 idea, but we'll see - she'd like it for Summer i'm sure

Should've said I do 300 miles a week, mixture of Motorway and B-Roads. I commute to Bridge of Allan, every day - but there are amazing roads about, and I love driving them, even in the SAAB - so to make that experience better would be a great stress reliever

[p4cks]

OP - I hope you don't mind me asking, but how the hell does a 20 year old find themselves owning a Saab 9-5?!

[Gav147]

306 Gti-6? had one for a couple of years and it was a great car.

[Ben3883]

Seicento Sporting? Just picked one up as a first car for my sis: £750 to buy, £650ish to insure. Revvy little thing - it won't set the world alight but it's bloody good (cheap) fun.

[SlowStig]

I would prob suggest some form of hot hatch, just depends what your insurance quotes are like on them. Such as:

MG ZR
306 GTi-6
Golf GTi
Puma 1.7
etc

Unless you fancy going smaller and older which means you can always look at:

106 GTi/quicksilver
205 GTi
AX GT
Renault 5 Turbo
Metro GTi
Golf GTi mk2
Fiesta Zetec
etc

I would get a selection of hatches and run the reg plates through comparison sites for a rough idea as to insurance costs and then get a couple which you really like and then try and get the best deal for the cars!

[bobr]

Ford Ka?
Pretty much the cheapest thing to insure and supposedly one of the best handling FWD cars

[JeS10]

p4cks said:

OP - I hope you don't mind me asking, but how the hell does a 20 year old find themselves owning a Saab 9-5?!

I like to be different Hence the Suzuki Ignis Sport and such. Not to mention, I needed a car to match 'style' - which is god awful - holed knitted jumpers, flat panel trousers etc. SWMBO wanted, what she called a 'st-chic' car, like a Yugo, or something. Apparently its cool. Unlike a 9-5, although I beg to differ.

I'm away to sew my elbow pads into my tweed sport coat.

[Deluded]

Started to read your first post and had a car in mind by the last few lines but seems like you already got there first.

Suzuki Ignis Sport.

[JeS10]

Cheers folks I'll start running details through my insurer, and weighing up numbers (MPG and BHP/tonne, two most important for me )

[JeS10]

I'm looking through the options mentioned above, there is actually rather a lot of nice things to be had now. It seems everyone is jumping on TDI VAG's and stuff, so these cars are going somewhat under joe-public's radar. I like the FTO actually, a few nice examples in classifieds, but don't think I could live with it's thirst? Not to mention, insurance mighn't be too happy.

I'd quite like to supercharge whatever I get though, SWMBO agrees (likes the whine apparently) - which might limit my options? Although probably wouldn't do this 'til I bought a replacement when I can insure something else. I suppose that means whatever I get i'd like to keep as a 2nd car, when that time comes.

Edited by JeS10 on Friday 25th March 10:06

[MrAdaam]

Just put SWMBO in the passenger seat, plenty of whine's then..

I'd stick it out and go for a 306 GTI-6, Saxo VTS or MX-5. They are the ones on my radar currently and I'm in a similar postion as you.

[JeS10]

She is currently learning to drive, and she did say when she has a car I can get whatever I like - which is a nice principal. Bearing this in mind something crap, cheap to insure and run, would maybe make more sense - I could stomach running a KA for a year... maybe.

[RobM77]

You could try an MR2. There's a strong owners club, although the meetings I went to were mainly old people in mk1s and people with neon lights in mk2s They do a fair bit though, and the cars satisfy your criteria.

[JeS10]

I'm insured with Aviva, and just put all my details in through the 'My Policy' thing on their site. That way I can keep my policy the same, and literally just change the car itself, and of course it's value if need be.

Anyway, they couldn't quote me for anything besides the Suzuki. I'm currently £1500 for the SAAB, and they'd want £900 for the Suzuki Ignis Sport. I tried the Puma next, because I thought it'd be cheap enough for them to quote me automatically online; but no. Then the 306, Saxo, FTO and MX-5. None of them could be quoted automatically. From experience this usally means they'd be considerably more than what i'm running atm. Hmm. Not keen on phoning up a call centre only to trawl through possibile cars with them.

[TomJS]

http://www.pistonheads.com/sales/2643537.htm

Old school iconic hot hatch?