Mk4 R32 to what?

[aldo56]

Morning everyone,

This may be a bit of a rant, i'm fairly confused about what to do. Bear with me though, i'm just looking for a recomendation.

I currently drive a 2003 R32 Golf which is approatching 110,000miles. I paid £6500 for the car around a year ago and i've done 10,000 miles in it. I've recently moved to within 2 miles of my work and feel like i could afford a faster car with worste MPG. (For ref the Golf gets around 25mpg on avrage.)

I've also noticed that i'll be lucky to get £6000 for the car, it seems that most R32's don't have over 100K. So i'm thinking, i could sell the golf now (before i loose too much money on it) and buy myself something faster and less economic... (I have to say that i still love the Golf and could not fault it but i don't want to loose too much money just by driving it.)

I don't want to spend any more than i'd get for the golf, so i'd assume a safe £5.5k.

I've been looking at a massive range of cars from; Audi S4s (2.7 twin turbo), E36 M3s, Imprezza WRX/STI, Nissian 200SX/Skyline, Volvo T5R etc. Ideally it would be 4WD or RWD and faster than the golf.

Into the mix also is thrown insurance, i'm 24 so it's still not that cheap. M3's and STIs seem to be around the £1100 mark which i'd winse at paying as the golf was around £600.

Take from all that what you will and leave me a recomendation!

Edited by aldo56 on Friday 9th September 12:08

[CurvaParabolica]

This being PH, allow me to be the first to suggest a TVR of sorts.

PS it's refreshing to see someone list poor MPG as a criteria!

[aldo56]

Although a TVR would be extremely nice, I feel I have to add a reliability criteria to the list. Surely this would take a TVR out?

[LuS1fer]

If you can live with LHD, you might get insurance through a specialist insurer on a 5.7 litre Corvette C4 (1985-1996). You'd need to find a good minter though but I had one for 3 years and nothing is more fun. Cheap VEL too.

[kayzee]

Strange, you're looking at it from a different way to me. I have an Impreza STI, and I live 3 miles away from work. For me, I've decided that it's just completely overkill considering 90% of what I use I use it for is that short journey to work and back! I'm now looking to get something cheaper to run... the insurance/fuel costs just don't really justify doing aroun 2,500 miles a year. However, when I have gone on long runs, oh my! I love it lol.

[Disco You]

Cycle to work and buy a TVR.

[SBN]

At that sort of budget i would stick with the r32, as any performance car you go for will need something doing.

Probably not what you want to hear but its better the devil you know and all that

[Lefty]

Evo V?
Audi Ur Quattro?
Early Boxster?
C43 or E55 Benz?
Jaaaaag XJR?

Hmmm, are 350Z's down to that kind of money yet? I test drove one of those and an RX8 on the same day back in 2005 or so. Loved the Z, hated the RX8.

[aldo56]

Maybe i worderd the reliablilty thing a bit strongly.

I'm handy with spanners and don't mind working on my own cars but i don't want to be doing it every weekend (that's my thoughts of what a TVR is like).

[Riknos]

2 miles to work? 2 miles? And you're going to buy a car to drive it? Get something nice and walk / cycle you lazy bd. I'm looking at 2nd hand push bikes on the net now so I can cycle to work, £20-£30 on ebay gets a bike and then I can spend all my saved money on a weekend toy.

Do that.

[aldo56]

Unfortunately, I have to take the car into work as I use it during working hours.

[snorkel sucker]

I say keep the R32.

Unless you are going to get something seriously different such as a rag top or westerfield.

The R32 is a good car, and likely not to depreciate too much more. Getting into something similar is likely not to excite you very much and end up costing you more.

I would personally be looking to keep the R32 for at least the forseeable future, save up some money and then, come jan/feb/march maybe get into an S1 Elise.

Different enough to be fun, but practical enough when you need it

[Daston]

aldo56 said:

Although a TVR would be extremely nice, I feel I have to add a reliability criteria to the list. Surely this would take a TVR out?

Not really so far my TVR has actually been one of the most reliable cars I have owned.

As long as you get one with either the Essex V6 or Rover V8 parts wont cost an arm and a leg and a lot of the maintance can be done at home.

[browna]

im in a slightly similar quandery to you. i have a civic type r, im not bothered about petrol costs.

rather than move sideways to another hot hatch tyre car, im keeping my car a while untill i can aford to step up to a substantially better car for around £8-9k which at the moment is gonna be a monaro cv8, hopefully.

out of your list id love a skyline or m3, but im no good with spanners, so i need a little better reliability.

id also consider

rx8/350z
mazda 6 mps
vx220/elise and a daily shed

Edited by browna on Friday 9th September 13:13

[Gruber]

From what you say, I'd keep the R32 for the time being.

With winter just round the corner and you living in Scotland, I'd have thought a quick and comfy 4wd was just the thing.

They hold their values very well - better then most stuff you could buy at that price point that would fulfil your needs.

And to be honest, now you've passed 100k, I can't see that it makes any real difference to value whether it has 110k, 120k, or whatever, provided it is properly serviced and well looked after.

[Lefty]

I've got a mk v r32 that I use every day (about 17-18k / year)

It's a good car but IMHO it's not exciting enough to be a toy.

OP, you could always supercharge it...

[aldo56]

Thanks for the feedback guys, i've been going back and forward between selling it or not for a while now. The best thing i've read here is that it's going to make very little difference between 110k and 112k (which is about all i'm likely to do for a while).

I may just save my pennies and go wild next year!

• cough* E46 M3 *cough*