Nearly new hot hatch - £15K..

[thenortherner]

Thanks guys.

The BMW is too high a mileage and age for what I'm looking for and won't hit the required economy.

I like the Polo - I had a 6R GTI DSG in 2011 for 3 years. The interiors just not changed at all! Not sure whether that's a good thing or not. The only thing is that none of them seem to have nav. I'm tired of sticking my phone to the windscreen and the continual 'GPS signal lost'.

[kieranblenk]

My twopenneth;

Alfa Mito 170 Veloce - bit old hat now but still looks great
New Swift Sport is excellent but down on power
Leon 1.8 TSI FR - underrated model with 180bhp
Corsa VXR - not the best image but a decent car

[Squadrone Rosso]

My money would be in a Abarth 596 180 Competizione (and was, new).

Try & get one with the performance pack (slippy diff, different wheels & carbon Sabelt seats).

They have so much character!

[S9JTO]

2016/2017 1.8TSI Ibiza Cupra, same internals as the aforementioned Polo GTI (above), except a more stylish package with a slightly different interior?

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

[Tannedbaldhead]

Squadrone Rosso said:

My money would be in a Abarth 596 180 Competizione (and was, new).

Try & get one with the performance pack (slippy diff, different wheels & carbon Sabelt seats).

They have so much character!

Great fun but a bit hard going (literally) as a commuting daily.

I'd be swithering between a 208GTI and Polo GTI basing my choice on both cars managing to be great drives whilst comfortable, refined and well equipped enough to hack everyday commuting.
Oddly enough I was in the same boat last year. Picked a new 208GTI over the Polo solely because one was sitting in the showroom ready for immediate delivery. The Polo was on factory order and was as near as damn 6 month away from having one up my drive.

[CallorFold]

Went with a Clio 220 Trophy myself with similar criteria -

Max £15K - mine was a little over this, but only 12 months old with 7K on the clock from a Renault dealer
40 MPG fairly easily when needed - sitting at 70 on the motorway with cruise on will yield low to mid 40's
Decent reliability - no problems so far, covered under warranty anyway
Won't fall apart in after 3 years - shouldn't do..
Will cope with the odd track day - easily

Great spec as standard assuming you go for the Phase2 Trophy model (mid 2016 onwards models).

RS Tuning will take it to near 250bhp with just a map, which makes for a pretty tasty power-to-weight

[thenortherner]

After a lot of sodding about I've bought a 3 month old pre reg 208 Gti Prestige with 20 miles on the clock.

I got it for 14.7K in the end. And I managed to get 7K px for mine. Most dealers only offered 5.6k including one in Bolton who valued it in person. One in Notts hung up on me when I said I'd like 7K! WBAC valued it at 6K and I reckon I couldn't have gotten much more than what I achieved if I'd sold privately. I can't understand why the px values varied wildly against brand new cars listed at pretty much the same price.

In the end there was so little difference in value between a new one it wasn't worth getting one with a year's warranty left and 20k miles worth of farts on the drivers seat.

I'm picking it up on Saturday.

[ZX10R NIN]

Glad you got sorted.