Good starter car for 17 year old - £750-£1500 budget?
Discussion
Searching for a car for my daughter..... there's a lot of choice out there and I quite like the Toyota Yaris, because it has a good reliability record and I enjoyed the one I drove extensively when it was new.....
I wondered about the Honda Jazz, but the image is perhaps a bit OAP for a 17 year old, ditto the Nissan Micra......
Also quite keen on Ford Fiestas as again, they seem to have a good reliability record according to the reliability index online tool...have seen a Ml4 1.25 Zetec on line for £600 with 61000 miles on it. Seems to represent good value for money, even if its a bit old now.
Vauxhall Corsa? These don't seem to have such a good record but very popular with youngsters I am sure for good reason...
VW Polo/Skoda Fabia/Seat Ibiza, all seem a bit more expensive for what you get!
Fiat Panda... wondered about these (especially if I could find a 100hp model, lol!!)
So any recommendations from fellow dads out there who have bought their offspring a cheap first car?
MRichards99 said:
Yaris', Micra's and Jazz's all have an OAP reputation - but this is good for a young driver as it means cheaper insurance! As an 18 year old, a Yaris is far cheaper to insure than any Fiesta or Corsa. You might get lucky on insurance on a really oddball choice such as the Skoda above, I wasn't able to find anything like this though (would your daughter be happy driving some big, powerful estate because it has cheap insurance?). As a Yaris owner, I'd vote for one of those - probably the least old person car out of the three OAP choices but still quite quirky for a young person I think. 1 litre models (of which I have) aren't dangerously slow unlike other 1.0 models of other cars due to the VVTi (so you have enough grunt to not be a mobile chicane). Backboxes, drop links are consumables in Yaris' - you'll see in 8/10 Yaris MOT histories that they've failed on drop links at some point. Other than that, pretty good cars! Set up to understeer (car has been given a very safe setup from factory) but you can make it oversteer if you do it right 
. Hope you find something good!
I remember a 300 mile round trip to Birmingham in a 1 litre Yaris in 2001, it was 3 up and I barely dropped below 90 MPH all the way home down the M40/A34/A31. It was quite nippy if you ragged it to the redline and the car had very good body control..the memory of the drive has always stayed with me as I was shocked at how composed it was at speed.... Hope you find something good! My research suggests the Honda Jazz can be troublesome with age and miles...not as good as a Yaris.
Nissan Micra- I am a big fan of the Mk2 having thrashed several as courtesy cars, the frog shaped Mk3 however has a lot of Renault parts so I wouldn't be as keen!
I hadn't thought about the Yaris being an OAP car, I guess you're right...just less so than a Jazz or Micra. I live near Bournemouth and every other OAP seems to have a Jazz!!
Edited by greenarrow on Saturday 31st March 14:30
..Aside from these all being 100 miles or more away from my address, I'm a bit wary (rightly or wrongly) of buying Renault and the others are a bit big..
although the last gen Fiesta she is learning in is probably scarcely smaller than a Mk1 Focus, which gives me an idea, as they're cheap and plentiful.....
..anyone know how expensive a Mini is to insure?
The 107/C1 and Aygo are a good shout, I like them a lot. The only problem is they have good residuals and tend be worth more than £2000.
I was rather hoping for something cheaper tbh, hence £750-£1500 budget in the title. I haven't seen any that cheap anywhere near me. Cheapest locally, is about £1995.
Fiesta Mk6 1.25 is also a good shout. My wife has a Mk6 ST and they're very solid cars, which clearly can take a lot of abuse.
The Polo is another one I will consider although my opinion of the 2002 onwards era Polo Is tarnished through experience of one as a hire car in Lanzarote. I thought it was the most gutless, roly poly handling little car I had every driven! Hated it! That was a 1.4 too, as I recall. Being overtaken by 1.2 Corsas on every trip is a memory that has stayed with me!!
As a leftfield shout, I also quite fancy a Panda 100hp. They're only group 11 insurance (lower for example than a 1.3 Suzuki Swift) and as the car will be shared by me and I am selling my beloved Mazda MX5 to make way for it, tbh, I want to buy something that's enjoyable to drive as well as cheap to run. For that reason, I also am strangely drawn to the original Ford Ka, as they're a blast to drive....
defblade said:
greenarrow said:
The 107/C1 and Aygo are a good shout, I like them a lot. The only problem is they have good residuals and tend be worth more than £2000.
I was rather hoping for something cheaper tbh, hence £750-£1500 budget in the title. I haven't seen any that cheap anywhere near me. Cheapest locally, is about £1995.
There are plenty of sub-1500 Aygos on Autotrader (I didn't check C1s or 107s)... don't know about the "local" bit though. Still, a long train trip to see the car followed by praying it gets all the way home is good way to buy I was rather hoping for something cheaper tbh, hence £750-£1500 budget in the title. I haven't seen any that cheap anywhere near me. Cheapest locally, is about £1995.
I will keep looking in the local ads, sometimes bargains crop up.
At the moment I have to say that a cheap Yaris, Fiesta or even a Mk2 Micra is top of my list...
Piersman2 said:
My son passed last year and we ended up getting him a KA Sport 1.6 as his first car. Standard KAs were about £850 for him to insure, the Sport about £1050. The car itself was about £900 IIRC. Finding one that wasn't effectivley more rust than metal was a challenge though.
Great little car to learn to drive in, handles like a go cart, nippy with the 1.6 engine and generally a great round town car. KA image is not up to much but the Sport is a step up from the standard ones.
He ran it for 6 months and then swapped it for a MG TF 1.8, which cost him an extra £400 top up for the remaining 5 months, but he'll be able to insure that next year with a years NCB for about the same as the KA was this year. So it might be worth hanging onto that MX5!
Funny you mention the Sportska as I have been looking at a few on ebay....always very well regarded as I recall, a sort of 2000s version of the Up GTI, in a way. What puts me off to some extent is the VED rate which is pretty high for a small car...I'm not sure but I think it may be as much as £280. That's a lot when you're running two other cars.Great little car to learn to drive in, handles like a go cart, nippy with the 1.6 engine and generally a great round town car. KA image is not up to much but the Sport is a step up from the standard ones.
He ran it for 6 months and then swapped it for a MG TF 1.8, which cost him an extra £400 top up for the remaining 5 months, but he'll be able to insure that next year with a years NCB for about the same as the KA was this year. So it might be worth hanging onto that MX5!
Re the MX-5, its coming up to the next round of rust treatment for its MOT so as this seems to be an annual event, I've been wondering if its time to bail out. I've had 2 and a half years of fun. But you're right, in a year or two the insurance might not be bad. Also, the last three letters of the MX5's numberplate, purely by coincidence I add, are LEB, which are my daughter's initials!
CubanPete said:
Does it have to be a small car?
One of the apprentices at work ran a volvo S60 with the 5 pot diesel, because it was an old man's choice, I don't think he paid any more to insure it than the 1.2 Corsa choosers.
Er, no......I cant imagine any 17 year old girl wanting to drive a Volvo S60??!!!One of the apprentices at work ran a volvo S60 with the 5 pot diesel, because it was an old man's choice, I don't think he paid any more to insure it than the 1.2 Corsa choosers.
NorthernSky said:
defblade said:
NorthernSky said:
If the MX5 is a mk1, share a classic insurance policy with her. How many 17 year old girls do you see driving these around?! Sports car as a first car... she'd be v lucky. Saves you taking risks on varying degrees of overpriced 'modern' hatchbacks.
be careful, most classic policies don't accrue NCB(/D)...This is all null and void if it isn't a MK1 of course (;
There are a few reasons why the MX-5 is going. mainly, it seems to need a bit of welding with each MOT, not super expensive, but £200 to pass last years test and the Mrs is getting a bit fed up with it, as its our 3rd car.
Secondly, its not on a classic insurance policy...
Thirdly, the insurance isn't actually that catastrophic whilst she is on a provisional license, but as a new driver on her own, the cheapest quote on Compare the Market is £1873, compared with £861, the cheapest I've found for either a Ford Ka or a Peugeot 107/Citroen C1 type car.
Finally, with the s
te weather we've had, seemingly for ever, TBH I've hardly driven the MX-5 since last summer. I work 70 miles away in Reading (getting the train) and just haven't used it much at the weekends, so I've kind of bitten the bullet and agreed with my wife that we'll sell the MX-5.My plan is to buy another MX-5 when daughter goes to Uni in just over one year...this time I'll get a NC, which hopefully wont be as rusty!!!
blueg33 said:
For my 17 year old daughter we ended up with a 2007 Fiesta 1.4 Ghia. We had to look around for ages as there are lots of ropey cars about. Paid £1800, it has full history and cambelt done a month or so ago.
For my son (now 22) we bought a 1.4 Fabia. The Fabia is faster than the Fiesta (100bhp vs about 80bhp) but about the same price to insure as a learner or newly qualified driver.
Over the 5 years he has had it the Fabia has proved costly to maintain.:
New rear spring
New power steering rack
Repeated egr and idle problems
New starter motor
Cambelt and water pump
New fuel fill release mechanism
New electric window switches
Annual polish of headlight lenses to get it through MOT
On the plus side it has never broken down and he has toured Europe with 3 passengers and camping gear (not sure how it all fits)
Its those typical VAG problems that put me off either a Fabia or a Polo (I owned an Audi and VW over a ten year period and both were plagued by niggling problems, the Audi needed a new flywheel when only 6 months old!!).For my son (now 22) we bought a 1.4 Fabia. The Fabia is faster than the Fiesta (100bhp vs about 80bhp) but about the same price to insure as a learner or newly qualified driver.
Over the 5 years he has had it the Fabia has proved costly to maintain.:
New rear spring
New power steering rack
Repeated egr and idle problems
New starter motor
Cambelt and water pump
New fuel fill release mechanism
New electric window switches
Annual polish of headlight lenses to get it through MOT
On the plus side it has never broken down and he has toured Europe with 3 passengers and camping gear (not sure how it all fits)
Funny you mention the Ford Fiesta 1.4 Ghia. I've seen one locally with 55,000 miles on it and am quite tempted to go and have a look. My wife has a 2005 Fiesta ST and aside from an annoying track rod end problem last year which took a lot of trouble to diagnose, its been pretty bullet proof in the 3 years we've had it.
Did a whole load of insurance quotes yesterday, hypothetical ones, assuming daughter had passed test was driving on own. its all well and good getting quotes for a provisional driver, but its when they pass that the fun starts insurance wise!!
The Japanese cars are expensive! A Toyota Yaris 1.0 for example, is over £200 dearer than a Ford Ka. A Suzuki Swift even dearer, dearer than a Citroen Saxo VTR of all things. I didn't try a Mazda 2, but I'm betting that will be expensive too.
Cheapest of the models I tried was a Hyundai i10, the 1.2 model too, not the 1.0 one. Its a car I hadn't thought about, but am now seeking out as it has £30 road tax and a very good reliability record....ticks a lot of boxes actually and doesn't suffer rust problems, unlike my favourite, the Ford Ka.
The Ka and Citroen C1 were both exactly the same price. Admittedly I only tried a comparison website. I may try some other sites later.
On and weirdly, a Ford Fiesta Mk5 1.25 is £400 more expensive than a Mk6 Ford Fiesta 1.4 Ghia, which itself is the same as a Corsa 1.2....
I found it hard to get my head around some of that tbh. Are earlier Ford Fiestas more likely to be crashed?!
brrapp said:
Shiv_P said:
blueg33 said:
brrapp said:
Another vote for something slightly bigger here.
A Focus is better car than a Fiesta, similar insurance, and you'll get one a couple of years younger than a Fiesta at the same money. People automatically think small is best for kids and hence you pay a premium for 'young peoples' cars' . You'll find similar with most manufacturers, Meganes cheaper than Clios. Astras cheaper than Corsas etc.
If you have to get her a 'small' car, the k12 (googly eyed) Micra is actually a pretty good shout for the money. My son is on his third (04 diesel bought for £200, then 09 1.4 petrol bought for £1000, Now on 06 160SR petrol, bought for £1100.)
I did not find this to be the case at all, especially on insurance prices for kids who have just passed their testA Focus is better car than a Fiesta, similar insurance, and you'll get one a couple of years younger than a Fiesta at the same money. People automatically think small is best for kids and hence you pay a premium for 'young peoples' cars' . You'll find similar with most manufacturers, Meganes cheaper than Clios. Astras cheaper than Corsas etc.
If you have to get her a 'small' car, the k12 (googly eyed) Micra is actually a pretty good shout for the money. My son is on his third (04 diesel bought for £200, then 09 1.4 petrol bought for £1000, Now on 06 160SR petrol, bought for £1100.)
Best prices were £1440 for the Fiesta, £1345 for the Focus.
I'm down near Bournemouth and we do have some of the cheapest insurance rates. The cheapest quote I've got so far is £845 for a Hyundai i10...fully comp. Ka and C1 come in at £861. Fiesta 1.4 £954, Focus, £989.
As someone else has said, best I let her choose from a selection of vehicles.....
Hammer67 said:
Buy the latest, lowest mileage Micra K11 you can find. Loads about for a grand or so.
Bought one for little Miss H67 in 2012 when she was 17 for £800 with 60k on it.
She still has it now with 110K on it and several years NCB.
It`s now 18 years old but is still 100% reliable and costs pennies to maintain.
I love K11 Micras..I really do...had several as hire cars and learned to drive in the mk1 Micra like many people who took up driving in the 1980s..Bought one for little Miss H67 in 2012 when she was 17 for £800 with 60k on it.
She still has it now with 110K on it and several years NCB.
It`s now 18 years old but is still 100% reliable and costs pennies to maintain.
however, not sure my daughter would want one.... has an image commensurate with little old ladies. However, she's not really a car gal, so if she isn't fussed, its certainly high on my list.
I wonder if it will be cheap enough to insure though...seems like Jap cars are more expensive than European ones...
- UPDATE
Insurance is very good on the Ford Ka. Of all the cars I did quotes on, only the Hyundai i10 was going to beat it. She paid £315 as a provisional driver, fully comp.
I've driven it only briefly but I can see why these cars got good reviews when new. Feels really nimble and fun. I'm actually looking forward to stealing it for urban drives, when the occasion arises. I love small low powered cars.
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