Fiesta for ????

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Mazerati

Mazerati

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Italy, Florence
I'm thinking of selling my first car (an '04 Fiesta), and i should get around £2-£3000 for it. If what i've just said happens, then what cars can you reccommend for me? I haven't passed the test YET, but i've booked it, and up to this point the Ford has done nothing but develop stupid, niggly faults and basically give up on life itself.
All i'm looking for in a car is:
High MPG
Low Insurance Costs
Good Looks
Speed and all that nonsense doesn't matter.
p.s I'm not being lazy, i am shopping around atm.
 
£2-3k, presuming you can afford insurance on top, is enough to get any number of VAG TDIs, such as the Golf, Bora, Leon, A3, Octavia etc. Some of those are better looking and others are cheaper to insure than others, but they're all good on fuel, comfortable, well built and even though you're not bothered by speed, offer half decent performance too.

Insurance won't be particularly cheap on anything though if you're yet to pass your test, so really you'd be best off going for something with a tiny engine and waiting until you can afford something better. Anything around 1-litre should be cheap enough insurance wise, so I'd be looking at the VW Fox/Lupo, Toyota Aygo/Pug 107/Citroen C1, Fiat Panda 1.1/1.2 etc. All cheap to run and economical.
 
Mazerati
and up to this point the Ford has done nothing but develop stupid, niggly faults and basically give up on life itself.
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Wahey, it's not just me! Then again I have sort of run mine into the ground a bit, so I shouldn't complain too much.

And to echo HFS, things like the AyC107Go would be a good bet. You won't get a hugely refined car, and nor do they look much fun on paper, but they're quite good fun if you're happy to give it a good revving. Stereo's crap, mind. Might be a consideration, is all...

If you're shopping based on looks, the Panda's probably out. Aside from the 100hp, it's basically a Sainsbury's trolley. The Lupo manages to look vaguely interesting though, and if you're so inclined there are plenty of them painted Tic Tac lime green. I could be wrong, but I think you'll be hard pressed to find a diesel one though - which is a bit of a shame, because the 1.4 is exactly what you want really.
 
Thanks, both of you for your help.
I'm actually considering a VW Lupo for its looks and running costs.

Side-note: Does a Diesel VW Lupo really achieve 70mpg+?
 
Mazerati
Side-note: Does a Diesel VW Lupo really achieve 70mpg+?
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With careful driving, I don't see why not. On the motorway only, though.

VW also did a non-turbocharged 1.7 diesel for the Lupo. Not as quick as the 1.4 3-cylinder turbocharged one everyone wants, but it's about on-par with the 1.0 petrol performance wise (a mite quicker, according to Parkers, and 64mpg - same as the TDI - vs 48mpg)), has decent torque as it's a large-ish engine in a tiny car, and still gets good economy. Probably cheaper to insure than the 1.4 TDI too (1.7 is group 7, 1.4 is group 9) as non-turbo diesels probably don't encourage driving as quickly.

Also consider the SEAT Arosa - it's basically the same car.

That said, group 7 and 9 insurance ratings sound quite a lot to me. My old Fiesta was group 4 and 8 years ago that cost me £1400 for insurance - god knows what it'd cost today.

As a new driver I'd recommend looking for stuff below group 4 if possible to avoid getting screwed too badly.
 
Mmm, that's a fair point - one I'd completely forgotten actually. But then I'm sure you know how it works - at new driver age it's not so much buy a car and insure it as buy whichever car you can afford to insure :p So, best thing to do at this point is pop in a few quotes on some annoyingly advertised comparison site - choose your poison, basically. Try one for the troublesome Fiesta first, then you've got something to compare against.

On another note, if you weren't getting rid of a Fiesta for being too unreliable I'd have said look at a Clio 1.5 DCI. If you're looking at later ones (2005ish I'd say) there's actually a 100hp version floating about that should be fairly quick and nets you 65mpg if you don't drive round like a nutter. You won't be driving round like a nutter though, because the only way the steering wheel could give you any less feedback would be if you detached it completely. Clutch and gearbox are a bit unfathomable too, but you kinda get used to that.

But I don't recommend that really. Don't know why I brought it up, actually. Think I'm finding myself a bit lost with Ford off the table...
 
Just a though on insurance groups, they changed a few years ago from 20 groups to 50. Lots of places still use the old groups, but a group 7 (my old FIAT Bravo 120 multijet) became a group 13 etc. Might be that the lupo ratings are the new ones. My KIA ceed sport (140bhp) is group 9 (old), can't see a 75bhp lupo being the same!

My first car was a Skoda Fabia 1.4MPI. 68bhp, 39mpg (I got closer to 45) and group 4 insurance (I paid £900 fully comp for 15.000 miles). That is going back 4 years though. Fantastic car, bit slow but quick enough for me at the time. Had AC, trip computer and leccy windows too!
 
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homeforsummer
so I'd be looking at the VW Fox/Lupo, Toyota Aygo/Pug 107/Citroen C1, Fiat Panda 1.1/1.2 etc. All cheap to run and economical.
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I was thinking this too.
Lupo much more style than Fox though.
The Aygo etc. look great to me. But for some reason some people can hate them visually,
 
The Aygo is a great little car, my girlfriend has one. The stereo is really terrible though, and the doors feel a bit flimsy too.

How about a Yaris? :p Flame Gold. Aaaaw yeah.
 
Mike0105
Just a though on insurance groups, they changed a few years ago from 20 groups to 50. Lots of places still use the old groups, but a group 7 (my old FIAT Bravo 120 multijet) became a group 13 etc. Might be that the lupo ratings are the new ones. My KIA ceed sport (140bhp) is group 9 (old), can't see a 75bhp lupo being the same!
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Still the old groups - some websites haven't changed all their figures for older cars yet. It's very confusing!

And you'd be surprised. Volkswagens tend to have relatively high insurance groups sometimes. I think the Lupo GTI was in old group 13, so wouldn't surprise me if the TDI was in old group 9.
 
homeforsummer
Still the old groups - some websites haven't changed all their figures for older cars yet. It's very confusing!

And you'd be surprised. Volkswagens tend to have relatively high insurance groups sometimes. I think the Lupo GTI was in old group 13, so wouldn't surprise me if the TDI was in old group 9.
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But a MK5 Golf TDI 105 is only group 6! How bizarre...

Edit: Just done a bit of researching on the net, most sites list:

1.4 TDI as group 4,
1.7 SDI and the 1.4 (75) petrol as group 3,
1.0 petrol as group 2
1.4 Sport (100bhp) petrol as group 6,
1.6 GTI (125) as group 11.

These are old groups and look about right to me.

If you do go down the Lupo/ Seat Arose line, best bet is a 1.4 16v 75bhp petrol. Cheap enough to run, low insurance and the fuel is cheaper. You'll also find the prices lower than the TDI's.

Avoid the SDI and 1.0, they will have to worked so hard to make progress, you'll end up thrashing them.
 
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RE the insurance groupings, also worth bearing in mind that I think manufacturers have worked a bit harder over recent years to lower their positions. Good example would be the C1 trio, which as far as I'm aware are all (new group) 2 or 3, compared to something like a Saxo 1.0 First which is 7. Even my mother dearest's C4 is (new group) 12 where the equivalent powered Xsara would be 17.
 
Again, thanks guys, for the help.
I done a bit of research myself, which enlightened me; if, let's just say, every 17-21yo buys a Corsa, then undoubtedly the insurance for this car will rocket upwards, due to the number of young drivers claiming on them (i.e the 'boy-racers'). So, that is another advantage of the more rare Lupo. ('Rare', as in less common with new drivers, and i don't think a boy-racer will be too keen on even trying to show off in one :p) In other words, new driver + 'rare' car = win win
 
Mazerati
Again, thanks guys, for the help.
I done a bit of research myself, which enlightened me; if, let's just say, every 17-21yo buys a Corsa, then undoubtedly the insurance for this car will rocket upwards, due to the number of young drivers claiming on them (i.e the 'boy-racers'). So, that is another advantage of the more rare Lupo. ('Rare', as in less common with new drivers, and i don't think a boy-racer will be too keen on even trying to show off in one :p) In other words, new driver + 'rare' car = win win
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Indeed. Unfortunately even the Lupo is likely to suffer from boy racer syndrome, albeit perhaps not as heavily as the Vauxhall Bland Vessel of Nothingness 1.2 Twinport. To really beat the system you need to go very obscure - Citroen ZX obscure. Or Rover Streetwise, plastic-panelled obscure. Or Fiat Sedici, people-buy-the-Suzuki-version-instead obscure. You get the idea.

Note: I don't guarantee the low insurance costs of any of the aforementioned models. Except the ZX, which I've quoted myself before.
 
The ZX gave me very very low insurance too. As did the mk1 Clio.

And the Yaris, and I've got the 1.3. I imagine on the 1.0 it's even cheaper. Although my cheapest quote was with Tesco at £502 (after Clubcard discount) and the rest were about £700+ so it wasn't always cheap.
 
Maybe I was reading the wrong Lupo insurance groups then. Probably find the 1.0 or 1.7D aren't too bad to insure then.

Eric.
Dear Europeans,

Sucks to be you guys.
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Come back to me when you can buy a Miata in great nick for less than $1500 ;) Or a decent AW11 for $1100... Or a perfect E36 M3 for less than $5000 :D

Sure, we can't insure any of them but...
 

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