Motors Looking for a new (used) car, possibly hybrid?

Hi,
A check engine type light came on this morning, and it got me thinking (again) about whether it might be getting to the time I should upgrade my current car.
It's an 03 corsa 1.2l, ~102k miles, still works, although last year had to sort a couple of bits so ended up spending ~£500 on it including mot etc.

MOT is next week, and I'm worried it'll be another couple of hundred, and so I thought I'd have a look at options.

However I've no idea when it comes to cars, so really not sure if I should be looking to buy something 2nd hand, or leasing or a pcp or whatever they're called.

It's a fairly basic spec, with a tape player, no air conditioning etc with the interior slowly dying (handles on doors starting to come apart, getting ice on the inside of the windscreen, back windows getting stuck (manual)), so if I were to get something else I'd like to get some kind of upgrade but wouldn't be expecting the earth

Due to upcoming wedding and house buying, don't have a huge amount of money to blow on a car, but thought I'd ask for recommendations on the lower end of the spectrum

Any help would be appreciated.
If I had to outright buy something I'd guess maybe up to 3k? (haven't really thought about it as wanted to hear about thoughts on options), or if it was a monthly payment thing I guess possibly £200 a month?

Edit:
Tend to be town driving mostly atm, with the odd weekend trip of 300+ miles which will be mostly motorways etc.

 

If you are buying a house and don't have mortgage etc sorted, don't enter any sort of finance deal until completed as of course it will impact your viability.

Next don't get married, save a load of money, then buy a better car

Sounds like you might have a lot of outlay with stuff happening, if the old Corsa has been reliable and its spend is mostly due to age related maintenance which a newer secondhand car may still require, then maybe keep on trucking in it 'till the big life things are over.

Check engine light may not be a big deal, you can get a ODB code reader for about £10 on Amazon that might point you in the direction of understanding what the issue is and whether it can be resolved easily.

 

That's a good point I hadn't considered.

Haha well I'm not that fussed about having a nice car, definitely wouldn't spend most of the money saved on a wedding on a car.

I mean I'm going to wait until next week till the MOT before doing anything anyway, but as it's not something I'd ever considered before (leasing/pcp or whatever) I wanted to get some ideas now.​

 

What do you need the car do? Apart from journey profile.

Do you need to carry loads of gear? Does it need to have rear door for passengers? Does it need to be good as a family car? Is manual gearbox okay?

Another Corsa? Fiasta? For £3000, you'd be looking at probably around 10 years old cars.

Agree with Sandys. No PCP/leasing until you've moved into new house. If the current car can get through MOT, keep it until you've settled down.

 

I'm not a car guy, but for some reason I want manual and 5 door.
Something a little bigger than the corsa would be nice for when I do have to move a bunch of stuff (for a trip camping or whatever). Family is a couple of years away but yeah.

I don't mind my corsa at all, had wondered about an astra as that's the next size up (right?) without being a big car.
Also wondered if a newer/bigger car might make longer journeys a little nicer. Did 400miles this past weekend and I didn't really enjoy that hah.

An attraction of lease/pcp which is why I'd started considering was being not a car guy means I'd have less to worry about. Worst nightmare is spending a couple of grand on an older car, only for it to start breaking down within a year or two and taking up time/money I don't want to spend on it

But the mortgage thing makes perfect sense, so happy to just think 2nd hand, and as I mentioned, will see how the MOT goes anyway, but I like to have an idea before then.

 

You'd be looking at Astra, Fiasta, Golf kind of sized cars then.

Look on autotrader, set budget, 5 doors, and see what's out there, what sort of age you can get. Then read up on reviews or comparisons of those cars back when they were new.

Perhaps consider a Prius hybrid? 10-15 years old should be within your budget, they are well known for their reliability.

 

I mean I think so, but I'm fairly open, since the corsa is the only car I've owned/driven really (was my parents' car before I got it), so the past 10 years have been driving that car hah.

I did have a look on autotrader before making this thread, but there were seemingly so many options thought I might be able to get some advice to help remove some noise.

I'll consider anything really, had thought to aim for <70 or 60k miles but maybe I could go higher I've no idea. Does automatic/manual make much of a difference with regards to that for example?

Oh and also another reason I was considering something a little bigger is I thought that might mean a little more powerful, since the corsa can struggle on hills when some luggage/passengers are in the car.

 

Auto's tend to be thirstier than manuals (as long as you remember to change gear before she's screaming anyway lol), town trips mostly kind of cancels out the newer diesels due to DPF problems if it doesn't get regular long runs. So small petrol, manual would be (probably) the most economical option.

Check road tax figures for anything you look at, sometimes where a car falls in that will surprise you. Also make sure to check insurance quotes before buying as you don't want to get a lovely car that for no explainable reason costs a fortune to insure.

I currently run a diesel Fiesta, and though fairly economical, it doesn't get the mileage (or have the power of) the smaller engined diesel Citroen I had before. Zero rated road tax though instead of £30 !

 

All of these things.

The "spend money to save money" new car purchase can be a bit man-mathsy in many cases, so consider it carefully. If the Corsa is really kaput, it getting it through the MOT is actually comparable to a new vehicle, consider a low-cost rental until you've moved house, or at lease secured a mortgage. I looked at this as a stop-gap between selling one car and finding the right one to replace it, and if you're not fussy about the particulars, you can find something for remarkably little money, like £70/month or less with no term committment.

 

I mean I'm sure it's not kaput, but I think the money I spent last year on it was more than it was worth, and so if this year was going to be that again it makes you wonder...

Do 2nd hand cars have kind of cutoff prices, where an extra/one less thousand gives you access to a 'next level' of cars or is it fairly linear?

Never considered rental, aiming to buy this summer so wouldn't be long before the mortgage etc is sorted.
Another trigger was me not being a huge fan of driving back and forth to Scotland many more times in it (that's where I'm moving to in the summer) having done it a couple of times for holidays over the past two years.

 

Well if we say it's worth £1000, and needs £1000 of repairs, logic tells you it's not worth it, and logic is kind of right, but only kind of.

Thing is, if you were to then purchase a different car for £1000, there's always the chance that's going to similarly require £1000 of repairs. With the added disadvantage that you have no idea about the history of it.

So if you want something you're going to be confident is in great shape, and won't be costing you in repairs, you need to spend a fair bit more. And even then with private sales there's nothing to say, even having spent say £5000, it's not going to roll off the forecourt and need a further £1000 in repairs. So then you're looking at manufacturer certified preowned or new, which is clearly going to command a huge premium and whether it's financed or cash, it's going to have a big impact in affordability of a new house.

 

I used that logic last year when I briefly considered whether it was time to change it, it's only at the risk of having a 2nd year of the same situation that I'm more seriously considering it.

And those reasons were also why I'd been considering leasing or whatever to try and remove potential issues etc haha.

 

New houses need stuff, stuff needs money, money you won't have if you are stuck (I say stuck and you can't ust punt on like private sale) in a lease for x years, add to that your missus might start nesting and popping out your spawn, these little buggers need money and probably a whole different vehicle requirement to fit all the crap in, forget the car, run before life's over

 

Yep, those little buggers are costly. We might be pissing £700 down the drain if the virus gets worse and we stop sending son to nursery to minimise risk. Wife is being very cautious.

Back to cars.
How confident are you with your current Corsa's reliability? Possibly after £500 fix for this MOT, you can continue to drive it for another year without problem. Do you need the car to be reliable over the next year? If it doesn't start 1 morning, can you still get to work?

Even if you had to spend over £1000 on it, that's still only £100 a month. Leasing will likely set you back more than that and tie you down to a set mileage and financial burden.
Then in 10 months time, you are in a better position with better understanding of your finance/mileage requirement to look at lease or a newer 2nd hand car.

 

Not at all considering MOT was a bit under £400, then 6 months later another £160, then another 6 months later (now) it's MOT again and the same check engine light came on that cost me £160 last time (electronic and transmission or something).
I can still get to work where I am, but with moving in the next 4-5 months I've no idea what my situation will be.

And yeah the right move probably is just to wait even if the cost this MOT is fairly high

 

So a quick update a couple of things have changed and I've convinced myself/others have convinced me that upgrading probably isn't a bad idea regardless of the MOT.

So looking for:
2010+ (seems reasonable if the idea is to keep it for a while)
Cruise control (never had it but think I'd really appreciate it for those longer journeys)
Astra sized (whatever that's called, basically size up from my current corsa)
5 doors
Low tax (would be nice both from an environmental stand point and financially!)
~£6k budget

Quite like the idea of a hybrid, possibly a prius or auris (they seem to be the main contenders?). Obviously my budget is higher than originally planned and so my requirements have a little as well.

For the past 4+ years I've only been doing 6-8k miles a year, I can see that increasing a bit but I don't think I'll suddenly be doing 20k+ and so I believe diesel probably isn't the best shout?

 

A few years ago I was able to get a 2013 Chevy Volt with only 8k miles for $16k, which represented HUGE depreciation from the MSRP, especially for a car with so few miles.

We're barely starting to creep up toward 50k miles. There have been no mechanical issues. We've only changed the oil a couple times (the car tells you when you need to change it based on how many petrol miles you've put on the car). It's a little heavy on the tires because it's a heavy car, but with regen braking, we haven't had to replace the brake pads yet.

I know that's out of your budget and I'm not sure the availability of them in the UK, but I've absolutely loved it. I can drive ~30mi a day on electric only and then it will switch over to petrol for longer trips, so I never have range anxiety and I don't have to plan trips around charging.

Most of my daily driving is on 100% electric, so I only fill up once every other month at most unless I'm taking one of those longer trips out to see family, etc. The visibility is pretty awful, but I've gotten used to it. The gen.1 cars only have four seats since the center console area is filled with batteries. The gen.2 cars fixed this problem to give you five seats. There's zero leg room in the back if you move the front seat all the way back to its furthest position. At 6'-4" tall (193cm), I fit comfortably, but only if my seat is all the way back.

A Prius Prime would be similar as would a BMW i3. The i3 is better car overall, but is really ugly (imo). I've come to really love my Volt.

 

PHEV's are still rather expensive......

The Chevy Volt in UK is a Vauxhall Ampera, here's a buying guide: https://www.speakev.com/threads/guide-to-buying-a-second-hand-ampera.26041/ Unfortunately slightly outside budget, but if you look from total cost of ownership perspective, driving electric will cut down your cost by a LOT. If you can left-shift your spending a tiny bit, it pays off in the long run.

About 2.5-3 years ago I went from 1 car (06 Merc C class) to 2 cars (Skoda Octavia diesel '63 reg £8800 and Nissan Leaf '64 reg £8900). It's driving on electric made it possible. Including car depreciation and fixes, I was spending 450-500 per month on the Merc to drive 18k miles. Now, I'm spending ~500 per month, putting 8k on Skoda and ~12k on the EV. I commute 60 miles a day, over half the time with EV, other times is because wife wants to drive somewhere, so she gets her car back and I'll drive the Skoda.
Driving electric is so enjoyable, I'm never buying another ICE car ever, next car will be a long range EV to replace the high maintenance dirty diesel. In the 30k+ EV ownership, nothing ever needed doing on the EV drivetrain, while Skoda needed bi-annually oil change, plus timing belt, water pump and gearbox oil.
Currently spending ~£300pm on Skoda but only ~£200pm on EV despite driving more miles. I think I can afford £200-250 per month on EV car depreciation or PCP payment if I were to replace the Skoda, almost double current predicted depreciation value of the diesel.


But back to the thread..... assuming EV is out of the question (is your new place a house with driveway?)

A Prius will certainly be within budget and size, I know colleague's 2005 had cruise control so newer ones should also have CC. Low tax as well if you buy cars before 2017. After 2017, all cars get taxed same £140. Before 2017, low CO2 emission cars only pay £free-30.

Avoid diesel, cars in early 2010 will have DPF problems unless regularly driven long distance. Also pre-2015 diesels are very dirty and will be hit with all payment schemes city council can come up.

 

Yeah I don't think I can commit to a fully electric car just yet. Hybrid I definitely like the idea of, but they still seem to demand a premium, so over the weekend I did some googling and it seemed I'd be looking at a 2010 prius for example, and for the same money I could get a 2010 a3 (which I assume is a 'nicer' car) or a 2012+ petrol if I don't mind paying more tax.

I think I'd be able to convince myself to pay a little extra at the start for a low tax car for that long term cost reason, but probably not full electric.

Came to the same point about diesel over the weekend as well, just not viable unless doing a lot of driving which I don't intend to be doing.

I also came to the realisation that the fabia is the same size as my corsa which is a shame as I saw some nice looking ones available.

 

@wuyanxu sorry for the ping, just thought I'd ask as you seem to be fairly up to date on the subject, do you have any opinions on auris, prius, civic and jazz as they seem to be the ones available for <6k and 2010 or newer.