C2's and other small cars advice please...

pulliptears

DS drove an 07 1.2 clio until he had a 15mph bump last week and the insurance have helpfully written it off. Whilst we go through the argument as to how much they want to offer vs how much it would cost to replace the vehicle he's looking at replacements.

We can scrape between £3-£4k we think. He's 21, this has royally !!!!!!ed his insurance so his hopes for getting something a little larger this year are well and truly out of the window.

He likes C3's but I know nothing about them at all. He's also keen on Punto's but I seem to recall Punto and Head Gasket failure going hand in hand. He laughed at a Pixo (ok, can't fault him there) and seems to think Aygos etc look like 'shoes'.

Any suggestions? What he buys now is going to have to last for quite a few years now and needs to be reasonably reliable and be 'cool' enough for a lad to be seen in (wont tell you what he said about my Fiat 500...:o)

AdrianC

He's an adult. He's got money. He knows what he likes.

There's an easy solution here. Good luck to him in his hunt.

pulliptears

AdrianC wrote: »

He's an adult. He's got money. He knows what he likes.

There's an easy solution here. Good luck to him in his hunt.

He is an adult.

He hasn't got money (other than the meagre settlement offered by insurance we are bailing him out and as this will mean we can't bail him out further down the line when a gearbox drops out or a head blows it means we need to research and have input now)

There isn't an easy solution because simply we don't know whats decent and reliable in the second hand market anymore.

F1F93

He's 21! Does it matter if it's cool? With an accident as well, his insurance will be ridiculous anyway, he needs to be less fussy.

My Fiancee is 21 and she drives a Honda Jazz, and she is the only person ever to drive one who's under the age of 60!
When I passed my test, I drove a Rover 25, while my brother drove a Rover 75 when he passed. They're not cool, they're not quick, but they were cheap as chips to insure.

It's rather irresponsible of him to rule out cheap cars because "they look like shoes".

EDIT: For the record, I'd actually recommend a Jazz. My OH picked hers up for £3000 just over a year ago (2004, 56K, 1.3, low 40s mpg) and its a terrific car. Low insurance too.

pulliptears

F1F93 wrote: »

He's 21! Does it matter if it's cool? With an accident as well, his insurance will be ridiculous anyway, he needs to be less fussy.

My Fiancee is 21 and she drives a Honda Jazz, and she is the only person ever to drive one who's under the age of 60!
When I passed my test, I drove a Rover 25, while my brother drove a Rover 75 when he passed. They're not cool, they're not quick, but they were cheap as chips to insure.

It's rather irresponsible of him to rule out cheap cars because "they look like shoes".

EDIT: For the record, I'd actually recommend a Jazz. My OH picked hers up for £3000 just over a year ago (2004, 56K, 1.3, low 40s mpg) and its a terrific car. Low insurance too.

He does need to be a lot less fussy, however thats something he needs to realise himself, and i think it's dawning on him that it's better to drive something small and cheap than catch 3 buses to work. I wouldn't call it 'irresponsible' of him, naive perhaps but not irresponsible.
Ironically his insurance dropped massively this time and he was looking at an older Civic, obviously thats now out of the window.

He has mentioned Jazz actually so thats another worth looking into, thanks.

Idiophreak

Why did he go through insurance? Were other cars involved?

Imagine this will cost him far more than the cost of an 07 Clio in increased insurance premiums for the next 5 years...

pulliptears

Idiophreak wrote: »

Why did he go through insurance? Were other cars involved?

Imagine this will cost him far more than the cost of an 07 Clio in increased insurance premiums for the next 5 years...

Yep, 15mph shunt into the back of another car (ironically the car he hit was virtually unscathed). Didn't even set the airbags off on the Clio but I guess the age of the car went against it and they have written it off. We debated buying it back and fixing it but decided against that. I think the fact that this was the 07 Campus rather than the new shape also devalued it somewhat.
He's run a quote based on his now fault accident and it's putting his insurance up by about £30 a month on a similar 1.2 car. Believe me he's very very angry with himself, but cant change anything now.

F1F93

pulliptears wrote: »

He does need to be a lot less fussy, however thats something he needs to realise himself, and i think it's dawning on him that it's better to drive something small and cheap than catch 3 buses to work. I wouldn't call it 'irresponsible' of him, naive perhaps but not irresponsible.
Ironically his insurance dropped massively this time and he was looking at an older Civic, obviously thats now out of the window.

He has mentioned Jazz actually so thats another worth looking into, thanks.

Why does he want something larger? More boot space? If so, the Jazz has loads of clever storage solutions, like the "magic" rear seats. You can fit a lot more in there than you'd think is possible. Economy is good (low 40s around town, about 50mpg on a run), its a little slow IMO but coming from a 1.2 clio it won't be any worse. EDIT: Just seen it's a Campus, which I believe has 60bhp. The Jazz has about 82 IIRC, so it'll be a bit nippier but still not fast. But the insurance was brilliant!

Assuming you go for the older model (you'd be very lucky to find a decent example of the newer shape in budget) then I'd go for the 1.4 SE (which is only a 1.3, but marketed as a 1.4!).

SE is decent spec, S is pretty bare so I'd avoid that. SE has air con, a sunroof, CD player etc. Sport I believe just adds a sporty bodykit and increases the insurance - not worth it IMO. However they did revise the range in about 2005/6 so it might be different after this.

pulliptears

He doesn't really want anything larger, his Civic plan was based on the fact he liked the car rather than the size, of course thats no use now.

Jazz size is ok and certainly something we'll look at. He's very taken with C3's at present.

pulliptears

I shall now apologise admit it's the C2 he's looking at....
So many numbers lol

AdrianC

He really needs to play with a meerkat before setting his heart on any specific model. C2s are a good example - they've gone through a real chav phase, so it wouldn't surprise me AT ALL if they were hideously expensive to insure for a young lad with a history of bouncing cars off things.