I’m in Europe, looking for family car and have no idea what to look for, as cars are far from my thing.
I’ll start with a bit of info. We don’t drive that much, most often just short rides in town (like groceries, kids to school, etc.) or short drives to nearby towns (10-15km). Longer distances about once a month (50+ km). Slughtly bigger car is a preference as we usually have stuff to carry in boot. Currently we have old Ford Mondeo turnier from 2003 and due to its engine problems it needs to be replaced. I have around 15k € budget, so will be looking at used market cars.
Because of intended use I scratched out all diesel offerings. Right? Leaving me with either gasoline or hybrid options. Full EV are probably no go due to price. I’ve picked a few possible cars from local/nearby sellers and would really appreciate your input on them (or alternatives I should be looking at).
Ford Focus wagon from 2019. Has 1.0 ecoboost engine (92 kW / 125 hp), has some nice equipment options like auto AC, heated seats, steering wheel and front screen. It has a mileage of just about 90k km (60k miles). It’s priced slightly under 13k €.
Toyota Auris sports wagon hybrid, from 2018. It’s typical Toyota prius-like hybrid with 1.8 liter engine and electric motor. Not plug-in hybrid. Mileage of around 150k km (100k miles). It’s slightly less equipped than the Focus (and it doesn’t support android auto or carplay) and is priced around 15k €.
2019 Kia Cee’d wagon. It is probably the simplest car in this list - it has 1.4 liter engine without direct injection and without turbo (73 kW) - does it mean less things to break? Other equipment is pretty good though (parking camera, heated seats and wheel, …) and it should still be in factory warranty till 2026. Priced at 12.5k €.
There’s also VW Passat variant 2016 plug-in hybrid. It’s decent condition, although it has over 210k km (like 140k miles). I don’t have option to recharge at home (flat), but there are 2 or 3 public stations in walk distance. Priced at roughly 16k € it’s slightly over my intended budget, but it’s a bigger more comfortable car and has plenty of optional features (like parking camera, driving assistants, full led lights, etc.).
And there’s about another gazzillion of cars and my brain hurts… Would you please help me decide?
It’s hard to compare reliability for the same cars in North America vs western Europe since the weather is much better (compared to most of North America, so not counting California) and preventive maintenance is much more common in Europe. My friend is a mechanic that came from Europe to Canada and he can’t believe the shit people find acceptable to drive over here…
I’m in San Diego. Can’t really get better weather than here. However, for anything with lots of battery, high heat is bad, so there’s that.
All of that’s why prefaced my statement with I’m an American. No one else had replied yet, so I figured I’d give my $0.02 as someone who works on cars.
Not saying your reply was bad, just wanted to add that disclaimer because VWs are considered to be great cars in Europe and as a person who does preventive maintenance I’ve never had as much issue with mine as my girlfriend has had with her Honda for example.
Interesting piece of info. Thank you.