Which cheap new car?

Long time lurker, rare poster. I am mainly a motorcycle guy, follow the GRM ethics on my 2 wheel creations but frankly get little joy out of working on some beater to keep it running. I do respect you guy's opinions and love reading about what you guys do to your cars, and yes a miata is in my future.

I am going to try to pick up a new car this weekend. Cashforclunkerizing my beater exploder. I get my kicks on 2 wheels, and the new car is mainly for the girlfrend who drives alot for work, and so we have something reliable for road trips. If it wasn't for cash for clunkers I would be looking at another beater, but she is sick of worrying about getting stranded somewhere, and $4500 will make a new car as cheap as a nice used car. I was thinking Hyundai Accent. There was a post about someone enjoying one they rented. Anything else I should be looking at? Yaaris? Kia Rio?

Cash for Clunkers rules will probably change with the new (proposed) funding so there's no guarantee any deal you pull this weekend will fly. Also $4500 won't cover the INSTANT depreciation hit on a new car. Buy something 1-2 years old and use the 'Sploder as regular old trade-in.

Accent's and Rio's are are essentially junk, Yaris, while not junk, is an overpriced, tiny penalty box. For darn near the same street price, you can get a much better car. BTW, 4500. will cover the instant depreciation on an inexpensive car. A 10-11K Focus does not depreciate to 6K driving off the lot. Dealers out here routinely offer up cars like the Focus, the G5-6, the Astra, compact trucks, entry VWs, the occasional Mazda 3, PTs, etc for between 9 and 13K. Shop around, decide what your needs are and you'll be amazed at the deals to be had.

Accent Hatch. Kia Forte. Suzuki SX4. Those are my top 3. Accent is a great little durable car, but cheap. Forte is a REALLY nice car. SX4 is a really fun car. All very reasonably priced.

If it helps, I cannot FIND a used accent in our area worrth buying for less than $3k right now. That's for a 7- year old car with 100+k miles. I'd say the people crying about resale on Hyundai's need to wake up.

Nissan versa, just another cheap option

I would never call the accent junk.. or the Rio for that matter. Hyundai knows how to build cheap cars that need minimal maintance and still manage to run forever. It was a steep learning curve for them that they overcame surprisingly quickly.. now they are learning how to build fun and luxurious cars.. all the other car makers should be VERY nervous about the Korean car maker.

mad_machine wrote: I would never call the accent junk.. or the Rio for that matter. Hyundai knows how to build cheap cars that need minimal maintance and still manage to run forever. It was a steep learning curve for them that they overcame surprisingly quickly.. now they are learning how to build fun and luxurious cars.. all the other car makers should be VERY nervous about the Korean car maker.

Agreed. But when I read the rest of his post talking up the PT, G5 and Focus, well I just figured he didn't knowanything about the newer cars and let it go.

I'm more than OK with being stuck in that "penalty box" of a car...

http://raceyaris.beninbrooklyn.com/?p=27

^Yeah, they don't offer those here. What we get is the underpowered, poorly assembled pile of poo that could just as well be a 90's Echo/Tercel.

Shoot, if we're gonna enter fantasyland I'll take this:

Bobzilla wrote: ^Yeah, they don't offer those here. What we get is the underpowered, poorly assembled pile of poo that could just as well be a 90's Echo/Tercel.

Yes there are more powerful ones out there... but.. where are US Yaris' made. AFAIK they are all made in Japan...

Tell me why the yaris, specifically, is poorly assembled.. I can see other yota cars that are made in the US have quality that is below par, but not the Japanese ones. I specifically bought my Rav4 for that reason, it came from Japan.

And I'll take this:

My wife's Rav came from Japan. It was, to date (including a 2000 Accent GL) the WORST vehicle we've ever owned. I've driven one Yaris, been in a half dozen. The interior on my 165k mile, 10 year old Accent has better materials and put together better.

The RAV ate 3 main cats, burned through the under splash shield, ate 4 O2 sensors, destroyed the rear diff in 86k miles. the Cats/O2's were due to a bad ECU ($3100 from Toy, manual trany car) that was finally diagnosed AFTER we traded it in for the Suzuki Grand Vitara. The Grand Vitara lasted us 97k miles with one timing tensioner replacemetn and normal maintenance.

Carson wrote: And I'll take this:

That is nice. Turbocharged Beta putting down 300+hp. BAd arse car.

Used Scion xA or xB, depending on your taste, makes a great everyday vehicle. cheap to own, good on gas, and the xB is very comfortable.

I have an xA, but the xB makes a smartchoice because it offers tons of room to haul people, stuff, whatever. If you don't need the space, the xA is cool too.

anyone tall Drive an xA? Do you find the seating postion to be the most uncomfortable, oddest feeling positon in a car like I do?

Bobzilla wrote: My wife's Rav came from Japan. It was, to date (including a 2000 Accent GL) the WORST vehicle we've ever owned. I've driven one Yaris, been in a half dozen. The interior on my 165k mile, 10 year old Accent has better materials and put together better. The RAV ate 3 main cats, burned through the under splash shield, ate 4 O2 sensors, destroyed the rear diff in 86k miles. the Cats/O2's were due to a bad ECU ($3100 from Toy, manual trany car) that was finally diagnosed AFTER we traded it in for the Suzuki Grand Vitara. The Grand Vitara lasted us 97k miles with one timing tensioner replacemetn and normal maintenance.

yup.. I can see how a bad experience such as that with the RAV can jade your view. Fair enough.

I have nothing against suzuki's or hyundai's. I do like the accent 3 door for the same reasons I like the yaris.

P71 wrote: Also $4500 won't cover the INSTANT depreciation hit on a new car. Buy something 1-2 years old and use the 'Sploder as regular old trade-in.

sorry man.. My Rav4 is 2.5 years old and just hit about $4500 of depreciation( and thats NADA trade in price). All depends on how good of a deal you can negotiate in the beginning.. HA!!

If you look at NADA retail, the vehicle is only $3k under what I paid for it 2.5 years ago.

I'm just saying.

^ And I can turn around and sell our 2000 Accent for more than I paid for it 2 years ago... so that's appreciation.

Funny, I have owned my 02 Elantra since new, bought it April 2002. I;ve watchedteh resale on it since the second year we owned it. It was funny, years 4-6 actually went up. Right now KBB (which is what I've been watching for the last 7 years) has it at $4,850. So in 7 years I've lost 7600. 4 YEARS ago it was worth 4900. So to blindly say that the Korean cars have terrible resale is silly. They're not as strong as teh blindly purchased hon/toy's, but people have been buying them by name only for years now.

The same Civic we looked at now would be worth $7050, BUT I would have paid $17k for it new. So I would have lost more money in the same amount of time. 69% depr for the honduh, compared to 71% for the hyundai. 2% is close enough for me.

Bobzilla wrote: anyone tall Drive an xA? Do you find the seating postion to be the most uncomfortable, oddest feeling positon in a car like I do?

I'm 5' 11", not exactly gargantuan. It took my quite some time to find a comfortable seating position. Even now, my legs are comfortable but my arms have to reach a bit more than I'd like to really grip the wheel.

Bobzilla wrote: ^ And I can turn around and sell our 2000 Accent for more than I paid for it 2 years ago... so that's appreciation.

same with my 96 civic.. I'm going to wait until gas prices spike up high again and hammer someone for double the price I paid for a rust free southern 40+mpg car in new england... Never seen salt... Oonly 105K miles...

Ohhh the money I'll make. Then I'll go out a buy a beater truck cause I drive 4 miles to work and back everyday. Mileage is of little concern to me. I'm going on week 4 in my civic for filling it up and it still has 3/8 tank left.

How about a Kia Soul? It has some fans at GRM.

In reply to Bobzilla:

Go out and actually drive the aforementioned cars before you comment. In addition to owning over 200 cars(and driving thousands, including most of the new stuff-yeah, I know a few magazine/ industry dorks, too), We usually purchase a new car or two every year. Our fleet doesn't just include exotics, we purchased a Focus Kona ZX3(in 2000) for 9400.(ad car). It was loaded, came with some limited edition extras and a mountain bike. 250. worth of SVT discounted suspension parts resulted in a great handling car that returned well over 30mpg and has been absolutely trouble free for 130K while hauling mountain bikes around the western states. Our newest addition to the new beater fleet is a fully optioned Saturn Astra(heated leather sport seats, Pirelli PZeros on 18' alloys,etc,etc,etc) Purchased for essentially the same price as the local Toyota dealer was asking for the dreadful Yaris-a car not even remotely comparable to the Saturn

The G5 is nothing more than a re badged Cobalt. Noted domestic basher Jaime Kittman of Automobile recently wrote a column about how well the Cobalt was screwed together and how nicely it worked as basic transpo. The warranty on the GM product is better than the mainstream Japanese offerings and the year of free OnStar is nice. Street prices of that car are ridiculously low. The PT, while a plastic laden device, offers very good versatility, a proven platform and very low prices.

The entry level Korean offerings, while much improved over the miserable devices that they used to build, are still subpar in many areas(although, with good warranties). I've driven them all and considering that most of the cars one market segment up from them are now discounted to never before seen levels-it would be foolish to ignore a comparison.

As to the "racing" Yari not being penalty boxes? Well, they race bar stools too-doesn't mean I want one. Miserable little cars.

All I'm saying is that there are a lot of cars out there and to limit your selection based on some dated, pre-conceived notions, is simply foolish. Some people car about storage, cargo area, performance, economy, warranty, style-whatever. try them all, investigate the offers and buy what you like.

I was in the hunt for a new car a few weeks ago and it came down to either a Yaris or an Accent. I came home with a Yaris hatch. I've put 1200 miles on it in two weeks and gotten no less than 40 mpg in it. Also, for a bone stock car, it handles better than my lowered Escort with Eibachs and a big fat rear bar. Overall, I have been nothing but happy with it. Women seem to like it too..

I really like both the Yaris, and the Accent, but I'd probably take a Cobalt over both of them.

Wow, I get back from a nice motorcycle ride in the mountains and there are 24 posts! thanks for all the opinions!

I've always thought new cars were a bad investment, but $4500 would at least come close to covering the depreciation, and the new car goodness (warranty, piece of mind, etc..) is worth something as well.

The GF likes the Kia Soul, but the dealer didn't seem to be dealing on them. I did see some good prices on the G5. We rented a Kia Rio for a road trip, (afraid none of our beaters would make it) and it seemed pretty nice. Definitely not exciting, but that's what my sportbike is for.

I am actually amazed that the sploder that I want to clunkerize still runs. It has had a CEL on, and goes into transmission limp mode when you drive it in stop and go traffic on a hot day, for about 4 years. It does fine on my 30 minute no traffic commute, but will not work for the GF who drives alot for work. about 2 years ago, fuel pump went out, or so I thought. swapped the fuel pump, still no worky, fought with the wiring for a couple of weekends, and finally just wired up a freaking switch to manually turn on and off the fuel pump. been doing that for 2 years lol. I don't even forget to turn it off anymore