Well, if you give me a bit more information, I’d be happy to shop vicariously through you.
-
How much do you plan on spending?!?! All other topics are moot until this is settled.
-
Do you have any predispositions about domestic/japanese/european cars?
-
Are you firmly decided on a 2-door Coupe (sedans are 4 door by definition IIRC)?
-
What is a car to you? This is an esoteric question, but it is important to know if you are the type of person who sees a car a way to get from point A to point B. Does a car help define you as a person? Will you be spending a large amount of time in it? Is reliablity the most important thing? Do you get off on bells and whistles?
OK, I can tell you that I am the type of person who loves cars, and must buy a car that I love, not what happens to be cheapest or rated highest in crash and relability tests. Car and Driver’s opinion rates higher than Consumer Report’s.
Some of my opinions on topics.
The BMW 328ci is the worlds most perfect car. I’d prefer the BMW M5 or Ferrari 550 Maranello, but those aren’t realistcally affordable for me. The 328ci is a 2 door Coupe, starting at $28,000, with some of the best safety and perfomance numbers for any car within $10,000 in price. I’d buy it in a heartbeat.
Never buy a Japanese car. I am baised against them, and they all are styled in the most conservative manner possible, and they are always the most underpowered cars in their class. This said, they sell well because of those fatcors. They don’t offend anyones sensibilities and get great gas milage. My biggest complaint with Japanese cars is that you pay more for less car. In the 70s you got high quality compared to US and Euro cars. Now in the 90s this is still believed to be true, but it simply isn’t. The 99 JD Power reports placed more US cars in the top 5 for relability, and the top 10 were almost perfectly distributed amongst the competitors. The #1 car ironically was the Jaguar (a punchline to most unreliable car jokes in the 80s) which is owned and operated by Ford. Toyota was the worst rated Japanese car, BMW, Honda, and Ford all rated in the top 5.
Avoid SUVs unless you are moving to a very poor weather region, or actually want to go offroad. Trucks are a great choice from a price and relability standpoint.
Get a sunroof. Its the best option you’ll ever pay for, with a disc changer being the only close runner up.
Consider a used car. You can get a great deal on a used and certified (returned leases usually) car for new car dealers. Often still warantied. The booming economy has made new cars popular and used seem cheap, so the prices have slipped a bit, and dealers look forward to ditch them. So if reliabilty is something you could afford to risk (good public transportation, flexible job hours) and you don’t put a high priority on getting “your” car, consider it.
All other factors being equal, buy American.
Hope I helped a little.