Recommend my first real car

In My Humble Opinion
1

I’m going to complete probation at my current job soon, which means that pretty soon, for the first time ever, I’m going to go shopping for a new car. No more cheap used one-wheel-in-the grave clunkers for me, I’m starting fresh! Of course, because this is such a monumental step, I’m going to need advice. Lots of it. The more the better.

Firstly, my four big requirements:

  1. I have a bit over $26,000 in my savings account the last time I checked. I definitely do not want to go that high, however. $15,000-17,000 is a good figure, $20,000 is a “definite maybe", and the absolute highest I’m willing to go is $23,000, and ONLY if we’re talking top-of-the-line quality.

  2. It must not take up a lot of space, and an outright compact is ideal. Not just for parking, but cornering; there are a lot of places on Oahu that require really sharp turns, especially (but definitely not only) parking lots.

  3. Even though Oahu doesn’t have the kind of long drives most parts of the mainland have, I do expect at least reasonably good fuel mileage, especially for a compact. 26 MPG highway minimum. Furthermore, while I expect some loss of performance over time, I do not want it to turn into a complete gas guzzler after the fifth year or so.

  4. It must be built to last. I do not want a critical system (engine, radiator, transmission, braking, starting, powertrain, electrical, etc.) suffering a complete catastrophic breakdown every six months. Same goes for things that aren’t critical but are a real pain in the butt to replace (power windows, power locks, air conditioning, etc.). Furthermore, when something does go wrong, I want it to be repairable…none of that search all over the island twice over for that Benz part and spend forever and a day five times and take it to the dealer twice trying vainly to correct the problem junk. (That’s what my dad’s been going through for months, and that stupid Benz still isn’t ready.)

Few other notes…

  • I’ll almost never get a chance to go over 60 anymore, so performance isn’t a big concern.
  • I don’t need a lot of trunk space. Enough for a typical load of groceries is fine. I won’t be doing airport pickups or heavy moving with this car.
  • Safety isn’t a big priority. In my experience, the best way to avoid being injured in an accident is to not cause one (and I’m a really safe, courteous driver; ask my mom). We don’t have swarms of SUV’s here, so I’m not too worried about being run over.
  • I don’t want to get a Civic, as that’s the most frequently stolen vehicle in the stage, plus every Civic owner I’ve ever known has run into really nasty problems after just a few years. I’m a bit leery about the Prius due to its heavy reliance on electronic components…I’ve had too much experience with electronics to ever believe this is a good thing. And I will never buy a Camry, not after the ungodly laundry list of problems I’ve encountered in each of the three Camrys I’ve driven.

Right now I’m leaning pretty strongly toward a Corolla. I’ve heard some nice things about the Accord as well, especially its dependability. And if modern Sentras are a big improvement over that gas hog with the eternally unreliable electrical system I had in college, that’s also a possibility.

(Oh, and I’m perfectly open to domestics that meet my criteria. I’m not holding my breath.)

2

Mazda 3?

3

Well I don’t personally love how it looks, I’m impressed by the engineering of the Honda Fit, and the amount of stuff you can apparently cram inside it. If I were driving in Hawaii, was looking to save money, and wanted a new car that wasn’t a convertible, I might choose the Fit.

4

My heart belongs to Toyota Corolla. I can’t bear to recommend any other.

5

Smart cars are now available in the US, or will be in a couple of months: http://www.smartusa.com/index.aspx

But be warned, you should maintain this philosophy:

…and you might have to rethink this philosophy:

But otherwise, it probably meets your criteria. It gets 45 mpg, you can get it for under $18k, it’s as compact as it gets, and I believe they’ve got a pretty good maintenance record in Europe (but I’m not sure about that). It’s definitely a head-turner.

6

Go with a hatchback design. They are much more useful than sedans.
Go with front wheel drive, though with small cars it’s not that easy to go without it.
Get some conveniences that you will miss if you don’t have them: electric windows and losks, internittent wipers, rear window wiper and defroster, etc.
Stereo that will dock your ipod or mp3 player.

I ended up buying a Mazda Protege 5 a few years back, but they don’t make it any more.

7

Toyota Corolla or Yaris (4-door version, hatchbacks are ugly :stuck_out_tongue: ), depending on how small you want to go.

8

You need to buy a used car. That is all there is to it. Your savings will be substantial and can be put to much, much better things like long-term investments. The $12,000 - $15,000 range can buy a nice car that would be out of your price-range otherwise and perform like new if it is 2 - 4 years old. Cars are the opposite of an investment. They are a cash such-hole and no rational person should ever buy a new one. A $500 repair bill every year pales in comparison to the expenses of a new one. Pick out one of your dream cars and then but buy it used. You will have a great time and still save money.

9

100% in agreement with buying used.

Preferably an old diesel Mercedes and a good set of tools from Sears.

Money is too hard to come by to just give it to some car dealer so he can make a boat payment.

In fact get a used car and a used boat!

10

Hummer. The big one. Perfect starter vehicle!

Or a Corolla. Corollas are good, too.

11

If you feel you must buy new, consider the Ford Focus. I think it meets all of your requirements. My first thought was the Mazda 3 (I’m considering one myself, but I drove a Focus and like it just fine) but the Focus will be about $4000 or $5000 less. That’s important, the Ford will be in your $15K range. Don’t sink a lot of money into your first car. Keep building up your savings, you’ll never regret having cash in the bank.

Edited to add: The VW Rabbit is also a good choice.

12

The wife and I have both been very happy with our two 2003 Suzuki Aerios, which they don’t make any more–the modern equivalent is the SX4, which looked pretty good at the recent Seattle Auto Show.

But I have to say that parts are a problem. Any time I need anything, it’s a good solid week wait for parts.

On the plus side, I hardly ever need parts. We’ve had a couple collision repairs, and a mouse chewed up my gas gauge wiring harness. The only real problem we’ve had that was Suzuki’s fault was a clicking noise from the front brakes; they installed the fix under warranty and it was good.

I can’t say that I would recommend the Suzuki Reno or Forenza, which are built by Daewoo, and which I have heard bad things about.

13

Actually, I don’t happen to know any convenient Toyota dealerships offhand, whereas there’s this one place I go to fairly regularly that has a whole bunch of lots in one place, including Honda. I’ll start there, then see if there are any better deals elsewhere.

Glad to hear good things about the Corolla, and I’ll definitely take a good look at the Mazda 3. The Fit sounds like a great choice, but it might be hard to find one. The Smart…eh, it has its appeal, but it’s just a bit too weird for my tastes (never mind finding a place that has one).

As for costs…huh. Look, I’m well aware that this is going to set me back a lot. I’m well aware that if I just want a ride, some of them go for $400 or less. The point is that I don’t want just a ride, and I definitely don’t want one that I know has gone to hell or will develop massive problems or has horrible fuel mileage. Don’t forget that major problems take time to fix. I once had a nice friend-of-a-friend who had plenty of free time to work on my family’s vehicles, and I still was badly inconvenienced for weeks at a time. Don’t get me wrong, I know that no vehicle is immune to problems, but some are definitely a lot better than others, and knowing that no one else has touched my car, knowing that it’s always been driven responsibly and treated with respect and properly maintained, that’s worth a world to me.

Every car my entire immediate family has ever bought used has developed nightmarish problems (the Camrys were the absolute worst, BTW), one in the first week. The Sienna we got new is over six years old; the only work we’ve ever had to do on it besides regular oil changes was to replace a defective shock absorber and patch up the side I digned up during an errant left turn. It runs like a dream. And the only problem we’ve had with our Prius, bought new, about four years old now, is a mileage counter snafu caused by some Toyota dolt during scheduled maintenance. No engine failure, no electrical failures, no problems with the braking (which are never never ever permanently fixable in a Camry no matter what you do), and in general it’s been vastly more dependable than I’d expect a rolling computer to be.

I know what I’m buying here. And I’ve spent money on many, many things that were far bigger wastes of it.

All right, thank you, SDMB, for coming through again! Now if you’ll excuse me, I have some serious comparison shopping to do.

14

Ford Ranger.

They almost never go for retail. Not that retail is all that bad.

You should be able to get basic nothing-optional-except-AC 4 cylinder 5-speed for less than half of your $26K.

My '97, owned since new, refuses to die. And it’s been hit by a distracted ditz in an Oldsmobile phone booth in '99 and 1/2 a tree while parked in '02.

Replaced a battery and an oxygen sensor under warranty. A starter and shocks in the 7 1/2 years out of warranty. You seem to fear AC, but mine has never given trouble.

Original-equipment tires suck in snow, but that’s not an issue in HI.

Mazda sells the same truck. I don’t know about HI but where I live, you can get the basic 4-cylinder for about $11.5K, or about 1K less than the Ford version. Fancy Mazdas go for more money than fancy Rangers. Go figure.

15

Even though I’ll keep buying Honda Accords until they stop making them (our first Accord went for 254K miles, second one’s going strong at 165K, which tells you why), it’s much closer to a midsized sedan than to a compact anymore, so I don’t know that it would be your best choice.

I’d say check out the Civic or the Fit.

16

Both are great recommendations. Check your email from me.

17

If I could start my last car shopping experience all over again, I’d get a small diesel VW (the Golf, ideally, but the Jetta wouldn’t be too bad either)

the ability to run Biodiesel would be too tempting, I want a car that’ll allow me to give the big metaphorical middle finger to OPEC