Our family, having recently added a new member to make a total of four, is in the market for a new car. Also possibly relevant: our older child is five and is starting kindergarten this year. It would be really great to have a car that sat more people than our five-seater sedans; whenever we have visitors (which happens a couple of times a year), we now have to take two cars whenever we go anywhere with them, which is annoying. I am also trying to set up a school carpool with another family, for which we’d ideally need to be able to seat four children (two siblings in each family), and in any case for playdates we’d need to seat at least three children.
I would very much like to buy a minivan, and my husband is arguing for an SUV. He likes to go camping, etc. (we try to go either camping or to a national park several times a year) and feels that an SUV would be a better choice for that kind of thing. It is true that maybe once a year we take our sedan on some sort of odd unpaved road for which it’s not really designed.
First, I guess, it’s not even clear we know what to think about in terms of the differences. So far we’ve come up with 4WD (the Toyota Sienna minivan would have this), towing capacity (we’ve never actually towed anything, but I guess it could happen; but the Sienna would have this as well), clearance (definitely something you only get with an SUV), and maybe a difference in tires?? Are there other differences that would make the SUV a better camping/national-parks/unpaved-roads/etc. vehicle?
The big reasons I want a minivan are that the doors are waaaay easier to open and it’s much easier for a small child to scoot in. (Our 5-year-old made do with our Civic, but there was definitely a period of time when she was 2-3 where it was really hard for her to open and close the doors.) And it seems to have more storage space. And I also get the impression that it’s easier to pack a bunch of kids in a minivan, but maybe that’s wrong?
So give me all your reasons why an SUV is better! My husband will thank you. Or if you have some compelling reason you think we should get a minivan, I’d like to hear that too.
It isn’t fair to ask your husband to drive a mini-van especially if his friends are going to see him in it. SUV’s are about 10,000 times more socially acceptable for a man to drive than a mini-van. No, I am not joking in the least. The only vehicle more emasculating than a mini-van may be a pink Cadillac and I would never own one for that reason alone.
SUV’s are also more versatile and usually handle better as well. If you live in an area that gets snow or even lots of rain, the SUV will be better equipped to handle it. SUV’s tend to be higher quality overall and hold their value better as well.
I can’t really help you as we decided to get a minivan in the end. I really didn’t want a minivan, but in the end, it made a lot more sense for us. We test drove a few SUVs with third row capacity, but found them uncomfortable for the passengers in the third row.
Jalopnik ( a car blog) wrote an article entitled “Parents, Just Buy the Damn Minivan” that sums up the arguments for the minivan. I think that your husband really just doesn’t want the minivan.
A Dodge Grand Caravan has a towing capacity of 3600 lbs. Most SUVs never go off road. As an added bonus, the minivan will be cheaper than the SUV, and will have more room inside.
My impression is the exact opposite; they have a higher center of mass and poorer handling. They also generally have less usable interior space than a minivan unless you go with the largest SUVs.
AWD is nice, but a good set of snow tires (which is more important on both types of vehicle) eliminates most of that advantage. The place where SUVs have an advantage is ground clearance, but unless you’re driving in a lot of snow or seriously off-roading it just means you are more likely to roll over. And the Toyota Sienna still has AWD.
Not saying this isn’t true, but can you provide a cite for that?
The Smart and Sassy Mom blog is basically just her saying “I’m too cool for a minivan, and I’m not going to make my life more convenient, economical, or fuel efficient to look uncool.” That’s her right, but it’s a particularly unconvincing argument.
It takes a very large SUV (like a Suburban) to seat more than 5 at a time. The minivan makes the most sense for the majority of your needs. They tend to carry more people and more cargo for the size and price.
Back when I worked at a place where there was a corporate fleet for field work, they started with minivans. They carried more cargo in a more economical way, and we found they offroad pretty well–the main consideration was ground clearance. And with more SUVs becoming “crossovers,” many of those don’t really have a significantly better ground clearance anyway.
Eventually, the decision was made that it was “unmanly” for the engineers to have to ride around in minivans and they “upgraded” field vehicles to SUVs. They cost more, got worse gas mileage, couldn’t carry as much cargo, and didn’t really add much except for comfort and the ego boost to the male engineers. In the accounting office, profits declined per contract due to the greater expenses associated with vehicles.
I know plenty of manly men who drive minivans because they make sense as kid carriers. None of them have suffered social humiliation or a withered manhood.
Well, minivans (including Siennas) tend to look like shit, so there’s that.
*On Deadman’s Curve I used to shut 'em down
I had the hottest muscle car in my hometown
I could burn rubber in all four gears
But I haven’t done that in a million years
Hey, little minivan, we’re goin’ to the pediatrician
She’s got an automatic tranny with overdrive
And the radio’s tuned to Magic 95…
On icy mornings when I’m feeling my age
I’m protected and warm in my steel cage
Her climate control really pumps out the heat
And her dual air bags just can’t be beat
Hey, little minivan, we’re goin’ to the children’s museum*
Let me take this moment to shamelessly plug this wonderful shot of my Mazda 5, which by the way is sitting on lowering springs, having dutifully hauled 4 people and ample camping supplies about a hundred feet out into the woods. Now I’m not going to claim that a lowered Mazda 5 is the best choice for camping, or even the best choice for a minivan depending on how much room for cargo you need (I also have a much more vanly-sized Kia Sedona available when I need it), but I’m naturally very skeptical of anyone who claims to need an SUV if they don’t plan on towing.
People like Shagnasty who have the vehicular attitudes of an insecure teenager drive me absolutely nuts, and I hope your husband is making this decision from a place of intelligence instead of weakness. And now here’s another shameless photo plug of my trusty Mazda5 banging out some hot laps at a road course, because minivans can do it all.
Is it my imagination or does the Mazda 5 look like an elongated SUV? Or rather, a small mini van?
A friend of mine traded her car in for a Mazda 5 because of her two good-sized dogs. She raves about it so much that I’m tempted to look at one…and I’m a diehard SUV person!
My one argument against the minivan is that contrary to the name, minivans these days are BIG vehicles. Like “might not fit in your garage if you’ve got an older house” big. It really is a marvel that they can make such giant slabs of steel as fuel efficient as they are, but they’re still not all that pleasant to drive in tight parking lots and smaller urban streets and such. That might also apply to some of the outdoorsy stuff where even if ground clearance isn’t an issue, a ginormous van isn’t the most nimble thing for the backwoods.
It sounds like in your situation (assuming you’re not planning on becoming a family of 5 anytime soon) a midsize crossover with 3rd row seats would meet your needs just fine. The 3rd row seats on CUVs are usually smaller and kind of a hassle to deal with compared to a minivan, but it sounds like you’d rarely need to use them.
(I was going to mention that the Mazda 5 was the one holdout of the truly mini minivans, but alas it’s being discontinued this year. The Ford Transit Connect is actually kind of similar size-wise but that’s being marketed more as a commercial vehicle so I don’t know if it would compare well in terms of creature comforts.)
I drive a Toyota Sequoia, my sister-in-law has the Sienna. Her second row is more comfortable with Captain’s seats, her back area when everything is folded down can haul a lot.
I have ground clearance (which I use for camping in certain areas in the desert and the Sierras), and I can tow a decent sized trailer (which I also do for camping, etc). I find that the hitch also works well with a bike rack attachment - I can put 4 full sized Mountain bikes on the hitch, put 4 of us with gear in the back, and the V8 still gets me passing others in the mountain passes.
I get 13 in the city, 17 on the highway.
Happy with my SUV - but I use it regularly in places where minivans tend to bog down (soft sand, rutted dirt roads).
Don’t bet on it. A mini-van may be roomier, but not always cheaper. Make sure you’re comparing apples to apples, depending on your specific needs. Most brands have a small and larger SUV. The smaller SUV may be cheaper than a mini-van, but may OR may not suit your needs.
I will share that I just bought my 3rd Honda CR-V, the smaller of their SUVs. It’s last year’s (low-end) LX model (because of our budget). Apparently, Honda has cut way back on the comfort of the interior. I should have given the newest Toyota RAV-4 equal consideration. I drive a lot, so I need a brand that can go the distance, like 300K miles. Reliability was a big factor in my decision with comfort send (with two kids who usually are in tow for short trips.) We looked at the Odyssey, too, but the base price was too high. I don’t see myself as a mini-van Dad, but if the price were right, I would sacrifice my pride to save a few clams.
It seems it boils down to 2 things:
How much will you use it for offroading/hauling
How much do you care about the “cool factor”
Think of it this way:
A minivan is an oversized car.
An SUV is a truck that has been enclosed.
Whether you need more of a car or more of a truck depends on what you will use it for.
Am I the only one who is surprised that so many people won’t drive a minivan because it isn’t cool? Frankly, I think people like the woman in **Shagnasty’**s link clearly have a lot more problems than which car to buy. According to her, the important lesson to teach your children is that it’s more important to look cool than to be comfortable or to save money on gas mileage.
Drove a Dodge Grand Caravan for years. Stow and go seats, holds way more than a SUV. Rides smother, better gas mileage and cost less then a lot of SUVs. I have no testosterone issues that keep to be catered to by a vehicle.
The problem with that is that these days most SUVs are also oversized cars, and a lot of them are much smaller oversized cars than minivans. Back in the 90’s, buying a truck-based SUV instead of a minivan was definitely conspicuous consumption, but these days buying a small SUV/CUV instead of a minivan is often the more frugal choice.
I suppose it would help if the OP could clarify if it’s a minivan versus one of the few remaining truck-based SUVs on the market (Suburban, Armada, etc) or minivan versus car-based CUV (Highlander, CX-9, etc).
