well, as a bunch of bikers, it seems obvious I should garner opinion on what car to go for for my eldest's first car! By jingo, it's a minefield. Insurance seems to have little rhyme or reason, a 1.0 vw lupo is more expensive to insure than a 1.4 skoda fabia, and similar engine size/insurance cost mismatches. Best in terms of tax and insurance seems to be an early 1970s vw beetle 1.3. £1600 insurance, and free road tax. Nearest modern car is around £3500/year and £225 tax. Anybody got bags of experience with air cooled v-dubs that can offer good "watch out fors", and similar? @finm as a spanner monkey, what experience do you have and can offer on these? In my youth I tended to weld and fix up my own cars, and my retired dad always does as much of his own maintenance as possible, so welding in some heat exchangers, the odd patch up and similar won't be too daunting. As an outside, has anybody else been through this car buying for offspring thing recently, and can offer a few tips? Cheers, Pete
if it where my kid i would avoid all the early stuff. Euro NCAP : EuroNCAP crash test results - The AA panda diesel or 100hp if it was my choice.
Beetle? really?There must be something more suitable,maybe from this century.Something with brakes,handling,comfort,heating,go......that sort of thing.
A young colleague of mine wrapped his first car round a pole recently. It WAS a fiat punto and he walked away so they seem to protect the driver well Vauxhall corsas seem pretty good now too. The missus got a 59 plate one from new when she passed and I've replaced an oil pressure switch (£6), that's it.
Mine ended up with a citroen C1 (or the Nissan Peugeot versions) It's still going strong 2 years later Insurance - try CSMA - (they also take into account and motorbike ncb)if your not a member pretend you are for the quote - it's only £20 or something a year if you end up going for it CSMA Club: LV Car Insurance
Send your sprog to the nearest car dealer to buy a brand new car on a PCP deal. Chances are they'll throw in the insurance as part of the deal, and the PCP payments will work out no dearer than paying monthly for insurance on an old jalopy.
All the new PCP deals with insurance are for 21 yo upward, unfortunately, or your logic @figaro would have been good (he's just approaching 17, and I would be happy to have it parked up on my old man's drive while we do maintenance and stuff on it until he passes his test). @Mr C I was hoping to stay around the £1k mark, but £2k seems to be where I keep getting drawn towards. He is a very mature lad, and can't stand blinged up corsa's and similar, and quite likes the idea of a classic, or possibly a panda or other less scallywag vehicles.
I loved my old beetle, it taught me loads about cars, mainly because it was always needing something doing to it. The windscreen wiper arms fell off on the motorway, the regulator packed in at 5am in the middle of the winter, the starter motor would only spin if you hit it with a hammer, the headlights would dim if you turned the stereo on, the brake master cylinder burst going down a hill in Plymouth, the heater system was laughable and it was more rust than anything else but I loved it! It had more character than any other car I have ever owned and would love another one.
When sorting a car for our son, now 22 but 20 at the time, it's was significantly cheaper to put him in a diesel. Was about £650 a year, gets cheaper every year as he gets older. He has a 1.4 diesel fiesta. He had three years on a motorbike before that but made not a jot of difference to his premiums.
We got our daughters first insurance from them, very cheap compared to the premiums her friends were paying, but when We went to insure Sam they didn't want the business and quoted silly money.
I passed my test in my Mum's Beetle. Fortunately I didn't crash it. The crash protection was considered bad way back then. Fin is right
Wifey has one of them, used to be my mum's. Been in the family about 12 years and hardly missed a beat and now on 135k. Great little car.
