Most economical car for £1k (or less)

It took me just under two hours from Southampton to just hitting the M25 (leaving Southampton at 7am) when I had a meeting to attend near Bedford. I'd be astounded if you could manage a similar journey in anything under 3 hours including the ferry crossing.

Surely getting the Red Jet on foot and then hopping on one of the many regular Southampton Central to London Waterloo trains would be a more sensible plan? (These usually stop at Clapham J as well if that'd be closer / more useful)
 
Is there a genuine reason why moving house is so completely impossible?

Surely find a web dev job somewhere on the mainland, and move nearby? Can your wife work part time?
 
Kenai said:
It took me just under two hours from Southampton to just hitting the M25 (leaving Southampton at 7am) when I had a meeting to attend near Bedford. I'd be astounded if you could manage a similar journey in anything under 3 hours including the ferry crossing.

Surely getting the Red Jet on foot and then hopping on one of the many regular Southampton Central to London Waterloo trains would be a more sensible plan? (These usually stop at Clapham J as well if that'd be closer / more useful)
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Your problem is the M3. I've done Portsmouth -> A3 -> M25 (J19) -> NW7 in two hours leaving Portsmouth at 7 and less when leaving later.

Red jet is expensive, as are trains.
 
MikeHiow said:
You say I am mad for considering this? What would you do if it came down to your only other option being unemployment?

Jobs are hardly available in abundance these days, much less IT jobs, or even those that pay well enough to keep a family of three comfortably.

As for a B&B - I don't see how that'll be cheaper than travelling? I mean you have to travel there the first night, travel home on the last night, pay what, £30 a night at an absolute minimum for a B&B, plus travel costs from the B&B to work each morning and evening (I doubt I'd find anything even remotely reasonable in EC1).
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I was paying £350 a month for a room in a shared house in north london, £300 in west london.
I fail to see how spending your life on the motorway is a good thing.
It will take ages for you to get outside the M25, let alone a decent way down towards the IoW each evening.
 
MikeHiow said:
Your problem is the M3. I've done Portsmouth -> A3 -> M25 (J19) -> NW7 in two hours leaving Portsmouth at 7 and less when leaving later.

Red jet is expensive, as are trains.
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As expensive as £10k a year? (which was fox being nice about the mpg!)
 
MikeHiow said:
Your problem is the M3. I've done Portsmouth -> A3 -> M25 (J19) -> NW7 in two hours leaving Portsmouth at 7 and less when leaving later.
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I've done london to cornwall in 3 hours, that desnt mean I'd expect to manage it everytime I get on the road :p

If you left portsmouth at 7am I honestly think you have a near zero chance of making nw7 by 9am, thats nearly 100 miles in rush hour traffic filtering into London via the a1/m1, it takes me an hour to get to Heathrow from the A3.

do you drive a police car? :D
 
Will Gill said:
I've done london to cornwall in 3 hours, that desnt mean I'd expect to manage it everytime I get on the road :p
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You lunatic, that must have been at 100++ most of the motorway miles surely? I've done the same journey before as a passenger sat most of the way at ~90 and it still took about 5 hours :eek:
 
Kenai said:
You lunatic, that must have been at 100++ most of the motorway miles surely? I've done the same journey before as a passenger sat most of the way at ~90 and it still took about 5 hours :eek:
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no comment! :p

Was not even in a fast car, just an amazing a303 experience, 2pm-5pm on a tuesday afternoon, simply no-one on the roads

I've also done it in just over 13 hours! Now that was horrible, was 30c+ heat in a renault 5 turbo, no idea how it didn't blow up!!
 
Will Gill said:
I've done london to cornwall in 3 hours, that desnt mean I'd expect to manage it everytime I get on the road :p

If you left portsmouth at 7am I honestly think you have a near zero chance of making nw7 by 9am, thats nearly 100 miles in rush hour traffic filtering into London via the a1/m1, it takes me an hour to get to Heathrow from the A3.

do you drive a police car? :D
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I'm not travelling to NW7, it was just an example.
 
Might be an idea to do at least one dry run to time exactly how long it *will* realistically take you in your own transport, then you will be in a better position to decide what is pheasible.
 
7:00, Southsea
9:00, London

That ain't gonna happen. It's possible to do Southsea < - > Heathrow on a good day outside Rush hour, but you'll need at least 60-90 minutes to get from M25 belt to anywhere in zone 1. And, prep for £20+ parking bill while we at it.
 
MikeHiow said:
I'm not travelling to NW7, it was just an example.
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Well let us know where exactly, as I commute in and out of London almost daily I'll be able to let you know what's actually possible. I'm not out to make you look like a fool or prove you wrong, I'm keen for you to appreciate what a nightmare rush hour traffic is. Do you have private parking too?
 
I haven't got that far yet, I do not know if driving all the way to work (EC1 - not sure if it can be done whilst avoiding congestion charge), or driving somewhere and catching the tube would work out cheaper.

I think a bit of research and experimentation would be required to get the right balance of cost and time (ie. some time could be saved by parking a little further out, and skipping the traffic on the tube).

Fox, for a start I believe 50MPG is achievable with the right car and driving style, but beyond that the hovercraft on a season ticket works out at about £3 a day iirc.
 
been waiting for the exact location.

EC1!!!! HAHAHAHAHHHAHAHAHAA!!

congestion charging almost certainly as well as minimum of £10 a day parking.
 
Will Gill said:
Well let us know where exactly, as I commute in and out of London almost daily I'll be able to let you know what's actually possible. I'm not out to make you look like a fool or prove you wrong, I'm keen for you to appreciate what a nightmare rush hour traffic is. Do you have private parking too?
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I think he said EC1 somewhere earlier in the thread? Not a chance.

Edit: doh, beaten!
 
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