First Car

TubbyGreg

TubbyGreg

TubbyGreg

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Joined
18 Jun 2015
Posts
300
Location
Bedfordshire
I'll be 17 kinda soon-ish and I was wondering if you guys would have any recommendations as a car I should keep a look out for. It needs to be cheap to buy, run, insure, and be safe(ish).
At the moment, I'm looking at a Volvo V40 near me for £400, I kinda need something big to take my tuba around in.
 
Your the first 17yr old I've heard say they want a Volvo estate as there first car :p. It's normally a 1.2 Corsa Sri with 18 inch black rims and bad man rear tintz!
Bigger Safer cars will be cheaper to insure like the Volvo u mentioned or a Mondeo etc. Try putting a parent on the insurance aswell. Have u got money put aside incase anything breaks? With having such a small budget.
 
I had a big problem with any decent sized car (Mondeo, different Volvos, etc) when I was looking at my first one but it's such a magical formula that not even the insurers understand it so might be ok for the OP.

Funnily enough in the end Focus ended up being cheaper to insure than the usual Corsa or Fiesta.
 
Dav4 said:
Your the first 17yr old I've heard say they want a Volvo estate as there first car :p. It's normally a 1.2 Corsa Sri with 18 inch black rims and bad man rear tintz!
Bigger Safer cars will be cheaper to insure like the Volvo u mentioned or a Mondeo etc. Try putting a parent on the insurance aswell. Have u got money put aside incase anything breaks? With having such a small budget.
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Yup, I've got an emergency fund.
 
neoboy said:
I had a big problem with any decent sized car (Mondeo, different Volvos, etc) when I was looking at my first one but it's such a magical formula that not even the insurers understand it so might be ok for the OP.

Funnily enough in the end Focus ended up being cheaper to insure than the usual Corsa or Fiesta.
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Exactly this, being younger I have had some peculiar quotes for example 5 door Ford Fiesta 1.2 - £750, Lexus IS200 - £1100, Nissan 200SX - £800.
Absolutely no idea how they come up with some of these quotes and its not even a one off, most of the companies are all around the same price.
 
iaind said:
Volvo V40 is not even remotely close to a high risk car, why would it be an issue?
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you'd think so :) but in my case, 24, fresh license and it costs more than s2000 honda, mx5's etc.. volvos/saabs are super expensive on insurance for what ever reason! I can insure an e39 m5 for around the same price a v40 costs :rolleyes:
 
iaind said:
Volvo V40 is not even remotely close to a high risk car, why would it be an issue?
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Because its a larger car in a higher insurance group and outside the parellel universe of ocuk where insurance on big cars is free this generally rules it out for new drivers.
 
[TW]Fox;28653314 said:
Because its a larger car in a higher insurance group and outside the parellel universe of ocuk where insurance on big cars is free this generally rules it out for new drivers.
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It genuinely was cheap for me (unless you think I was lying about my beautiful 850 T5 :p). None of the standard Polos/Corsas were cheaper to insure than my 850, the only cars I found to be less were properly **** - stuff like Diahatsu Chrades, Perodua Kelisas, etc.

My XJ6 was only about £1700 to insure for me at 18, which was only £100 or so more than the standard small cars.

I'm sure that for a lot of people that isn't the case, but insurance is a complete lottery with stuff like that. There's plenty of 17/18 year olds on PH with interesting cars insured for sub £1500, so if you're looking for a first car I don't see why you wouldn't at least try to get quotes for more interesting stuff.
 
Wasn't it a Volvo V40 Clarkson got on that young driver challenge as insurance was a lot cheaper than the 'normal' new driver cars?
 
[TW]Fox;28653314 said:
Because its a larger car in a higher insurance group and outside the parellel universe of ocuk where insurance on big cars is free this generally rules it out for new drivers.
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I didn't make my point terribly clear. What I was meaning was that the OP shouldn't dismiss a particular car because one person found them expensive to insure. It might be cheaper than smaller cars, it might be the same price, it might be hugely more expensive. Until he gets quotes he wont know - there's absolutely no guarantee that it would be any issue at all
 
TubbyGreg said:
I'll be 17 kinda soon-ish and I was wondering if you guys would have any recommendations as a car I should keep a look out for. It needs to be cheap to buy, run, insure, and be safe(ish).
At the moment, I'm looking at a Volvo V40 near me for £400, I kinda need something big to take my tuba around in.
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not sure why I find this amusing!
get a quote for the insurance - not sure if a £400 car would be "cheap is run" could be lucky with it I guess, just keep the fingers crossed
 
arfoll said:
Yup, well said... tbh look at the insurance categories a car falls in, they're not always logical but usually revolve around power/engine size/RRP of a car and are a good indication of a cars insurance cost. Lowest V40 is going to be like group 17 whilst a skoda octavia can be as low as 7.
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I never found groups to be that relevant, when i worked in insurance my employer split cars up into segments listed from A-Z. And then rated risk from 12 to 99 based on loads of factors including their own historic statistics i believe so grouping was only a small part within that. So a car rated H72 would have a completely different cost to one rated T72 & certain segments would carry age or experience based restrictions too.

Basically, you need to get losds of quotes.
 
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