Cheap fun car options at 5k, any?

Crizzy

Crizzy

Crizzy

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I'm going to be in need of a new car over the next couple months, it's going to need back seats to carry my little ones to school a couple of days a week, but that's the only real requirement that I have. Budget is a modest £5k.

Ideally I'd like something that is fun as well, my previous cars have been a Z4 and MX5, although I have no expectations that my next car will be in the same realms of performance or driving pleasure.

At the moment I have given serious consideration to an ep3 Type R, but I think all the good ones are asking above this!

I'm quite out of touch with the market, so would appreciate some advice if possible...

The other option is that I make this our proper family wagon, which wouldn't necessarily mean a lot more miles, but I would need a lot of room in the back, the ability to tow a small trailer and ideally 3 full sized seats. If I go down this route then I can up the budget to £10k. But then I lose out on having something a bit more fun on the weekends!

Any ideas?

Thanks :)
 
I had a Clio 197 F1 Team for a couple years and it was easily the most fun car I've owned. Not fast, but fun. You would struggle to get a good F1 for £5k, but a regular 197, maybe even with the Cup suspension, should be doable. My kids loved that car. And was big enough for carrying the kids about and stuff.

I also had a VW Golf Edition 30 for a while. Again, you might struggle to get a good, low mileage one for £5k, but you should get a good GTI for that. That was, again, one of the most fun cars I've had. That car was lowered though, and I upgraded to R32 brakes and stuff. But it was a lovely thing to drive.

I think for a fun car, you wouldn't want to go much larger than the Golf. If you want something better on family duties, then probably something bigger, and a bit faster, would be the way to go. But then it'll be a bit less fun in the twisty stuff. In that case I'd be trying to look at something like a B8 Audi S4. You might be able to find something suitable for £10k there. Not sure you would find a decent 335i / 335d from BMW for that money though. Or you could look at something like an early D4 Audi A8. Wouldn't necessarily be the most fun thing going, but would certainly have the luxury and space.
 
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Three-door ZC32S-gen Suzuki Swift Sport, or a five-door one if you can find it in budget. Great fun to drive at even sensible speeds, tough, comfortable, cruise nicely as well, and stacked with kit – climate, keyless entry and start, bi-xenon lights, cruise, DAB, etc. Lots of nice mechanical and performance touches as well. Decent practicality for their size, too.

Put a CTC intake kit on it, maybe a brace or two, some decent pads, and that's it. Have fun! Sound superb with an aftermarket intake, which they really do need to give them that full-on Sport vibe.

Sold mine a while back and regret it. I usually have the attention span of a gnat and change cars every three or four months or so, on average, but I owned the Swift for almost three years – which speaks volumes. Did everything in it from camping trips, sleeping in it, being behind the wheel for 11 hours (not driving continuously, mind, seven and a bit hours for that), practically no gripes.

Mine averaged a calculated 39.4mpg over some 20,000+ miles, for what it's worth. You could nurse it up to 45-50mpg, but it'd require a bit of care. Only thing it ever needed, consumables aside, was a condenser for the AC and a headlight washer. And it got used hard regularly (lots of time spent up in Scotland, for one thing, on some superb roads).

No timing belt to worry about, either, but do listen out for noisy lifters. The engines aren't the quietest, mechanically, but if it sounds like a bag of nails then the lifters will need reshimming, which can cost a bit (they're solid, not hydraulic). Make sure there are no issues with the transmission or final drive (awkward shifting/clonks) as well. Otherwise, just put fresh fluids and filters in them from time to time, and they'll just run and run and run.

Only things I ever really wanted to add were heated seats and rear parking sensors (which some have), for my partner. A bit more steering feel would have been great, too, but I found it more entertaining and engrossing than a lot of alternatives. Much preferred my Swift to the EP3, and the FN2 (although the FN2 is obviously a bigger and more powerful car, so it has that in its favour, and the engine is great as well), for example. And you don't need to worry about rust.

Anyway, enough gushing from me. Worth a look, if it floats your boat. I'm probably going to end up back in something with a Suzuki badge in short order, I think.

gOM93T7.jpeg
 
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Renault Clio RS 182 2.0 16V Both Cup Packs 2004 | eBay

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Spend the leftover cash fixing up the tasteless mods (wind deflectors, tints and black wheels) and you've got yourself something really fun for not much outlay!
 
I'm finding a lot of "cheap" cars have suspension issues now thanks to our decaying roads. So watch out :/

Especially sporty cars which have likely been driven like they have been stolen quite often.
 
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Crizzy said:
I'm going to be in need of a new car over the next couple months, it's going to need back seats to carry my little ones to school a couple of days a week, but that's the only real requirement that I have. Budget is a modest £5k.

Ideally I'd like something that is fun as well, my previous cars have been a Z4 and MX5, although I have no expectations that my next car will be in the same realms of performance or driving pleasure.

At the moment I have given serious consideration to an ep3 Type R, but I think all the good ones are asking above this!

I'm quite out of touch with the market, so would appreciate some advice if possible...

The other option is that I make this our proper family wagon, which wouldn't necessarily mean a lot more miles, but I would need a lot of room in the back, the ability to tow a small trailer and ideally 3 full sized seats. If I go down this route then I can up the budget to £10k. But then I lose out on having something a bit more fun on the weekends!

Any ideas?

Thanks :)
Click to expand...
You should get a "decent" if not perfect EP3 for that. Don't rule out an FN2 either - cheaper, more available and a significantly nicer interior. I was surprisingly pleased with mine, and only sold it because I emigrated.
 
Brilliant, thanks guys. I've never massively been into small hot hatches, but there seems to be lots of suggestions in this segment of the market so maybe now is time I start to broaden my horizons.

So the recommendations seem to be:

Small Hatchbacks

182 - I have always loved this car, and I always thought if I was going to go down the small hatchback route this would probably be the best place to start. I am a little cautious though as imagine most are getting quite leggy now and might need a bit of work to keep them going?

197 - I've never really given these much attention as I have always preferred the 182. But I'll go away and see what's about.

Suzuki Swift Sport - Again, these have never been on my radar as I've never really taken an interest into smaller hatchbacks, but sounds like you loved yours @Lashout_UK, so thanks for the advice I might check out some youtube vids and see what some facebook groups are like.

Fiesta ST - Which gen would this be for the budget? This falls into the smaller hatchback party so I would need to go and do some research as I don't really know much about these.

Mini Cooper S - Another potential, not sure if the budget is enough for a decent R56, so likely an R53 which I believe has a bit of a reputation for having some engine issues?


Medium sized hatchbacks

Golf GTI edition 30 - I had a quick look on AT for GTIs, there's not a whole lot out there that look reasonable for the budget, lots of tatty ropey ones which tends to put me off a bit...

EP3 - Yes if I could find one within budget that has good history, I think this would be ideal, but the same comments as the golf also apply here...

FN2 - Again, yes a possibility, I am not sure why these get so much hate - probably attributed to *that* Top Gear review. The last NA CTR as well so the end of an era with this one.

Coupes

Celica - Yes I do love these, but I only think it looks right in the GT spec, which might be a bit shouty and juvenile for a 40's something man. If I had the budget I'd probably be looking at a GT-86, and on paper the Celica isn't a world of difference.
 
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Another shout for the FN2. Similar to Lopez above, I loved mine and only sold it because I left the UK. It was fun and reliable. The only criticism I had was that it never seemed to calm down with the revs (even in 6th gear on the M4). As a result it got much lower MPG on the motorway than my similar power/age Octavia VRS (31 Vs 40+ MPG).
 
Celica is very different from the GT86. I've owned both. They seem to lasting forever though. The later/revised 1ZZ engines just don't die.
 
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Crizzy said:
Mini Cooper S - Another potential, not sure if the budget is enough for a decent R56, so likely an R53 which I believe has a bit of a reputation for having some engine issues?
Click to expand...

You have this wrong way round. The R56 has engine issues, the R53 is the one you want.
 
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Fiesta St would be the ml7 for that budget.

Imo more fun than my 182, faster and is just as playful. Mines is 225bhp and is just fun. It's hard to not be a hooligan everywhere you drive. Also does mid 40mpgs.
 
You might still be able to find an RS Twingo for 5k. They are becoming a bit of a collectors item though. Not the quickest hot hatch but fun and look great.
 
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We've had a Clio 197 and i didn't like it at all, didn't feel that fast and had a ton of issues in our ownership. Felt very poorly put together and i didn't rate its chances of lasting at all so we got rid of it, this was about 12 years ago so i dread to think how much of a liability one would be nowadays!

We've currently got a Z32 Suzuki swift sport - i'll echo pretty much everything lashout said, it's been an amazingly solid car, we've had it for 9 years now i think. It was on around 20k miles when we bought it when it was 3 years old and it's just about to tick over 90k. Only issue i've had with it was a rear caliper seized so i changed both, i think the fronts need attention now though as i can hear them binding when driving along with the windows down, but stuff is cheap for them, i believe the calipers are the same as the same age ford fiesta etc. It's not fast by any stretch but is is a lot of fun to drive.

Father-in-law had a Celia GT which i drove, it was OK i guess but left me very cold compared to the Honda DC5 i had at the time, which i guess was to be expected. But the engine felt very peaky and weak compared to the K20 in the honda, it would come on 'lift' and you'd get to the limiter but you'd just drop out of it once you changed, very strangely geared in that respect compared to the Honda's where they make sure you're always in Vtec when you're pushing on. I felt it was about 60% of a DC5 and maybe 80% of an EP3, i'd chose an EP3 or FN2 over one in a heartbeat.
 
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