First Car

Should be plenty

What age are you and what do you want from the car? The best first car is the cheapest you can find to insure, but that's not much good if you can afford to insure a citroen C1 but travel 200 miles a day
 
Remember with insurance it's NOT about the size of the car and the engine. Too many people go in saying "must be under 1.4" or something similar.

Insurance is a calculation of risk based on lots of factors, so you may find that larger, more "old man" stereotypical cars might be cheaper to insure because fewer young people crash them! Stuff like mondeos and accords may well be worthwhile and will give you a much better car from the money than small hatches.

So don't just look at engine size - both the Honda accord and S2000 have 2.0 engines. One of those cars you could probably insure, the other you almost certainly couldn't :)
 
Ah ok, I'm 20. I need the car to get back and forth to work mainly. But will be making occasional trips to Wales, and just other stuff on a day to day basis.

I'm just lookin for a list of good not too expensive cars so I can take a look of them :)
 
iaind said:
Remember with insurance it's NOT about the size of the car and the engine.
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Well actually, it pretty much is. We did this a few months ago and I did a load of insurance quotes demonstrating the myth that its not about the size of the car and the engine that you can insure a Mondeo for the price of a Fiesta is just that - a myth. Sure I take the S2000 example but its an obvious outlyer - its power output is considerably larger than most 2 litre engines. Generally, in the cheap car market, power output and engine size are roughly proportional. This will change one day when the current generation of cars depreciate but at the moment it isnt really the case.

Generally speaking the smaller the car and engine, the lower the insurance bill.
 
[TW]Fox;23384882 said:
Well actually, it pretty much is. We did this a few months ago and I did a load of insurance quotes demonstrating the myth that its not about the size of the car and the engine that you can insure a Mondeo for the price of a Fiesta is just that - a myth. Sure I take the S2000 example but its an obvious outlyer - its power output is considerably larger than most 2 litre engines. Generally, in the cheap car market, power output and engine size are roughly proportional. This will change one day when the current generation of cars depreciate but at the moment it isnt really the case.

Generally speaking the smaller the car and engine, the lower the insurance bill.
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Really? Certainly didnt used to be the case. Not saying a bigger car will be cheaper, but it may be a similar enough price to warrant considering. If I was looking at £1500 to insure a fiesta or £1700 to insure a Mondeo, I know which I'd have!

My first car was a 1.8 306 and my second was a 1.8TD mk1 Mondeo. Both were a lot cheaper to insure for me than the likes of Corsas and Saxos

Was really just saying that he shouldnt restrict himself on certain factors until he's done the research and understand what is and isnt insurable to him. Not saying he is, but a lot of first car buyers seem to do it
 
Ok OP, here's a very broad mix of cars you might want to look at depending on what you prefer or can insure

At 20 I can only imagine you will absolutely hate a few of these, but they're probably the most affordable ones!


C1/107
Yaris
Fiesta
Panda
Fabia
Swift
Focus
Mazda 3
Civic
Octavia
Mondeo
Accord
Toledo
Bora / Jetta
 
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I think insurance varies quite widely depending on a lot of circumstances (postcode, annual mileage, local stats etc), not just engine sizes. That might be why some people can insure a Mondeo/Fiesta for roughly the same, where others cannot.
 
The only factor that affected my insurance was the three points on my licence for using a phone while driving ( i was actually in a queue of traffic and not moving - obviously a slow day for our ever diligent police force). Added about £400 to my quote.
 
I am staggered at how expensive insurance is for young people these days! My first car (Back in the early 80's) was a Ford Zodiac V6 3.0. Admittedly not awesomely powerful by modern standards (140BHP) but by the standard of the day a large powerful luxury car. A years TPF&T was about a week and a half's wages. Nowadays people are expected to stump up a couple of months worth for cars I wouldn't even have considered worthy back then (and still don't for that matter, I am definitely a "Big Car" person LC80 4.2TD :) !)
 
oddsbodikins said:
The only factor that affected my insurance was the three points on my licence for using a phone while driving ( i was actually in a queue of traffic and not moving - obviously a slow day for our ever diligent police force). Added about £400 to my quote.
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That's still using a phone while in control of a vehicle. To the letter, you broke the law.
 
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