What to expect....

So you got totally stiffed/ripped off over your brand new Lupo and now you are going to go and do exactly the same thing, infact worse, by spending over £10,000 on a Suzuki Swift?

Are you insane?

Buy a used Mini from Mini cherised at your local BMW main dealer - it's a better car than the Swift, you'll get all the dealer stuff you buy a new car for, plus a comprehensive warranty. They are hardly unreliable cars and even if the worst happened and the engine blew up it'd be cheaper to replace the engine than suffer the depreciation from buying a brand new Swift which will be worth £3k tops in 3 years time.
 
[TW]Fox said:
So you got totally stiffed/ripped off over your brand new Lupo and now you are going to go and do exactly the same thing, infact worse, by spending over £10,000 on a Suzuki Swift?

Are you insane?

Buy a used Mini from Mini cherised at your local BMW main dealer - it's a better car than the Swift, you'll get all the dealer stuff you buy a new car for, plus a comprehensive warranty. They are hardly unreliable cars and even if the worst happened and the engine blew up it'd be cheaper to replace the engine than suffer the depreciation from buying a brand new Swift which will be worth £3k tops in 3 years time.

Listen to this man, he knows what he is talking about!
 
As said above, you're mad to buy a new car. You do realise you can just buy a decent warranty on a used car for a few hundred tops? I bought a 9 year old C Class mercedes with the best part of 100K mileage and the warranty for that is only £250 a year (warrantydirect.co.uk) so it will be peanuts for the sort of cars you're looking at.

Let someone else suffer the huge depreciation (as you have this time) and buy something 1 or 2 years old, otherwise, as saud above, you will regret buying it. New cars are for comporates and mugs to buy, never with your own money.
 
Beepcake said:
Driver just under 6 foot, front passenger just over 6 foot.
How comfortable is it though? From my experience its terrible compared to other superminis (and for the record, I can fit 4 6'+ people in my "old" Mini no problem...)

The whole point of my comment was that if he needs practicality - swift>Mini.

The Swift is an excellent little car - doesnt really do anything badly, and does a lot of things well.

If you have to buy a new car, you could do a lot worse!
 
Ok, i've just had a look on the Mini website for used cars (which has to be an auto and has air con + cd player). As I don't want anything less than a Cooper, so the cheapest seems to be £11,250-£11,995 and the colours are... British Racing Green, red and silver...

I also had a look at used Swift's as well, but the cheapest is £9,495.
Does anyone know what Suzuki engines are like in terms of reliability? If I do get the swift, i'll probably be keeping it for quite some time as my mum and my sister will still use it even if I don't want it anymore.. In which case, depreciation doesnt matter too much if i'm gonna keep the car? or not? lol.

I really do like the Swift though... I've had a look at some other small cars as well like the Yaris and Clio. Prices are similar but with not as much standard equip... I'd probably want to keep the new car for at least 5-6 years, so the build etc has to be good, with good equip and no slower than 12secs from 0-62mph!

So.. I really don't know what to do... and I need to make a decision soon :( And if I do get a used car, i'd only really want to buy it from the dealers directly..
 
Would something Focus/Astra sized be too big?

Just saying as although the suzuki spec may be good for a tiny little car, it's pretty much standard for anything bigger.

For £10k you can get sooo much car, surely the extra hassle of finding the one you want will be worth it considering how long you intend to keep it.

Plus I'm sure you know someone who could check a used car over, damn I bet someone on here would do it if you asked. :D
 
Mini's are not the paragon of reliability some would have you believe. My secretary had an 02 Cooper (bought new with the Aero kit for mega money) and it was forever in the dealers for various, often reccuring faults. It had 3 steering columns due to vibrations, faults with the ABS brakes , failed its first MOT on suspension bushes that the tester said were plain dangerous and should have been picked up when it was serviced 3 weeks previous under the inclusive service scheme. On the few occasions I have to move it around at work I thought it was horrendous to drive - I've driven big tractors with a smaller turning circle than a Mini fitted with 17's.

Just because they hold their value (because they are fashionable) doesn't mean they are actually any good!
 
Chief said:
Ok, i've just had a look on the Mini website for used cars (which has to be an auto and has air con + cd player). As I don't want anything less than a Cooper

You won't have a Mini One but you'd have a Suzuki Swift?

Oh come on :p
 
I like the Astra, size is ok I suppose but they're quite expensive aren't they?

Yeah I do prefer a Swift rather than a bog-standard Mini One actually :p It's the looks that counts as well.. I'd have to get alloys, body coloured wing mirrors, white side indicators etc... Yeah, fair enough its no supercar.. but these little things count and thats how I like it :p

As to the drive/handling wise... I haven't driven the Mini before, although i'm sure its better than the Swift.. I've driven the Swift and it handles much better than my Lupo though. I guess the handling wouldn't really matter to me *that* much...
 
Out of interest how did you end up choosing between a mini one and a suzuki swift?

Genuinely intrested as I havent even seen a suzuki swift on the road yet, which says to me nobody wants em, which says in turn it'll be darned hard to sell in three years?

What i HAVE seen are the new clio's, more and more Punto's, fiesta's and of course wave after wave (after wave) of corsa's; would one of these supermini's not be a more sensible option?

I still cant grasp spending £10k on a small car, all of my family do it, i look and think my GOD that could have bought you a 3 year old Audi A4 TDi with around 45k on the clock. Who caes if its a bigger car?? I went from an Uno to a Xantia np, why not have more space, prestige, kit, comfort, power, quality.... etc etc :D
 
manic_man said:
I still cant grasp...

Give up now.

There are a few things you can rely on:

The sun rises and sets.

The tides rise and fall

The mindbending stupidity of the general public.
 
Ok... my dad, brother and bf (plus you guys) all disagree on the Swift so i've decided not to get it anymore lol

So.. my budget for a new car (yes... has to be new pls..!) is £13k, so what car do you lot suggest? I want something quite reliable as i'll be keeping it for at least 5 years, it must be auto, has air con, not too slow (must be same or lil faster than my Lupo) and not too big.

I was looking at the Corolla T3 1.6 auto for just under £13k.. but my friend said the Corolla is getting kinda old and that they might bring out a new one soon? Corolla seems to be the best option at the moment.. What do you guys think??
 
£13k can buy loads of awesome cars.. or it can buy something mundane, new, that'll depreciate away to nothing. Oh well.

Best thing you can do is pick up a Focus 2.0 16v Titanium for £12800 at Broadspeed.com.

Top of the range, brand spanking new, list price £17000 but they'll do it for you, via Ford main dealer, for under your budget.

Edit: Just noticed it has to be auto, err you will have to drop down to a Ghia or something to get an auto for £13k.
 
MisChief said:
So lets say that I buy the Swift, how badly will it depreciate? In 3 years time will it be worth £3k or not even that?
If you are worried about depreciation, steer clear of new cars. 3 years down the line, I don't expect to sell my Corsa, I'd probably throw it at any relatives that want it and buy another new car for myself (not a Corsa though :p).

Buy a used car as many people have suggested, that way you don't need to think too much about depreciation.
 
Can't you even buy a 1-2 years old car? Surely when you got £13k you want it to go the furthest? Take advantage of others who buy new cars and take all the depreciation.
 
possibly not the best suggestion but how about a Aygo, that'd fit your budget, be cheap to run, insure and might not depreciate that much.
 
LeoWyatt said:
possibly not the best suggestion but how about a Aygo, that'd fit your budget, be cheap to run, insure and might not depreciate that much.

who wants a car that basic though :o

and as for buying new, why oh why. may as well throw £2k or so in the back of the fire because thats what it will lose as soon as you drive it away.
 
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