I need a small, economical car for work

sweatmachine

sweatmachine

moped
I've been driving my 3/4 ton Dodge Cummins diesel on average 2500-3000 miles per month for work. This is costing me approx $500/mth in fuel, not to mention the othe wear/tear issues which I figure at approx $200+ per month (tires, brakes, batteries, etc) so it's time for an econo-beater. I'm keeping my truck, so no trade ins are on the horizon. I just need a cheap, reliable new or lightly used car that gets crazy good MPGs. I'm looking to spend from $10k-14k.

I test drove a new Hyundai Accent 3 door today. It was pretty nice and just about what I'm looking for except they want almost $14k for it and I ain't paying that for a Hyundai egg. I like it but not that much. I think if they came down to around $12k I'd be signing the papers, so I might try to throw that out there tomorrow.

I would love to buy another VW TDI (Jetta, Rabbit, Golf, etc) but they are damned expensive. Great cars though, I sure miss my Jetta TDI, dammit.

I just started looking into this and I'm looking at all kinds of reviews now. Anyone have any suggestions?

Must haves:
Manual trans
AC
Cruise Control
bigass front seat for a bigass dude (which surprisingly the Hyundai and VW had)
 
Sal Paradise

Sal Paradise

Hooligan
Jeff, I feel your pain. Its hard to find a good econo car. The best ones I ever had were older Corollas with 5 speed transmissions. They never broke down and if you went slow enough they got close to 40 mpg. If you went " fast" they got 32. I say "fast" because they aren't . But I imagine Texas is flatter than NY so maybe thats not a problem.

But dollar per mile - older Corollas cannot be beat.
 
Shorty

Shorty

Two Stroke
Sweat, have you considered the Sonata? I know it's a little bit more than the Accent, but with the discounts and rebates now you could probably get one in the 16K range or possibly even better.
I took the plunge last year and bought one with a standard (never even considering a Korean car in the past) and I'm very happy with it. The 100K miles warranty is great and they have a lot of features standard (electronic stability control, tire monitoring system, 6-airbags and more). The new 4-cylinder Theta II engines crank out almost 200 HP which prompted Hyundai to drop the 6-cylinder version for this model. Average mpg is about 22-23 city driving and 32 hwy.

Shorty
 
B

bkiser

Scooter
I have a 2006 Mazda6i Sport 5-speed. Looks good, runs good. Much more room than an economy car. Very nice seats...I am 5'11" 230, but was comfortable in the car even when I weighed 275. Gets 30mpg at 70 mph. Mazda's depreciated pretty badly, so they are cheap used and there are a few manuals around, which also guarantees that it wasnt a rental car.

Brian
 
BlueJ

BlueJ

Blue Haired Freak
These days $14K for a new car is not a bad deal, especially if it has the features you want and fits your frame. I'd suggest you get over your dislike of the Hyundai brand name and pull that trigger on that one, if that's your only problem with it. You'll be paying that extra $2K running your truck for 2 more months, anyway.

Go look at CarMax and get a car that someone else already drove the new car smell off of and save a bundle.
 
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newbonnierider

Scooter
I drove a Hyundai Accent in college, it was a 2000 and it was stick. I put 100K miles on it in 4 years, and did burnouts at almost every stop sign. Over those 4 years the only thing i ever replaced were brakes, tires, and belts. AND it averaged 34 mpg or so. Great, great little car. And a surprising amount of room inside. If you pick it, you wont be disappointed.
 
S

strokerlmt

Moderator
My brother comutes by air between Vancouver and San Fran. He recently bought a jetta with 85k on it and left in SF. He liked it so much that he drove it back to Van. I had a jetta co. car in 02 and really liked it.
LMT
 
sweatmachine

sweatmachine

moped
I owned a 2005.5 (new body style) Jetta TDI (diesel) for about 3 years and loved it. They're just too damned expensive. I would really love to buy a 2 dr or 4 dr Rabbit/Golf TDI but again, $$$
 
koifarm

koifarm

Hooligan
Shoot for a nice Chevy S=10 pickemup truck....mine is the five speed manual, four cyl, which gets 30 mpg on the road, still has some class and ain't one of them furrin rice burners or a german sausage.....
 
DandyDoug

DandyDoug

750cc
Thank you Koifarm, I was going to chime in and say buy something that at least pretends to be AMERICAN if you live here.
Good deals out there on both Ford Rangers, and GM small pick ups. Another alternative is a used Ford Focus, or hang in there and wait for the new Fiesta to arrive. That is one sweet ride , a lot of content in a small package and priced right.
 
sweatmachine

sweatmachine

moped
koifarm said:
Shoot for a nice Chevy S=10 pickemup truck....mine is the five speed manual, four cyl, which gets 30 mpg on the road, still has some class and ain't one of them furrin rice burners or a german sausage.....
Click to expand...

Every 4 banger compact truck I've ever driven or directly heard of has been super underpowered and returned poor mileage. I'm surprised that you get 30mpg out of yours. Thanks for the info but I'm really not interested in a small truck...until someone wakes the hell up and makes a small truck with a diesel engine.
 
N

northcountry

Two Stroke
vibe

I've had 2 pontiac vibes, no problems, measured 34 mpg city and 40 mpg hwy. Decent storage, but seats suck for long trips. Should be able to pick up a low milage one for a decent price. Just traded one in (30,000 mi.) for $10,000.
 
W

whyme

TT Racer
Ha HA..."pretend to be AMERICAN if you live here"...ummm isn't this a Triumph site... Ahhhh....England/Thailand ring a bell??
 
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