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Mike please feel free to move this to where you see fit!

So my sister was in that accident and insurance decided they're gonna total out the Jeep. I'm all for buying it back and building it into a rock-crawler, but that's not in the financial cards right now unfortunately.
Going up tomorrow to see if it's as bad as it sounds on the insurance report, and if it is we'll need some suggestions for a new car.

We're looking in the 5-8K price range.

Must be 4wd, awd, or fwd.
Prefer automatic.
Small cars, regular size SUVs, small pickups all considered. Right now her rental is a Sonata and she considers that too big (but was fine driving a Grand Cherokee around).
Hopefully low miles.
4 bangers or small 6s heavily preferred but will be open to everything.
Looks don't matter too much (it'll be lucky to be washed once a month).
Basically an efficient, dependable d.d. for a college kid.

I'm very open to suggestions or offers.
Anyway thanks in advance!

I would think you could find an impreza around that price range but I will say this, my brothers impreza (not a WRX) has been a bit of a money pit especially the past few years. Tell her to look at the Honda shipping boxes, err I mean the Elements. 4 banger, AWD and Honda reliability. oh yeah, and a dorky collage kid look.

Oh I forgot the most obvious choice. Ural.

Honda Civic in the 2005-06 range. The two door coupes will go for less than the 4-doors.

I'm sure there are some decent finds on Craigslist or the local paper.

But yeah an older Civic/CRX/ Del Sol, mid 90s Camry/ Corolla/ celica would be around that, if you're lucky you could find an older Subaru 2.5 RS. I know Dodge Neons would fit perfectly in there but I'm not sure on their reliability. Nissan Sentra is another small car that's popular with college crowds.

Ignore the Toyota Celica in my sig pic... too far from you anyway

Speaking of Celicas, it's a pretty big/wide car compared to the older civics but after driving it in the snow I found that the Celica can handle well in such weather, roomy and has good storage space. The bad would be the rear pillar and longer hood and the pop up headlights may freeze but I haven't experienced that in the dead of winter with ours. Many can be had at that price but mileage may be high because they're good cars if maintained.

We've been out driving all kinds of vehicles in our price range... I HATE car shopping for women!
Especially two women...
Mom's car, sister has to drive it, so they have to agree on a singular car.
5-8k
16+ MPG in the city with a leadfooted driver
reliable
under 110K
good condition
low owners
"cute" whatever that means
good acceleration
............. yeah ..............
If it was for me I'd have already had a car, but it wasn't "cute" enough for either of them.

Wrider wrote:Mike please feel free to move this to where you see fit!

So my sister was in that accident and insurance decided they're gonna total out the Jeep. I'm all for buying it back and building it into a rock-crawler, but that's not in the financial cards right now unfortunately.
Going up tomorrow to see if it's as bad as it sounds on the insurance report, and if it is we'll need some suggestions for a new car.

We're looking in the 5-8K price range.

Must be 4wd, awd, or fwd.
Prefer automatic.
Small cars, regular size SUVs, small pickups all considered. Right now her rental is a Sonata and she considers that too big (but was fine driving a Grand Cherokee around).
Hopefully low miles.
4 bangers or small 6s heavily preferred but will be open to everything.
Looks don't matter too much (it'll be lucky to be washed once a month).
Basically an efficient, dependable d.d. for a college kid.

I'm very open to suggestions or offers.
Anyway thanks in advance!

Humm... maybe I should start a Car Talk forum?



Have you considered a Jeep Patriot? I have as my next car, they are inexpensive, offer 2WD and 4WD options, are great on gas and big enough for anything. I have seen videos of them going off-road even with the Trail Rated version and it's pretty amazing.



Mike

Hey guys thought I'd update you. We went to a shop/dealer in Aurora called Summit Auto. We'd been recommended to them by a couple of personal friends. We managed to pick up a very good condition 2002 Impreza 2.5 TS wagon for just under 8k. Has the sport package from the factory. That thing "procreating" rocks...
I took it for a test drive last Thursday when I was running errands all around the northern part of the state, and liked it from the get-go. The thing has great grip, has the 2.5 boxer motor so decent acceleration, AWD of course. The clock shows 140K. That's where the good news starts. This shop automatically does the problematic head gaskets, timing belt, pulleys, etc on EVERY car they sell. They also went through and replaced any worn CV joints/shafts/boots. It came into their shop with a blown tranny, so they found one out of an 04 that had been rolled with only 55K on it, and swapped that in.
They also have a one year bumper to bumper warranty on anything they sell. Even if the light in your dome lamp goes out they'll replace it for free (of course there's the cost of the trip up there, but hey.)
They're a scooby specialist shop, family owned and operated for over 20 years by a family of Russians. And they practice what they preach... The son (salesman) has a 2003 Legacy GT pushing 400 HP to the wheels that they did all the work on themselves. They also have a lifted Outlander that they swapped the engine for a scooby H6. They have some gnarly pictures of it rock-crawling up some pretty extreme terrain in Moab.
Anyway I'll keep you guys updated with how the car does and if it breaks down or not!

Congratz.

Anywhere west of Denver in CO, AWD is almost mandatory, no?

Congratulations! I hope the car works out well for you.

PS - Where is the photo!?? (I have a little car photo gallery in our gallery you can pop it into andpost it in your reply here)

Mike