Used Car for City & Regional Driving - Budget $20,000

Lmangamuncher on 24/02/2024 - 20:56
Last edited 24/02/2024 - 21:19 by 1 other user

Current car is starting to show signs of slowing down (troubleshooting problems right now but seems to be endless since hitting 220K kms)

Looking to get an automatic medium sized card (can be sedan or hatchback)

Mostly city driving but do about 2 interstate drives yearly + monthly camping trips within 4 hours drive of Melbourne.

Order of Priority:
1. Fuel Efficiency
2. Drive Quality (can have a conversation on the highway and turning on the A/C doesn't kill the drive quality)
3. Reasonable Maintenance Costs (no Euro cars for me haha)

Budget is around $20K

Currently leaning towards an ICE car as hybrid break even would be ~9 years for me (about 16K/km per year with ~40% of this being on highways). Been considering Corolla/i30 but unsure if I should look at something else or look at something cheaper ($10-$15K) and invest the $5K. Haha.

Any Suggestions?

Automotive Car

Comments

  • mapax on 24/02/2024 - 21:00
    +3

    Camry if you’re a real OzBargainer…

  • cdaddy on 24/02/2024 - 22:13

    Toyota Camry

  • Euphemistic on 25/02/2024 - 06:14
    +2

    "Drive quality" is personal. Youll need to test drive some and pick one YOU like.

    Pick a japanese or korean model that you see lots of on the roads. Ita hard to go wrong. Corolla, lancer, mazda 3, i30 are a starting point. Theres more, but cant think of them.

  • Nillionaire on 25/02/2024 - 11:10

    triple your budget and buy a tesla

    /s

  • Gdsamp on 25/02/2024 - 11:44
    -1

    toyota camry, toyota aurion, honda accord, mazda 6 (not diesel)

    DON'T get hyundai i45/sonata or kia optima (2.4L GDI engine)

    aurion would be my pick with mostly highway driving.

    • mangamuncher on 01/03/2024 - 18:16

      thanks for pointing out the GDI engine.

      didn't realise this was why these cars start burning oil

  • dtc on 25/02/2024 - 14:27

    What is 'medium' for you - are you talking hatch (mazda 3, corolla, golf etc) or larger (camry, accord, mazda 6)?

    As said, anything Japanese or Korean will be fine. There are some better quality than others (eg the Lancer is pretty basic, but its also cheap). They are generally a bit over your price range by a couple of $1000, but a Corolla hybrid does fit your criteria pretty well. So does the Camry hybrid but you will need to get a lot older model. However lots of choices

    • cdaddy on 25/02/2024 - 18:00
      -2

      mazda 3, corolla, golf etc

      These are small

      Medium would be cerato, i30 sedan, Astra etc

      • Gdsamp on 25/02/2024 - 19:21
        +2

        all those cars you have listed are in the same class

      • dtc on 25/02/2024 - 21:24

        I was trying to differentiate between a Kia rio or a Suzuki swift (small) and a Mazda 3 (medium) and a Camry (large). Well aware those are not the official VFACTS categories but it’s a common way people describe cars.

        Fun fact: A Mazda 3 sedan is 4660mm long; a VB commodore was 4705mm long. So a Mazda 3 is ‘small’ but it’s only 45mm shorter than what used to be a large family car …

        • kerfuffle on 25/02/2024 - 21:32
          +2

          I have never heard anyone refer to a Mazda 3 or equivalent as a medium car.

    • mangamuncher on 01/03/2024 - 18:15

      Sorry this was ambiguous. Thanks for the advice!

  • shoppe on 05/03/2024 - 09:24

    Used Tesla.

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