new driver looking to save some money

[Wilden]

Hi everyone,

I've been lurking here for the past couple of months and am very impressed with everything you guys have managed.

I passed my driving test 2 weeks ago, and now that I'm looking at cars I thought it was the right time to register. Any suggestions? I'm a dead poor student at the moment so I'm looking for something that's cheap to buy, cheap to run, and cheap to insure. Naturally it'll probably be as slow as hell. I don't mind though.

Thanks for any suggestions
Wilden

[Ryland]

look for a small car, and if someone gives you **** about them not "being safe" just tell them that you couldn't find something smaller in your price range, or ask if you should get a mac truck instead.
the smaller toyotas and honda tend to last forever and if you are not worried about how they look you can get a pretty cheap one and at least with those cars if you take care of problems when they start to show up you can cut them off before they get costly.
Mostly tho, you need to ask what you need a car for, how is your life changing now that you need one and didn't need one before.

[Wilden]

I see what you mean, I've been looking for small cars, but the issue is, with what I can afford, is to get something that is going to be reliable aswell.

I've been looking at spending about £1000 (about $1450), but everything I look at seems to have done over 70 or 80k miles. And, since I don't know masses about cars I don't know whether something liek that would be reliable. I will start looking into the toyota's and honda's though. If you know any particular models which are better than others I would be grateful for a suggestion.

[Ryland]

For $1,400 you should be able to find a great car, ask friends and family if they have something they are selling as you can normally get a good deal if they know you, then get the shop manual for it and read it, then open the hood with the book in hand and read the book again, the whole thing, if you go to look at a car that makes a funny sound then go to the libarey and look at the shop book for that car and check out the trouble shooting section to see if it's something minor or something big.
I've hooked friends up with 40+mpg cars that cost any where from $120 up to $500, non of them needed more then $200 worth of work.
In my mind 200,000 miles on a car is not an issue as long as it has not been abused, I've seen abused cars with 40,000 miles that I wouldn't take if they were given to me.

[Wilden]

Thanks alot for the advice, I'll bare it in mind when I eventually go hunting for a car.