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Artereis
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
Hey folks. Sometime in the near-ish future, the wife will be trading in her crappy old car for a used car no older than a 2006. She's shooting for a small SUV, and the ones we intend to test drive are as follows:
Nissan Murano/Rogue
Toyota RAV-4
Honda CRV
Mazda CX-7
Subaru Forester
Hyundai Santa Fe
I do the majority of the driving during the weekend in my xD. This car is basically to get her back and forth from the Metro station during the week, which is about 10 miles. Secondary purposes will be storage space if/when we next move and for larger item purchases.
She's going for that size car because she wants something a little heavier to deal with the icy NOVA winters. She's driving my 1998 Pontiac Trans Sport now because her older Altima fell apart due to rust, and noticed that she felt a lot safer this past winter in the van than she ever did here in her car.
I expect some of those cars will be stricken from the list fairly quickly based on first impressions and an initial test drive, but if any of you have any good/bad experience with any of those, your input is welcome and appreciated.
Nissan Murano/Rogue
Toyota RAV-4
Honda CRV
Mazda CX-7
Subaru Forester
Hyundai Santa Fe
I do the majority of the driving during the weekend in my xD. This car is basically to get her back and forth from the Metro station during the week, which is about 10 miles. Secondary purposes will be storage space if/when we next move and for larger item purchases.
She's going for that size car because she wants something a little heavier to deal with the icy NOVA winters. She's driving my 1998 Pontiac Trans Sport now because her older Altima fell apart due to rust, and noticed that she felt a lot safer this past winter in the van than she ever did here in her car.
I expect some of those cars will be stricken from the list fairly quickly based on first impressions and an initial test drive, but if any of you have any good/bad experience with any of those, your input is welcome and appreciated.
Artereis on
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If you're looking for winter safety, the Forester's AWD would be a good factor to consider. You might also look at the Impreza, it's a little smaller but the AWD will keep it sure footed in the snow.
(I won't comment on the Rav4 and CRV; I'm certain others will chime in on these though)
The Forester, in it's previous-generation, looks tiny but has assloads of cargo space and rides a lot more like a car than an SUV. The Subaru AWD system is top notch and the Boxer 4 engines are very reliable and provide good power for the vehicle's size
I haven't yet driven a CX-7 or Santa Fe - my thoughts from riding in a Santa Fe though is that it's a capable little SUV, albeit a bit underpowered and "tinny" in it's previous generation. Didn't much care for the interior and the seats were a bit hard
PSN - MicroChrist
I'm too fuckin' poor to play
WordsWFriends - zeewoot
Regarding the Forester -
My wife loved hers, and I quite liked it too once I got over the funky appearance. The automatic transmission on it is terribly outdated compared to the competition; I think the current model still has the same 4-spd that was in our 2004. It won't shift quite as smooth as a nicer 5 or 6 speed and having fewer tall gears means it doesn't get as good fuel economy as it could. They seem to hold their value remarkably well. Residuals are pretty high. I sold ours for $11K (or about 42% of what we paid new) after nearly 7 years and 80K miles, which is by far the best I've done on resale.
It does the things an SUV needs to do and I'm assuming it's probably on the lower end of the cost spectrum.
Except I doubt there's going to be very many previously owned of the latest model available yet. I drive a 2010 Terrain SLE-1 AWD and love it, though I do wish there was a Manual transmission option.
PSN - MicroChrist
I'm too fuckin' poor to play
WordsWFriends - zeewoot
Drives really nice, pretty comfy, for a while we used it whenever we drove home (~2hr) until I got my 06 Altima. I think hers is at 110k miles, never had any engine problems.
There are always dealer demos and other low mileage late model vehicles. Can't hurt to look at it.
Thread over.
on a lighter note, your choices there are pretty solid (except the CVT, obviously). I've driven a forester as a loaner, and very much enjoyed it, the build quality was quite good, it seemed very solid (if a bit spartan, but thats subarus style) and had very good road manners. Surprisingly, it also got very decent gas mileage, I think it was around 30 mpg.
Nice car, not that there are a lot of them around though. It'd be a bit easier to find a jetta TDI sportwagen if you want to get your diesel on; my dad gets about 40 mpg on his.
My wife's Forester was an auto '04 turbo, and observed mileage 50/50 city/highway driving was about 18-19 mpg.
They also hold resale value really well. Mines an '09, and used ones are selling for more than what I paid for it new.