Buying a new car

[AkshayB 0]

My father wants to buy a car in the 15lacs on-road price range. The monthly travel will be around 1500km/month. He has a chauffeur to drive him to the office but mostly drives himself when going out with the family. Ours is family of 6-foot plus, so legroom is one of the main criteria. We went to the showrooms and we have shortlisted the choices to Honda Civic and Toyota Corolla Altis. We recently went in for a test drive and contrary to the reviews we found the Corolla better to drive. The Honda's steering was too hard (harder than the Manual steering in our Maruti 800) and there also seemed a bit of lag with the car turning a bit late after turning the steering. Is this normal? Or was the car faulty..

Please advise...

[BonFre 0]

Corolla in that respect is a better car but I would also suggest you to test drive another Civic because steering is pretty light & direst.

 

Thread moved

[Durango Dude 2]

For the big made family may I suggest an Innova V D-4D, since you have a driver. Extrememly comfortable for the passenger's and you have enough money left over for some real good ICE.

[sb-alto 21]

The toyota innova makes sense. Its a pretty good car and hugely comfortable. Still if you like to have a sedan then the civic is he one to go for. The hyundai sonata transform may also fit your budget. Its a big sedan with loads of space.

[sarabjeet 3]

hi akshay

it is pretty hard to choose between these two cars , both are good performers and hold their resale value value and are VFMs , i would say go for toyota m8 , since u said 6 foot the civic might become a pain when getting in and getting out of the vehical because of its low stance

[creativebala 178]

Do give a try to Captiva, its a best all rounder + 7 people can travel in utmost comfort

[darklord 0]

@CreativeBala

Captive would be way out of their budget of 15L

@Akshay

Since you seem to be okay with petrol cars(based on Civic and Corolla), you can also look at Laura 1.8 TSI and Jetta 1.6 Trendline too.

@DD and sb-alto

Adding to your suggestion of Innova, do you think the base version of Innova + DC Lounge (costs abt 5L) makes sense here? Since he's from Mumbai, access to DCDesigns would be easier.

[sb-alto 21]

My mistake in the above post. Oops , sorry for that

Skoda's service is not too good. That is what keeping me away from recommending skoda laura or the VW jetta.

DC designs are stunning no doubt but i would not recommend it on a new buy. These fancy fittings are damn costly +5L as you said and maintaining or repairing them is a pinch for the pocket and pain for the owner. 5L can buy you another good car. Rather the highest variant innova 2.5VX with ABS makes more sense and is comfortable as well.

@akshay : If you can stretch your budget by another lakh then the ford endeavour 4X2 is also worth considering. But decide whether you want a sedan or a SUV???

[darklord 0]

@sb-alto

Since he's in Mumbai, I was hoping there'd be at least one good Skoda dealer over there. And as far as the DC Design is concerned, If I had the money I would probably get it done

[sarabjeet 3]

guys its clear that he is looking for a car and not suv or mpv since he has shortlisted corolla and civic

[deepakds 0]

Also test drive the Laura TSI and the Cruze. Might be you would like the Laura.

[AkshayB 0]

Thank you for the suggestions

But my father doesn't want a innova it has a tourist vehicle image in his mind.

We did look at the Laura petrol but it has a transmission tunnel (I think that's what its called) jutting out about 3 inches from the rear floor. So having 3 people in the back is very uncomfortable.

My father was very impressed with the civic, especially with the 4 extra inches of legroom it offered over the corolla. It also feels more spacious inside. But he was totally put off by the test drive especially with the steering on a supposedly more driver-friendly car. The car they gave us was a 2006 model with 36000 on the clock. It also

didn't look in good shape with the gear knob and steering leather worn

off. God knows why they keep such cars for a test drive, as it makes or breaks the decision to buy the car.

Contrary to what everyone thinks (& I too earlier thought ) its not that difficult to get in and of of the civic

The Honda dealership has called us back for another test drive on a different car.

[BonFre 0]

You are right, Honda provides nitty-gritty innovations like flat floor at the rear, paddle shifts, etc. I would really suggest you to try a diff. Civic as steering doesn't have any issues. Ask the dealer to let you try a new car, they do it if you insist.

Also, in Mumbai there should be a more than one dealerships, try others too.

[rahul1810 0]

Hi, as far as spaciousness is concerned Honda's are champs at that department. I would recommend you that you test drive Civic at another dealer because I own the City and the steering is an very good. So I can only expect that Civic will be atleast on par with City. Maybe that Civic was facing a problem.

[Power 0]

Hey akshay, We both are in the spot light. ( we both are from mumbai )

 

Why dont you TD the Laura 1.8tsi, its best - i ruled out civic and altis after driving the laura. December discount on laura - 70 K off on Laura petrol, so the car will turn up about 13.70 lacks( thane) Laura has alot more CLASS compared to civic. After all its German engineeing. Autobahn skoda ( prabhadevi ) told me the discount will end by 10th dec, so hurry on your decision.

 

where do you live in mumbai ?

Power2009-12-07 23:24:54

[rssh 59]

You ought to give the Laura one more glance if you are a family of 4 then the transmission tunnel won't bother much also avoid Autobahn in Prabhadevi they really suck big time.

[AkshayB 0]

@Power

I stay in Thane

@rssh

We do have 5 people sitting in the back quite often. Also I havn't heard favourable feedbacks from the skoda dealer in Thane.

I have heard that Civic had some suspension issues at the start with the rear wheel touching the body when seating 5 people. Is this true?

[rssh 59]

Yes the Civic had that problem due to ultra soft suspension and when the car want loaded and on a pot hole the tyres scraped the body but it was rectiified later and the newer model has more stiffer suspension.

[the bikophobic 0]

hi,my frnd wants to get a small car,he shortlisted these-

1. a-star zxi

2.i 10 sport

3.spark

4. a 2nd hand wagon-r

 

i suggest him a-star bcoz of its safety features,wat abt u?? plz suggest me as early as possible,bcoz he has to get it at december end..

[bluesapphire 1]

hi' date='my frnd wants to get a small car,he shortlisted these-

1. a-star zxi

2.i 10 sport

3.spark

4. a 2nd hand wagon-r

?

i suggest him a-star bcoz of its safety features,wat abt u?? plz suggest me as early as possible,bcoz he has to get it at december end..

[/quote'] Well refer some similar threads, search them and am sure you will find many queries similar to you else start a new thread. This thread is for sedan and dont merge your query here.

[Durango Dude 2]

@darklord: I think DC Lounge is a 'personal' vehicle and not for the family, it eats into space and can't seat the whole family; max only two can fit in the rear captain seats.

[AkshayB 0]

Had the civic's second test drive today... it was on an automatic.  The steering was good , the earlier car did indeed have a problem. The dealer said that he has sent that car for repair. The dealer even allowed us to drive a new car but only in the showroom's spacious parking lot. So we have finally decided to go for the civic and will be booking the car soon for the December discounts.

Also, how much can i expect for our current Hyundai Accent GVS Dec. 2003 model. Done about 94000 kms, accident free, central locking, no rattles or squeaks, still rides and drives like the way it did when we bought it from the showroom, new tubeless tyres run only 4000 km, 3yrs warranty left on the battery. No problems whatsoever

[bluesapphire 1]

So are you going for automatic version? and which color you have decided?

[BonFre 0]

Good choice Akshay. I remember local Honda dealer has many a times given me TD on new cars but on insistence!

[AkshayB 0]

Hello evry one...

Got the car this friday, the color is the new polished metal. Took it for a spin in the evening. Great car to drive. The color looks the best under the yellow glow of the street lights. Trying to post pictures, but this internet is giving problems, wil try 2moro.