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Small to medium and probably SUV as I've driven vans/trucks for much of my later years.

And any particular views about the Motability scheme.

Prefer a full hybrid or similarly economical mid hybrid. Plug ins look interesting but I'm unlikely to be able to install a home charger.

I'm from the age when cars had only about 4 or 5 important parts and we repaired them at home, which I'll no longer have to worry about.

Looking at the choice has driven me nuts but I think I've narrowed it down a bit.
Reading What Car reviews confuses things as it finds the flaws/limitations of every model.
But I know that whatever I get will be a world away from anything I've driven before.

Thanks for that.
You've now got me looking at the Civic again, which I originally thought had too much of an advance payment.
I'll have to look at the Qashqai too.

I was originally looking at the sexy Tucson but am put off by mediocre economy.
Looked at the Volvo XC40 too but, good as it is, looks and feels like an old man's car.
Others I considered were the Kia Sportage and Hyundai Kona

The one I like, based on near perfect reviews, is the Volkswagen T-Roc. Even that is a problem as the full hybrids don't come out until last quarter this year.

Bear in mind that just about any new car that you buy these days has loads of "features" that you probably don't want but can't refuse.

There is the speed limit nagger, that beeps should you exceed the limit (it thinks is in force) by 0.0001mph. Yup, it VERY often gets it wrong, but you gotta think of the children.

Then there is the "drive in a straight line assist" that beeps (usually with a different sound to the speeding beep) and jerks your steering wheel should you dare cross a white line anywhere without indicating.

Hidden somewhere in the dashboard is a camera pointing at your face. It checks whether you are intensely staring at the speedometer, and if it feels as though you may be distracted, it suggests that you might like a cup of coffee.

These days you don't buy a car - the car buys (owns) you

I'd stick to cars that have Toyota, Suzuki or Honda written on the back, with Kia/Hyundai as a reserve.

They all have lengthy warranties, the first 3 are rolling 12 month ones activated by having it serviced, Kia/Hyundai are standard 7 years, de-activated by not having it serviced, so pretty much the same thing!

Toyota have an excellent hybrid drive train (thousands of taxis licenced in Wolverhampton can't be wrong) I'd look at the Yaris Cross.

Like all cars nowadays, if they need any parts above service items you have to wait months, and like all dealership chains if anything does go wrong you will wait 6-8 weeks for an appointment to even get them to look at it, but Toyota, Honda & Suzuki very rarely break.


They are all festooned with driver/safety aids that most people try to turn off, Renault offer a single button to do this, I'd expect Nissan to do the same. I just drive with them on and take no notice of all the bings, bongs and beeps, the steering shaker is easy enough to drive through, although the first time it happened I did think I had a wheel coming off (again...)


The only useful feature IMHO is the adaptive cruise control that uses lidar to follow the car in front at a "safe" distance (I think it is too close for motorways...)  and automatically sets the speed to the limit (you have to confirm it and can override it if you disagree). It takes all the effort out of A road driving, you just let the car in front do all the work in heavy traffic & queues. You still have to stop at islands & junctions yourself though.








 

A couple of respondents here seem not to have noticed my mention of Motability?

Or they noticed that it was ostensibly included as a separate question.

Whilst many regulars are more than capable of reading far beyond what can reasonably be deduced from the information posted in active case threads, if you have been wasting people's time with a poorly worded question, that is on the author, not the reader. In my opinion.