Here’s the thing. We’re car enthusiasts. We pick and choose our cars on emotional whims, and spend aching hours obsessing over the cars we desperately want to own. Often, the cars we choose are neither cheap nor practical, and many of us will admit our fleets are not always in the best mechanical shape. That raises a question: What car should you be driving, instead of whatever impractical/unreliable/suboptimal machine is sitting in your driveway?
I’ll openly admit I’m guilty of some folly in this regard. I drive an Audi TT – a drop-top roadster, of course – in one of the rainiest cities in Australia. I live deep in the inner city, so I barely ever actually drive the thing, and its ride height is so low that it’s getting beat up every time I go over a speed bump. Of course, it’s my dream car, so I hold on to it for dear life.
Basically, I should be driving something else. And I know exactly what that car is. See, on the day I bought the worst car I’ve ever owned, I had actually test-driven something else. It was a first-generation Honda HR-V. This vehicle ticked a lot of boxes for me. It was all-wheel-drive, with a good ride height, so I could totally blast it around on the beach in the summer. Plus, it had a manual transmission. Ultimately, though, it felt cheap and a bit janky, so I passed it over for that hateful BMW.
Now that I’m living in the city, I realize this Honda would have been perfect for me. It had a nice high driving position, and absolutely wouldn’t fuss over any of the bumps, grates, or kerb ramps that plague the city. With no turbo, it would have been a touch better on gas than the Audi, plus it ran on regular instead of premium. It also had tons of cargo space, and was so cheap, I could hardly make it worse even if I drank four liters of Mountain Dew and spewed all over the interior. I could have found parts for it all over the world. Plus, it was still manual, so it’d satiate that part of my enthusiast brain.
This would have been an altogether better car for the kinds of driving I do these days—infrequent, on clogged city roads. Plus, its just-barely-off-roadable ability would have served me well on the occasional jaunt to the out-of-doors. Still, I love my Audi, and I’m not complaining. I just realize that there was a better, cheaper option for me.
Now, since this is Autopian Asks, I throw this over to you. What should you be driving, instead of the brown diesel Cadillac coupe you’re so addicted to?
Well, my case is a little different. What car should I be driving, Is a 2008-09 Subaru Outback XT with a 5 speed. Quick, Practical and surprisingly good looking. But I can’t drive a manual at the moment due to cancer ruining my left leg. I can’t even drive my 01 Forester 5MT because of it. (It really tore me up emotionally) I’m stuck with a 00 Olds Bravada (Thank you Grandma) while I start to return to work and being able to drive with an auto. Can’t wait for the day I can rescue my Forester and finally be back to a sense of Normality.
Probably a 1st gen Insight that I looked at before getting my BRZ.
A 2002 Camry would probably suffice for my needs, instead of the Volvo S60 T6 AWD I have now.
Geo Metro probably. I knew I needed something inexpensive to maintain, good on gas, and didn’t need room for more than two people and minimal groceries… so I bought a Miata. The Miata is pretty good at those things and also fun. But a Geo Metro is even better at those things, getting 20 mpg MORE than the Miata can, being dirt cheap to maintain (not needing a soft top occasionally replaced certainly helps), and having more cargo space I didn’t ask for but definitely comes in handy, while still being TINY to the point where you can’t accuse them of being too generous with the cargo space.
I’m happy with my Miata, it serves me well and does everything I need a car to do at prices I can afford, and nothing about it is excessive. But, I could make do with a Geo Metro, which would be even more practical in my daily life, in fact being more practical than I need it to be. Just not as fun, and the Miata definitely covers the fun desire.
I’m gonna say the Miata is the car I should be driving right now anyway :p I just don’t need anything more than what it offers right now.
A CUV of some type. With AWD for the few times it snows here as they do a terrible job of keeping roads clear in my area. Since I’m a Mazda fan, probably a CX-5 or a CX-50. I have two kids and my wife has a van, but I take the kids to school on my way to work in my vehicle during the week. So, my vehicle has to be able to haul two kids safely and easily.
As it is, I have a 2016 Mazda6. It does the job fine and best part is that it has been paid off since 2019. That $0 a month car payment hits different nowadays.
I’ve always respected people who bought the Mazda 6 in the final years. I got to drive a rental one and I absolutely loved how it drove, the interior was gorgeous and I really liked how Mazda gave you a BMW esque experience but for less.
I’m about to move, hopefully to a big city where I won’t need a car at all. But then, it’s 700 km from my home city, and I have a weekend house in the hills nearby. So I’d need something with good fuel mileage but still competent on the highway (my Ka was a pain) and on twisty roads. My budget will be tight when I move. A used Ford Focus and a Fiat Punto are on top of my list.
I should be driving exactly what’s in my driveway:
A 1991 Accord Wagon with a 5spd and VTEC.
I should be driving it for exactly the same reason everybody else should be driving it: it is, in most ways, the objectively best car ever made. Good gas mileage, perfect size and cargo capacity, reliable and durable, and fun too.
I should be driving what I’m already driving – a midsize 3-row SUV. I have enough kids the third row is a necessity. I tow a cargo trailer, so a 5000lb tow rating is required. I live in a mountainous area that gets snow and have a house in a spot that requires AWD to get home when it snows (FWD and snows just doesn’t cut it, as we are reminded by my wife’s van each winter). I am also an avid offroader, so ground clearance and low-range are important. In my case, a GX470 has been checking all the boxes for me for many years now, and will hopefully continue to do so for many more years to come.
Since I’m currently in college, I need a vehicle that checks several boxes. I need something that’s reliable, safe, some amount of cargo space, gets good mpg, easy to drive and park, cheap to insure- the typical “A to B” car. Something like a Camry or Accord built in the last 10 years or so would be ideal.
So naturally, I drive two vehicles throughout the year. My 2005 BMW 325i that my dad helped me buy as a high school graduation present and my 1997 Ford F-250 Supercab, 8ft bed 4×4 with a 7.3L Powerstroke under the hood. They’ve both had their moments of impracticality but the feeling I get driving them around or looking into the parking lot and seeing them can’t be beaten
2023 Prius Prime.
It has all the range I need in electric for most days, and would work to road trip for times when I need to travel further.
However, I instead daily a 2023 Integra… because 6MT.
If I had the money and space, it’d be nice to have both, but if I can only have one, I have to have a car I enjoy driving on days off.
(I could manage without my van, which is a 2008 Sienna AWD, but I mainly use it to camp in and to drive in the winter, so the fact that it gets 15MPG isn’t as huge a deal.)
Well, I’m a single dad with two kids and a dog. I like camping and cross country skiing and mountain biking. I a
Own a modest home that occasionally needs work/updates. So it doesn’t need to be huge, but at least a little space & utility would be good.
I’m also a teacher, so it needs to be cheap and reliable.
My commute isn’t crazy, but it’s not nothing so it needs at least decent mpgs.
I also live in Minnesota on a hill. AWD isn’t a must, but it is pretty dang helpful after a blizzard.
I suppose I should be driving something like a Highlander Hybrid
(Checks driveway)
Huh. Looks like I’m driving a first gen Highlander Hybrid.
Guess my critical thinking is intact
Probably something like what I am driving now for my commute (34 miles RT), a 2012 Honda Civic GX, CNG powered. Gets good MPG-equivalent, comfy enough and mostly just works. Just not very exciting. I plan to get something more fun when I retire in a few years. Maybe one of the cars I used to have, 1st gen Honda Insight, Honda Del Sol, 1972 BMW 2002, early VW Golf GTI. Or maybe even go Miata.
During the summer, a moped. I have a 4 mile commute. When the weather turns, probably a Mitsubishi Mirage, manual of course.
Probably my 2014 Volt that I sold in 2020 as I was mainly WFH and didn’t need a daily driver that much, and just bought my 2000 Ranger EV, and we didn’t need 3 whole cars…only to turn around and not be wfh a few months later, and the trucks limited range, especially in winter, wouldn’t cut it so got a Bolt EV, which is great, but..the Volt worked absolutely perfect, and was nearly paid for, and could also be used to go on long trips without thinking about charging infrastructure, and the seats were way comfier.
Hindsight’s 20/20, new plan is to get newer PHEV SUV to replace our Forester and at some point maybe update the Ranger batteries and sell the Bolt, live and learn.
For the second car, I was tossing up between a few options, starting at the most practical end a Nissan Note e-Power Nismo, a 2010-12 Toyota Crown Hybrid, a Crown Athlete 3.5 from the same era or, what we eventually settled on, a newer-gen 2013 Toyota Crown Athlete 3.5, which was quite a bit more expensive. The Note would have been newer and far (far) better on petrol, but in the end we couldn’t go passed the Crown’s swish interior and cool gadgets like soft-closing doors, plus the bank-vault solidity in the way it drives. Then we landed on the later model because I prefer its more aggressive looks and it looks less dated on the inside, even though the previous gen probably would have been fine (and a better buy in terms of its depreciation curve).
For the family car, probably a Toyota Estima hybrid would have been more practical, fuel efficient and reliable than the diesel Ford Territory 7 seater we ended up getting. It was actually my wife who ended up saying no to a people carrier like the Estima because she didn’t like the idea of driving a van-type car. And I agree the Territory is definitely a nicer car to drive and so far has been plenty big enough to cart me, my wife, my baby son, SIL and MIL in comfort during our weekend excursions (the middle row actually seems more spacious with a baby seat than even far larger cars such as a late-model Nissan Patrol, which I recently rode in). I do fear that when baby number two arrives and we have to start using the 3rd row regularly we might find ourselves wishing we got something with sliding doors and a bigger 3rd row though, but we’ll see!
I’ve owned my perfect car for 13 years. My 2011 BMW 328i wagon, 6spd, RWD. It does everything I ever really need to do with a car with grace, space, and pace, to shamelessly borrow from Jaguar. I plan to be buried in the thing.
I desperately wanted to get a new 3 or 5 series estate wagon with the B58 i6. Sadly that combination is forbidden fruit in the USA and we’re worse off because of it.
We really aren’t. The car needs no more power than the N52 provides.
I should be driving the Model A that got away from me while I was going to community college. It would have been slightly modernized by now. 😉
LS swap?
302 with ITB.
I mean, I probably *should* be driving some tiny little hatchback since I’m generally just commuting 42 miles each way to work, but instead I have a 1995 BMW 540i/6 with a 4L V8 that gets 21mpg on the highway and requires premium gas. Oh well, at least I have a nice comfortable car.
2010 Mustang GT with a 5spd or a 2013-2014 Mustang GT with an automatic.
OR
4th gen V8 4WD 4Runner/GX470
A used 6.0L L96 HD. But gas is a concern…
Maybe I should be driving a 6.2L L9H (non-AFM). That was an option on LTs and LTZs….
I, and everyone else here, of course, should be driving any vehicle equipped with the pinnacle of automotive technology. That is, obviously, the Jatco Xtronic CVT. It’s perfect for daily driver duties, with its shift-free driving experience and superior fuel economy, and also ready for when you need to go fast with infinite ratios for maximum power at any time. Plus, its lifetime fluid makes it hassle-free reliable.
I was looking at those eons ago, it’s a nice little car. I think you just had to watch out for intake manifolds or coil pack replacements, I forget which. One of those might be for the Maxima of that era though…
Nice ride!
I see you replied to my pre edit comment! I will reply accordingly.
Thanks! Yeah, that intake gasket gave me trouble. They are an absolute chore to replace, but it runs well. Also, they use a distributor, which also did need replacing. Only other issue is a knock sensor, but it’s not thrown a CEL yet, so I don’t care enough honestly. It’s a very good car though. It is surprisingly agile, and has very comfortable seats. Loved it on a 2000 mile road trip I recently did in it.
Yeah, my then-gf (now wife) had a grandparent with a 2000 Altima and the seats were really comfy.
A distributor! The coil packs might have been for the Max then, haha. The 3L V6 was bulletproof, but I think it might have eaten coils at that time.
As for your edit….. Oh dear. It’s funny. I’ll say that.
This is irony or sarcasm, right? Please do not tell me you are being serious. <faceplam>
You have much to learn, Kevin
I really don’t, when it comes to most things automotive.