It's time to be more practical. The Mustang was fun but it's time to move on. I need something with more space. Something that isn't going to try to kill me every winter. I need...a SUV/crossover. I will describe the vehicles my wife and I looked at and our experiences at the dealership today. 1) Jeep Compass - I liked it. Size was alright. Pretty comfortable ride but my wife wasn't a fan. 2) Jeep Cherokee - We both liked this slightly more. More roomy, better features. 3) Toyota RAV4 - Probably my favorite drive of the day. The lane assist was cool (I waited for an empty road and then started to go over the middle lines but the sensor caught me before I made it. Very impressive.). Honestly, I really loved it except for the dash. The way everything was angled was odd to me. 4) Chevy Equinox - Probably my wife's favorite by a small margin (Cherokee was a super close second). Chevy definitely had the most up to date technology. Chevy is clearly tops right now when it comes to technology. Very enjoyable all-around. 5) Honda CRV - Nothing crazy. Gets the best mileage of the five. Base features are probably the best of the five without having to upgrade to a different version of the vehicle. Plus it's Honda. Honda's take forever to die. As for our personal experience? Jeep pissed me off. They were trying insanely hard to get us to by one TODAY. We got there at 9:30, I let them look at my car while we were looking at the Compass and Cherokee. My sister and father were coming to see our new house at 11:30. It was 11 and I told them we needed to go. Wait! They were pretty sure they had a 2016 exactly like we wanted. Waiting, waiting, have us look at one that was missing a couple key features we wanted. Went back inside, told them we needed to leave, they ask us to wait while they look some more. Finally I went to the front desk, told them I'm leaving, I want my keys back NOW and I'm pissed they made me wait in the first place. Toyota also tried to sell us one for today. When you are spending $30k, you don't spend it that day if you don't know exactly what you want and it took a while to get them to figure it out. Chevy was great. No pressure at all to buy something today. Very relaxed. They actually have sold 70% of the Chevy's driven in South Jersey. They don't mark stuff up like other dealerships. We had access to the base price and every single itemized piece of equipment involved in the vehicle. It was a nice experience. Honda was good too. I understand it was near closing but the guy was happy to let us test drive and talk to us. No pressure to buy it today. Dude was very laid back. If we do go Jeep, I'm buying from a different Jeep dealership just to spite these jerks. Anyone have suggestions, preferences, history with these?
Toyota's have been my family's (parents/siblings) car of choice for a while... They last a while. In my experiences Chevy's drive like crap... Not a huge fan of their cars. For the record, all those car salesman are trying to get you to buy a car today because 95 percent of them are commission only.
I've been driving an equinox for a while now and like it. Plenty of room for most things, handles well, and and has pretty good acceleration for the 4 cylinder. Great in the snow and I've had zero mechanical issues. I live on a steep, windy hill that always gets plowed last - she's a champ. I do have the AWD version. I've heard they have an issue with burning oil but I'm going on 70k now and haven't had any issues. That may not be an issue with newer models but I'd recommend looking into this. I've always been a GMC guy.
stay away from jeep, the little things seem to go wrong with them, all the little comforts seem to break early. my experience anyway. i'd go with a nissan personally. price range and quality matchup well there. can't go wrong with a pathfinder
I like and drive Honda cars but Ford and Toyota seem to have more bells and whistles like the lane assist and parallel parking for you.
i don't know anyone who has a rogue personally but the nissan 4 cylinder is a very solid engine and the 2.5l they use in the rogue should have pretty good power. my wife has a 4 cyl sentra going on 12 years now and not one problem with it. my sister has the murano and the 6 cyl is a soldier of an engine too.
I got a new Cherokee in February, have put about 11,000 miles on it including about a 3,000 mile road trip. I like it. Zero problems. Definitely find a different dealer, preferably one that has had the same ownership for twenty years or more.
What about Subaru? They have the best AWD hands down, their outback looks really good and has great ground clearance with excellent gas mileage. I believe Honda has made the transition to CVT transmissions as well, just in case that was going to be used as a negative against Subaru. My sister in law and her family love their subarus, they live in Illinois so they do get some bad weather, car is tried and true in bad weather, they have a 10 year old Impreza and they just replaced the original forester with another forester. Right now I drive a Toyota 4Runner and my wife drives a Toyota Highlander.
Take a look at the Kia Sorrento and Sportage. I own both, great vehicles all around. I have had a few Jeeps in the past, but I would stay away from them and the Chevy.
Kia, Hyundai and Mitsubishi are 2orth looking at. Good value vehicles. Subaru makes a good car, but they seem cheaply made on the inside for the money.
What's your take on Jeep? I'm looking at a spring purchase and was looking at the Jeep Renegade. I've owned 2 Chevy trucks, put 350k one the 1st one, and the only downside was the electrical system was forever shorting out.
I had 3 consecutive Jeep Cherokees the last one, about 8 years ago. My first "new" car was a 1988 Jeep Comanche pick up, had the great 4.0 litre engine which was awesome and built up some good will and loyalty that I had for Jeeps which finally wore thin. I actually loved driving them. I don't think the interior is as spacious as some of the competitors and were not as user friendly on the dash. But my main reservation is that all 3 of the Cherokees I had were 3 year (45K mi) leases and all began having nagging problems toward the end of the lease, I would not trust one to put 100k + miles or several years of driving. I have owned Hyundai and Kia's since with a lot less aggravation then the GM/Chrysler vehicles I had driven the 20 years previous.
Get the Toyota, no question. Toyota/Lexus all the way till someone else proves them wrong and starts building equal quality cars.
Honda is sharp as well, I gave my Accord to my daughter and it was still going strong with 180,000 miles in it, nothing but basic maintenance.
True. I have an 09 Civic that I bought from my friend who upgraded to a Lexus IS 350. So jealous. It cost me about 2k less for the Civic than an 09 Camry. I would have preferred the Camry through.
I will no longer own front wheel drive cars living in the northeast. I own a Toyota 4Runner with a part time 4 wheel drive system. Good on gas but I have 4x4 for the winter. I plan on buying a Subaru WRX as my summer fun car, starting to do some research, hopefully have it by spring if not this year then definitely year after.
