Learned me: first gen Veloster

Specifically, how claustrophobic is the hatch area? Do the rear seats lay flat? How bad is the automatic transmission I keep reading about? Would you buy one? Should I get the turbo? 

Really? Where's Bob? He's usually the first guy in here. 

I used to have a 2nd gen, so I'll answer a few of these

1) Its not that bad, however the hatch opening sucks.  Yes the seats lay flat

2) I have never heard anything good about it.

3) No, its just a visually different body on the the basic small car platform from Hyundai/Kia.  'Basic' is an important keyword here.  I have a Soul now which shares that platform and its... not great.  Find a Forte5 Turbo - it is a much better packaging of essentially the same thing.

4)  Yes, I really enjoyed that engine (I believe it was unchanged from gen 1 to 2).  It smooth, makes good power, responds to mods well, runs on 87 and gets pretty impressive fuel economy for what it is.  Mine would knock down >40 on the highway.

And yeah, the driver's door suuuuuuucks.

In reply to ProDarwin :

Good to know man thanks

Not sure on the gen, but the 2013 turbo cars have engine problems and it's related to a very bad factory tune. If you look at one of those, make sure it runs right and fix the tune before it blows up

First gen is the same drivetrain as whats in our two Rios. 1.6L Gamma's and manual or auto 6-speeds. The auto is actually really good once it learns (adaptive learning takes some time to figure you out). manu-matic mode is decent, it will auto-upshift at redline but is quick to downshift coming into a corner. Normal street driving it will downshift and use engine braking like a manual etc. Overall a decent trans if you have to have two pedals. The gearing in the rio/accent is better for the auto than manual as well.

It came down to consumables for me when I was purchasing... and that stupid drivers door. The Rio SX manual was just the better option for cheap tires, brakes and having 4 doors and a usable hatch. The N/A model is no barn burner, but it has good bones. Brakes are sufficiently sized, the manual you can install an LSD, wheel wells will hold a 17x8 and 235's. There are intake, exhaust and tunes available for them to make 130-ish whp and it weighs (sans sunroof) around 2800lbs empty IIRC. 

The 1G Turbo variant has a DCT, not the traditional 6spd auto.  I've heard its a lazy DCT and there are reliability issues.

In reply to ProDarwin :

I can only refer to the NA cars, that's the limit of my experience. I do know that tunes gain an idiotic amount of power for them.