My latest what cars for us $25k price range?

SWMBO and I are both contemplating replacement of our DD mobiles in the next year or so and are looking for suggestions.  This has largely been started by the acquisition of a well used Tahoe for trip duties about 18 months ago.  It is the most practical and luxurious vehicle we have ever had and it has twisted our little brains...

Current scenario is that SWMBO DD's an early 350z (I think it's the Enthusiast model) and I'm DD'ing an FR-S.  Commutes are about 13 miles each way with limited options for fun encounters on the drive.  Basically one on ramp each way that can be good on the rare occasion you can catch it with no traffic.  Fun drives for the heck of it have become far less frequent.  Neither car would be used for auto-x or track use so classing is completely irrelevant. 

So we are both considering 4 door replacements for practicality reasons.  SWMBO is still pretty insistent on a manual trans even though her normal use is 1st, 3rd, 6th in the 350...she has also been spoiled by the low end grunt (all the torques!) which allows her to get away with this laziness... I would be willing to consider a dual clutch manumatic or a normal manual trans.  

Looking for new or almost new to keep for 10 years/150k miles with the must have luxurious options of not soul-crushing, cruise control, dual zone climate control (manual or auto is fine), and heated seats.  Would prefer heated steering wheel for SWMBO.

I've been thinking about 4 door hatches like Ford Focus ST (my first guess for SWMBO as I think the low RPM torque and Recaro seats would make her happy), VW GTI (how scary are the current crop of VW's?), Hyundai Elantra GT Sport, Chevy Cruze, and Mazda 3.  Not looking for a crazy fast rocket like a CTS-V, but an ATS-V might be fun... SWMBO is thinking Hyundai Veloster.

So, what does the hive say?

TL:DR - What 4 door car (no SUV's) can you buy new or essentially new for approx. $25k that's fun, kinda luxurious, has a manual or dual clutch trans, and won't be scary or overly costly to own for 10 years/150k miles?  Looking for 2 cars ($25k each), don't have to be the same one, but now that I think about it might be easier to maintain if they are the same...

Find the most unmolested EVO VIII or IX. I think $25,000 will get you there. I'm totally wrong, but you should do it anyway.

I'm looking at similar cars right now. Be sure to check out the Civic Si and Accord Sport. 

 How much WRX does $25k buy a person these days? I'd be surprised to see a clean ATS-V in your budget, but should be tons of regular ATS around. Can you get a recent Lexus IS with a stick? Maybe even a Buick Regal GS?

Of course, when I hear 4 door/boring commute/low end torque, I think of electric, PHEV or hybrids. You won't find one that lets you shift your own, but besides that it seems like the right tool for the job here. Lightly used Volts, or Fusion, Camry, Sonata/Optima hybrids, Lexus ct200h, etc would all be in budget.

Because I just bought one, I'll throw this out there.  If SWMBO loves her 350Z, then why not get her a 4 door version, the G37/Q40?  It was made all the way to 2014 and can be had well under your budget.  You can't get a heated steering wheel (trust me, I was shopping the very same market you describe) but it's got everything else..and you can find it in a 6spd.  BMW 328i is also a great option, as we nearly bought that instead.  They do have heated steering wheels as an option...it's part of the "winter package".  The FoST is fun, I had one with the Recaros.  We even had the Ford Racing tune done, which doesn't void the warranty.  It's an absolute torque monster, but some things about it drove me crazy...very small fuel tank, turning radius of a dump truck, very high strung personality. 

In reply to STM317 :

SWMBO doesn't have any interest in electric or hybrid. If she buys first, I'm thinking about maybe going full electric with something like a Leaf or maybe a Volt which would be mostly electric use for me.

In reply to Boost_Crazy :

I'm pretty sure SWMBO will think the Accord is too big for her.  Do they both come with either 1.5 or 2.0 turbo engines?  I did see a few Civic SI's on Cars.com for $25k last night and was surprised based on what I'd seen in other posts talking about $10-$15k market adjustments being popular.

Edit:  Just realized I was lumping the Civic Si & Type R into the same vehicle when they are not.  It's the Type R's with the market adjustments...

In reply to Klayfish :

Much like the Accord mentioned above I'm pretty sure SWMBO would say the Infiniti & BMW are too big, but I'll try to get her to drive something of that size & see.

She doesn't really want 4 doors except that she is short & having the seat forward with long doors of a coupe makes getting out without dinging the car next to you more difficult. Not to mention when the wind blows it shut on your shin.

SWMBO would not be interested in a tune, so that might tame the FoST a bit.

Well, give the G37/Q40 a shot, because the driving dynamics should feel very familiar to her and she may (or may not) like that. 

The FoST without the tune is less prone to torque steer for sure.  I drove mine stock for a month or two.  But it still has a small fuel range, horrible turning radius and this is just a personal thing, but my wife called it a "squirrel on caffeine".  Even though cars are just machines, if I had to describe a personality for it, my wife was spot on.  That was fun when I wanted to mess around, but if I just wanted to relax and cruise, not so much.

Mk7 GTI.  Might be more maintenance intensive than other options,  They are a very comfortable and fun commuter.  I suspect you can get a base model for around 25K ( or a lot less if there are 2017s on the lot near you).  Only thing missing is dual zone climate control, may need to go up a trim level to get it.

My wife has over 50k on hers and one unscheduled warranty issue (shifter assembly), and one wtf recall (fuel pump) so far.

Friend just got a '18 Mk7 GTI SE for something like $25,500.  The '18's are the ones to get, they have double the warranty and come with the Performance Pack brakes/diff along with Apple Car Play.

In reply to eastsideTim & docwyte:

Have recent VW's been more reliable than in the past when owning a VW out of warranty was a frightful proposition? I hear hints that they have gotten better, but not sure if that is just based on providing a longer warranty or actual quality improvement.  Assuming we keep for 10 years or 150k miles more than half of that time would be out of warranty.

My limited exposure is that they feel very luxurious for the money & I think SWMBO would probably like that, but I don't want to get her in a maintenance nightmare as then I have to deal with that & an angry wife...

In reply to secretariata :

They do seem to have improved significantly since the Mk4/Mk5 days, but (IMHO) are still more likely to have issues than the Japanese brands.  Against the Focus and Fiesta ST, I’d guess reliability may be a wash.  I think the thing that was annoying in the past with VWs was that things that shouldn’t break, broke. That hasn’t completely gone away (shifter assembly in my wife’s car, for example), but I think it has gotten better.  My wife paid for a 5/100 warranty, just in case, but a lot of that was fear of out of warranty DSG issues.

In reply to eastsideTim :

After looking a bit more at pricing, the GTI looks to be more for similarly equipped and if I need to add an aftermarket warranty on to that they aren't anywhere close on price.  I guess I'll have to do some research into reliability to see if an aftermarket warranty would be needed for peace of mind.

Klayfish said:

Well, give the G37/Q40 a shot, because the driving dynamics should feel very familiar to her and she may (or may not) like that. 

The FoST without the tune is less prone to torque steer for sure.  I drove mine stock for a month or two.  But it still has a small fuel range, horrible turning radius and this is just a personal thing, but my wife called it a "squirrel on caffeine".  Even though cars are just machines, if I had to describe a personality for it, my wife was spot on.  That was fun when I wanted to mess around, but if I just wanted to relax and cruise, not so much.

She is far more into appearance than driving dynamics.  She only has the 350z because it looks nice.  Rarely goes over 3500 rpm's and skips gears because it has enough torque to get away with that.  The challenge of smaller parking spots and fewer of them at many places makes it harder to find a spot away from everyone.  Result is the longer, heavier doors are more of an inconvenience for her than they used to be, so she is considering a 4 door for the first time ever...ultimately she may decide not to go that way.  We rarely have more than the two of us in a car and if so we can always take the Tahoe or whatever I wind up with.

The '18 GTI comes with a 6 year 72,000 bumper to bumper warranty.  Doubt you'll need anything past that...

In reply to docwyte :

Oh, I didn't realize they had upped it that much.  Thanks for the info...

As you may be able to tell I'm just starting to think about this and trying to come up with a list of cars to look into. This is a class of vehicles I'm pretty unfamiliar with as we have only had coupes and truck/suv's in the past.

secretariata said:

In reply to STM317 :

SWMBO doesn't have any interest in electric or hybrid. If she buys first, I'm thinking about maybe going full electric with something like a Leaf or maybe a Volt which would be mostly electric use for me.

If she likes torque, she will love electric power.  100% torque at 0 RPM  

I read on another site about a Focus ST for super cheap, like in your price range for a new car cheap.

In reply to Toebra :

Even though her daily commute is only 25 miles, she will suffer from range anxiety.  Plus we will need a reliable backup to the Tahoe for trip duty if it goes down. I am much more realistic about my driving needs and range anxiety will not be an issue for me, so if she buys first I'll be seriously looking at electric probably without any ICE range extender...but a Volt might sneak into the picture.

Seems to be a lot of Foci ST's available new under $25k.  I think she would really want the ST3 package with the heated Recaros and the heated steering wheel. I hadn't really thought about them until she commented on how she liked the seats in the FR-S after driving it for the first time in 6 months or so over the weekend.  I have seen a few of them within my price range, so I'm confident I could find one and get the deal I want. 

How much are low mileage CPO FociST going for vs new? 

In reply to yupididit :

The cheapest CPO that a quick autotrader search turned up: 2014, 19k miles, $17k

Seems like plenty of STs with under 30k miles in the $16k ballpark too, although not specifically listed as CPO

Nicest/newest 335/435 (or is it 430 now?) you can find.

If the Accord is one size too big, it sounds like the winner is a new-gen Civic 1.5t. 

STM317 said:

In reply to yupididit :

The cheapest CPO that a quick autotrader search turned up: 2014, 19k miles, $17k

Seems like plenty of STs with under 30k miles in the $16k ballpark too, although not specifically listed as CPO

Can't see buying new when deals like that exist.