Well my first car was a 1977 Alfa spider... I wouldnt recommend it for sooo many reasons. The fact that it pretty much never ran would be reason number 1. Fun to look at though.

my first car was a '62 TR4. ..and this wasn't 30 years ago. it was in 1999. I knew going into it, that if I was in a wreck, id probably be killed. gave me respect for driving. again, would not recommend. ha.

Speaking from experience of buying budget cars for daughters :rolleyes: resist at all costs buying cars that are interesting to you - those will come back to bite you in the ass. You'll be sorry with anything European for this type of car - ask me how I know! Today's generation does not care about cars the way we did - they are appliances to them. So buy the most bland appliance you can find. Honda or Toyota are sure bets. $5000 is going to buy you a 10-12 year old Honda or Toyota with 150,000+ miles - still lots of life left in those. I would also consider a plain-jane Taurus or Impala. Hundreds of thousands of these have been driven 200,000 miles+ by salesman/rentals/employees. The reliabilty is good (the build quality? Maybe not, but your daughter won't know the difference).

I would not limit the search to under 100,000 miles. 200,000 miles is the new 100,000 miles for cars built in the last 10 years or so.

My son recently bought a 2000 Civic for $4000 with 92K on it. We had to look pretty hard for a decent car under $5000. It's easy to work on (I've never wrenched on a Honda until now) and runs like a top.

My daughter is currently driving our 95 Camry V6 that we bought new. That thing is bulletproof (see the 'station wagon' thread :)). 180K and runs as good as it did when it was new, and doesn't burn a drop of oil (my son's Honda does - one of the drawbacks of buying a used car and not fully knowing the history, even with a PPI)

Looking at safety from a different perspective... buy her a regular cab Ranger, 4cyc 2wd if you want close to 30mpg, or v6 4x4 if you want that.

I say this because with just a 2 seater, she is never going to be "picked" to drive her friends ect around. At that age, 3 4 or 5 teens in a car leads to bad news...

Ferg

Ranger truck in the snow is bad news, will a new driver know what to do when it suddenly tries to swap ends? I would stick with good old boring FWD.

Got the Rav4 for my daughter. A drunk driver hit her from behind at approx 35 mph according to police. Trashed his car of course as well as hers. She had mild concussion, that was all. She got another Rav4.

I guess in the interest of defending BMW's honor I should say I had a 1983 BMW E21 320i as my first car. Pretty much bulletproof, though I ended up driving it into the ground. Started misfiring badly when warm. Think it was the piston rings worn out- they were probably original with 250,000 miles on it (odometer broke). It also needed a valve job at one point to pass smog.

Manual transmission, manual steering, rear wheel drive, it could haul a lot of stuff, just not a$$. :)

Best car in the world is "Company Car." Best car for a first car is one that she chooses and pays for herself with her hard earned money. It should also be maintained with her own hard earned money. That's the safest car.

Dan

HAHAHA! No kidding! I love having a company issued car. I really don't care what it is either, because its a car I don't have to worry about. If it doesn't start, I call our service provider and they come get it and I go rent something else. :D