New (to me) Car!

After the second time of my Lumina being in the shop in as many weeks, I decided to stop delaying the inevitable and get a newer car. The Lumina is a 1999 model and has 150k miles, so I don't think there are too many miles left, and certainly not enjoyable miles at that. I'm giving it to my 17 year old brother as a first car.

Over the past two weeks, I've test driven many cars. Everything from a Volkswagen New Beetle to a Honda Pilot to an Audi A6. This was more to familiarize myself with the cars out there and decide what attributes are important. First of all is reliability. I'm tired of cheap american econo-sedans that all look the same and crap out after 100k miles. Second was fuel efficiency, of course. And the third was comfort. I am a big guy, and a Yaris would not be a good fit. These were my only major considerations, but I also wanted something that wasn't like every other Camry out there, and something I can be enthusiastic about instead of yet another ho-hum-mobile.

The first vehicle I seriously considered was a Honda Element. On paper it was a good match, and the look of the car didn't bother me. When I test drove one however, I was not impressed. The driver area was not terribly comfortable(the window controls jammed into my leg) and the car had very little acceleration.

I tried a Saturn Vue next. Another small SUV with not terrible gas mileage. There was nothing bad about this vehicle, but nothing leaped out as nice either, and since the ones I looked at were $15-17k I didn't want to spend that much on something I didn't really care for.

Enter the Scion xB.