Are you a discerning enthusiast about to take your first steps onto the car ownership ladder? Are you after a four-wheeled friend that won’t be some 1000cc shopping trolly with the verve and handling of one? If so, our best first cars list should be your bible.
Well, maybe not the bible. But it will certainly help you choose a motor that is both cheap to insure and offers the driving involvement a petrolhead needs.
After untold hours of seat time across several decades, days spent poring over the classifieds and comparing more insurance quotes than we care to remember, our writers believe the Mini Cooper to be the pick of the bunch. After all, its sweet combination of handling and affordability has kept thousands of enthusiasts coming back for more.
Don’t fancy one? Each car on this list has a unique selling point to mark it out from the other slabs of metal in your average car park. From superminis to hot hatches, there’s a good option here for everyone.
And if you have a bit more money to play with, try our best used cars for enthusiasts article.
The Mini may be one of the most iconic cars in the world, but it also comes with a bit of exclusivity.
No fewer than 13 trim levels were available with a list of colour combinations and options form so extensive that it looked like a child’s Christmas wishlist. This means that no two Minis are likely to be the same, giving you a slice of car-park cachet.
This generation was birthed with the code ‘R56’ – ‘R’ standing for Rover. That doesn’t mean it uses any Rover bits, however, because this endlessly configurable hatchback was reliable with strong build quality and is now available for sensible money, with fully ULEZ-compliant petrol engines no matter which year you pick. Plus, it's in insurance group 17.
Six engines were offered, ranging from a 1.4-litre petrol to a 2.0-litre diesel. While the diesels are a bit gravelly, they don't detract from the fact that this is a reliable, fun-loving hatch that turns on a 5p piece and is instantly recognisable.
Problems? Practicality is quite poor and some cars have developed gearbox issues after living hard lives; just make sure to listen out for gearbox whine on the test drive.
Read our Mini Cooper review
Join the debate
Add your comment
I'd hazard a guess that many youngsters are not bothering to take a test in a manual car given today's prevalence of automatics and EVs. So maybe it would be worth including one of the cheaper used EVs in the list of ideal starter cars? It's a fact that some of these are now cheaper to buy than their petrol or diesel equivalents, so why not embrace the future?
MX-5, or, something the person's actually interested in, it doesn't necessarily have to be fast etc, could be a classic VW or Fiat 500 etc.
Problem is that most insurance companies won't insure a young driver with many of the cars on this list and if by chance they did the cost of the annual premium with probably be more than the value of the car, What this article should be advising them to buy are cars with the lowest insurance group build up a few years no claims get more experience on the road before buying somthing more powerful.