TOP 10 MOST RELIABLE CARS UNDER £5,000

Alright guys, how's it going? Welcome back. Following on from a video I did recently where I talked about the top six most surprisingly unreliable cars you could buy, many of you asked me to do a similar video with the most reliable cars you could buy, so here you go. Here are the top 10 most reliable cars you can buy for under £5,000. If you're one of those people who want reliability above all else, I personally don't buy into that but each to their own, you need to remember the acronym KISS. Keep. It. Simple. Stupid. You need a simple natural aspirated petrol engine. No turbos, no superchargers, no diesels. Keep. It. Simple. Stupid. Older diesels might have been okay but newer diesels are just so overly complicated and they're costly to repair, so avoid those. Again, if you want reliability above all else, go for a manual gearbox rather than an automatic. They're far more reliable and cheaper to fix. If you insist on going for an automatic, make sure you go for a proper true automatic with a torque converter rather than one of those silly semi autos or a twin clutch box because they're just complicated and expensive to repair. The first car on the list, and there's no particular order here, and by the way they're all Japanese. In fact, no they're not. One isn't. You'll have to wait and see which one that is. So the first one is the Toyota Corolla. No surprise there. It later rebranded as the Auris. It's now switched back to the Corolla so I obviously realise people didn't like the Auris name. The engines are chain driven so there are no cam belts to replace, no cam belts to snap, and they are bulletproof. There's literally nothing to go wrong. If you service them every 10,000 miles or 12 months, not only will they outlive you but they'll also outlive your grandchildren. They are that reliable. If you go for a manual, which I'd recommend, you might have to replace the clutch every eight to ten years but it's only a three or four hundred pound job. If you insist on going for an automatic then go for a Corolla Auto because that has a proper true automatic gearbox. The Auris, which came later, has a semi-automatic gearbox and they're no good. You'll find a good Corolla for just a couple of grand and you can literally set your watch by them. I've never had a minute's trouble with them. Number two, the Toyota Yaris. Any age, any year, any Yaris, they're all good. They just don't go wrong. Again, go with a petrol rather than a diesel, go with a manual rather than an automatic, and you just won't have any issues. I've had some of these in past exchange over the years that haven't had a service for six or eight years and they still run like a sewing machine. They're unbelievable. You'll find a good Mark 1 Yaris for around a thousand pounds, a good Mark 2 for around two grand, and a good Mark 3 for around three and a half, so it really won't break the bank. If you can only find an early Mark 1 then make sure you find one with a long MOT because they can suffer from rust. Number three, the Honda Civic. Again, any age, any year, change the oil regularly and you just won't have an issue. I can only recall having one issue with the Civic and that was a bad fuel pump. Three or four hundred pounds and it was fixed, but literally every other one I've touched I just haven't had a problem with. I would avoid the autos because they're not a true auto, they're a semi-automatic and they call them a iDrive or iChange or I should have bought a manual. They're rubbish, so pick a manual gearbox. Those semi-autos are horrible when they're working but they're even worse when they're not. Three thousand pounds will get you a good, sensible mileage manual Civic and it will outlast everybody. Number four is the boring but dependable Mazda 3. The petrols are great, they will run forever. If you want something a bit quicker, a bit more interesting, then they do a sport model with a two litre petrol engine and they're great. They come with loads of extras as well, so with that you get bright xenon headlamps, Bose audio, and bigger alloys, and they really look the part actually. My mate's had a couple of these over the years and he's never had any issues with them. The only negative is they're only a five-speed manual rather than a six, so on the motorway your ears might bleed. But it's not a bad price to pay for reliability. Every time I see somebody in a BMW 1 Series I just think to myself, you should have bought a Mazda 3 Sport, it's far better in every way. Again, three thousand pounds will get you a nice one, just watch out for rust on early models. Number five is the Daihatsu Sirian. Yes, I know it looks like Postman Pat's van, but if you can get past that it's actually a really good, reliable car. It won't get you a girlfriend or a boyfriend, but it will get you to where you're going. And if you're lucky, the previous owner might have thrown in their old tartan shopping trolley. The interiors are spacious and reasonably well equipped, and the engines are bulletproof. One word of warning though, the parts can be quite tricky to source, so do bear that in mind. But three thousand pounds will get you a good one, with low mileage. Number six is the Suzuki Swift. That's a tongue twister. I'm specifically talking about the 2005 Onwards models. It won the European Car of the Year award back in 2005. It kind of looks like a Mini, only in my mind I think it looks cooler. They're great little cars. The engines are great, they're quite peppy, quite fun to drive, the steering's good. There's really not much to go wrong with them. One word of warning though, the gearboxes, the manual gearboxes can whine with age, the bearings go, so I've had that a few times actually. But most are fine. You'll find a good one for between two and a half and three grand, and I think for a first or second car, you can't go wrong. Number seven. Now this is the only one on the list which isn't from the Land of the Rising Sun. It's the Chevrolet Spark. This might surprise you given that it's a General Motors product and it's featured on a list of reliability, but they are really reliable. We have one as a courtesy car at work and it's never gone wrong. We've done, I don't know, 30,000 miles in it maybe, and I imagine anyone who's borrowed that car won't have treated it with respect, and it's still just running. We keep planning to replace it with something newer, but what's the point? It's quite good fun to drive in a weird sort of way, because it's so slow you won't get a speeding ticket, and you drive everywhere with your foot completely to the floor. It's quite practical, it's quite spacious, you can fill the tank for 25 quid. You could do far worse honestly, and for two and a half thousand pounds you'll find yourself a good example. All of them come with USB points and auxiliary points, you can find them with aircon, alloys, they're quite good spec cars. Number eight. The Nissan Micra. Now specifically I'm talking about the K11 model. They're a little bit too old now to be taken seriously and featured on this list, but they are bulletproof. Every single one I've ever had has just gone on and on and on. They're still very popular with people who do Uber Eats and Deliveroo and that sort of stuff. Chances are when you get your Lambuna delivered, or your Hawaiian Peach on a Saturday night, it will have been delivered in a K11 Micra. No Micra since the K11 model has been anywhere near as reliable. Nowadays they're just cheaply built tat, and I wouldn't trust them as far as I could throw them, but the old K11, they were a reliable car. This is probably the cheapest car on this list, because 500 quid will get you a decent one with an MOT. Number nine. The ultimate car on this list is the Toyota Aygo forward slash Citroen C1 forward slash Peugeot 107. They're all the same. I've done a proper review with one of these old Aygos, and in it I just talk about its reliability. Things break, but it will always get you to your destination. The engine is a bulletproof one litre Daihatsu motor. It's one of the few cars you can literally not service, and it will still start on the key. The clutches are lightweight and a bit weak, but you'll replace it for 200 pounds. The boots can leak, but you can replace the seals for 50 quid. The door handles can snap off, but you can replace them for 25 quid. They're just really easy to run. The road tax is only 20 pounds a year. It's only 35 pounds to fill the tank. You really can't go wrong. Motoring just doesn't get any cheaper than an Aygo, and two grand will get you a decent one. Number 10, and the last on the list today, is the Honda Accord. Again, not the diesels, because I've had a few issues with timing chains and things like that, but the petrols just don't go wrong. They're a little bit thirsty. They will drink fuel, but they will run forever, and they drive very well. It's sort of bland motoring at its best. Again, two and a half grand will get you a decent one. Well, that's it. The most reliable cars you can buy for under 5,000 pounds. When you think about it, it isn't rocket science, is it? They're all well built, and they're all quite simple, and simplicity equals reliability. So, thank you once again for watching. Make sure you give the video a thumbs up if you enjoyed it. Make sure you subscribe if you haven't done already. You can follow me on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter. I'll leave the link below. If you've got any comments or questions or suggestions for these types of videos, then let me know. So, cheers guys. I'll see you next time.