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Greetings Shiters, hope all are well. Found myself in urgent need of alternative transport, last week. Long story cut shorter, after just shy of ten years I changed jobs and the new role involves a fair bit of training up and shadowing, plus some cab hopping as my designated truck wont be ready until March. Thus, my commute has gone from a 3 mile round trip to 60. For nighttime shifts it's been OK as I have borrowed the wife's Puma, but for day work all I have is my Series 3 Landy. Now this is fine on paper and I can, have and probably still will do mega miles in it, but sub-30mpg a shit heater and general Landroverness has lost its appeal very slightly. The cost alone isnt amusing any more. Also I'm 40 this year, and aching for a excuse to buy something as I haven't bought a car for myself for fuckin ages. Last Thursday I had a paid day off sorry standing down shift (this new job is the tits) so decided to go car shopping. Budget a grand, targets: 45 to 50mpg, cheapish tax and ability to seat four a bonus - originally was gonna get a van but the RFL LOL and lack of child carrying capacity quickly ruled them out. An hour on autotrader and three phone calls I had my target. The guy sounded like a normal human being and was genuinely surprised I hadn't just ghettoblasted his inbox with stupid offers. Mrs Scruff was at work and unlikely to want to ferry me about after doing the school run etc etc so I decided to be totally self sufficient and get the train. Worse case scenario, if the car was shiter than I expected, I could walk to work and borrow a van to get home. First job was route planning. Took the Land Rover to the yard where I keep all my old kak and left it there: Next a pleasant walk to the station. Here i punched my destination into the ticket machine, and once id got myself off the floor went on the interweb and got a ticket twenty five quid cheaper: Stamford station looking a little shabby in the cold. It's not far to Northampton, but my cheapo ticket meant changes at Nuneaton and Rugby, no matter I had plenty of time and it was a nice day for window gazing. coffee rating 3/10 It was pitch black by the time I got to Northampton, and very cold so I got all extravagant and got a taxi. Nice Passat in case you need to know. I shit you not, the driver was on his phone the whole ten minute or so, on some live cam bonking chat with a Eastern European (I assume from the lingo) sort. He must have sent her fifty quid by tapping his screen on the journey, she didn't even get her bits out. By the time I was about to say something we were there anyway, I told him to keep the meagre change as he will need it if he's addicted to bongo chat while driving. Anyway the car was much better than I dared hope, it was the cheapest example I'd seen and been described as having "more dents than a golf ball" but mechanically sound. Fortunately the guy had floodlights on his drive but TBH I didn't look that hard, you just know don't you? I went round the block with him and it felt tight as a drum, everything worked and after handing over 800 notes I was the tenth owner of this beauty. I insured it sat outside his house, taxed it (swearing a little it wasn't a 35 quid tax one as i smugly thought i'd researched but its not too bad) and then drove it home. Been going to and fro work in it for a week now and its great, I really like it! It is rough, but that's fine as I can leave it anywhere and not worry. It is absolutely mint inside and everything works. I have NO history of anything except what the guy I bought it from had done (DPF, various sensors, shockers etc). Its got 188k on it, I'm going to do the belt ASAP and then just see how we go with it.