Anybody own a Honda Fit?

A lot depends on how badly Ford's domestic engineers hack it to death. The world-market Focus is a great car. The one we get ... it's out of focus. And that's the nicest thing I can say about it.

 

My friend's wife has a Fit and loves it. She has a 25 mile commute and gets much better mileage than her last car. Can't really go wrong with a Honda.

 

I'm rooting for Ford to make a turnaround, and that's from a guy whose family has never owned anything but GM products. Well, there was that POS Ford Escort my brother had about 20 years ago.... If the U.S. automakers crumble (and GM isn't exactly thriving) it will be a tremendous blow to this country.

 

Completely agree, 2MCM. It's not that Ford has suddenly gone dumb. But I think they're cutting too many corners on their domestic products. Then they wonder why the Japanese manufacturers - namely Toyota, Honda and Nissan - are eating their lunches and the bags they came in.

 

Hondas are pretty reliable. My dad had an Accord from 1987 until about 1998. It was a good car for him.

 

Go cart handling. Great mileage. Sweet short-throw 5-speed. Good price. After 9,400 miles that's what I can tell you.

Best tank of gas was 45 mpg. Worst was 37 mpg.

Use it as my office. Seats four adults better than expected.

Handles better than a Mini Cooper. Lots of pep.

Will see how it holds up in five years.

 

I have 202,000 on my Civic and a Fit will be my next commuting car.

It might be in 6-7 years, though, and another 100,000 miles.

 

The Fit is a phenomenal car if it does what you need it to. I'd highly suggest finding Car and Driver's long-term test. The gist of it was they typically avoid that sort of car, but loved the Fit.

Civics are worth checking out, too. They get mileage that's close to that of the Fit, but are roomier. The caveat with both the Civic and the Fit, though, is they're in very high demand right now because of gas prices -- the Civic was the best-selling vehicle in the United States in May. My sister just bought a Fit and even finding one to test drive at a dealer was a challenge.

Arnold, the Mac Daddy family Mazda is a 6, not a 3. That being said, the 3 is still a really fine car -- it drives a lot more expensive than it is, and it's pretty roomy, too. And I wouldn't worry about Mazda's Ford connection -- Ford ends up using Mazda parts way more often than the other way around (and the 3 is all Mazda, aside from the platform shared with Volvo and the European Focus). The Ford bits on our Mazda6 are working out just fine.

 

Macdaddy,

I completely forgot you were the car expert here so here you go:

Our '94 Camry is nearingthe end of its days and we're thinking of the following (well, I am, HC wants a Mini)

What would be your first choice here--we're going to downsize slightly from a Camry

Mazda 3
Corolla
Matrix
Civic

Thanks.

 

I have an '05 Mazda 3 with 40,xxx miles. I haven't had problems ... yet. I actually need to replace the tires, but I've had no mechanical issues. Of course, I'm helped by the fact that the car doesn't have power windows and locks or air conditioning. Fewer bells and whistles to break, you know.

 

I was supposed to rent an Aveo last time I flew to California and ended up driving a Pontiac Sunfire for the same reason -- they were out of small cars.

I could feel the bitch in me running out of my pores.

 

Sunfire? Or G5? Sunfire's been dead for several years now.

How long has it been since you last flew to California?