What To Upgrade to From 2003Jazz? Looking for Larger car

[guest5168]

Finally its time for upgrade from my 12yeard old /260k mile jazz which I have used and abused A LOT and it still keeps going great ,looking for a larger car / more practical  (not that the jazz is unpractical, however I need something with even more space  some sort of SUV/Estate car which has large load area with seats that fold completely flat like jazz has , and has decent roof bar fixing where I can transport bulkier stuff which wont fit in boot because of the width.

French cr@p is out of the question, so is the nissan/ford/vauxhall which I don't even want to touch , probably looking at another japanese  since I like to keep my cars for loong time and use/abuse them a lot and I need reliability whatever I throw at it, have been using the Jazz to transport timber/construction materials several times per week for past few years , 700kg of cement bags aint a problem for it    . I do not want a VAN/minivan tho.

Budget of about 5-6k , and looking at ~2009-2010 year where someone else have taken the depreciation hit already.

btw i thought about just getting a 2009+ jazz, however the interior build quality put me off and I do need something bigger anyways , Thought this would be a good forum to post since I bet Most of the Jazz users likes to use it to the max as I do.

[Eddie Honda]

Honda Stream?

[TonyS]

Try a Toyota Avensis Tourer, loads of carrying capacity and comes with roof rails as standard to take a pair of roof bars for any long loads. Rear seats fold flat to give a good large flat area.
Superb build quality and it looks and drives like a car albeit not the most exciting drive you will ever experience but it is comfortable and well equipped.
The 1.8 petrol engine is bullet proof and gives reasonably good performance and economy so as long as you buy one with full service history you should be OK; it's chain drive to the overhead cam like the Jazz so no costly cam belt changes like VW/Audi and others.
Your budget should get you a good 58 plate of the facelift version of the second generation of the Avensis or possibly an early 09 plate of the later version introduced from the 09 model year.
Ran a 57 plate 1.8 TX petrol model for a couple of years until recently and it would swallow an amazing amount of stuff and only cost me usual servicing costs. Sold it easily with 93 k on the clock and it was still solid and rattle free, a really well built car.
Check one out a dealers to see the build quality for yourself.

[guest5505]

Toyota Corolla Verso

Kia Ceed estate

[guest5168]

Try a Toyota Avensis Tourer, loads of carrying capacity and comes with roof rails as standard to take a pair of roof bars for any long loads. Rear seats fold flat to give a good large flat area.
Superb build quality and it looks and drives like a car albeit not the most exciting drive you will ever experience but it is comfortable and well equipped.
The 1.8 petrol engine is bullet proof and gives reasonably good performance and economy so as long as you buy one with full service history you should be OK; it's chain drive to the overhead cam like the Jazz so no costly cam belt changes like VW/Audi and others.
Your budget should get you a good 58 plate of the facelift version of the second generation of the Avensis or possibly an early 09 plate of the later version introduced from the 09 model year.
Ran a 57 plate 1.8 TX petrol model for a couple of years until recently and it would swallow an amazing amount of stuff and only cost me usual servicing costs. Sold it easily with 93 k on the clock and it was still solid and rattle free, a really well built car.
Check one out a dealers to see the build quality for yourself.

actually... Im thinking about avensis myself infact went to check 1 already, however the rear seats dont fold 100% flat so there isn't flat load bay , however could you possibly remove the rear seat pads as such in order for it to make fold 100% flat? I know you can push the seat pads at 90 degrees, but You can't fold flat the front passanger seat than flat as well so you can't load in it really really long stuff like you can with jazz?

[guest5107]

Hello there. We're doing the opposite very soon, we're replacing our Frv with a jazz, our kids are older so no longer need such a big motor. Before the frv we had a stream, both being super reliable motors, the frv is a 1.8  with roof rails and it's much better on fuel than the older 2.0  stream was.
I can fully recommend both, and if I was in the hunt for a larger car, I really wouldn't look at anything else.
Hope this helps. Gaz

[guest334]

Stick to Japanese Korean & choose a new vehicle that you like to drive - there are 1000's out there, I would sell your \Jazz in local paper for cash and hunt down a deal. Good Luck

[culzean]

Try a Toyota Avensis Tourer, loads of carrying capacity and comes with roof rails as standard to take a pair of roof bars for any long loads. Rear seats fold flat to give a good large flat area.

Toyota Avensis are well built - I used to work for a company that supplied major body parts to Burnaston Plant,  my brother was looking at Avensis Estates but the deal breaker for him was that they have electric handbrake - so he's looking  for something similar with a 'normal' handbrake

[TonyS]

Only the later version introduced in 2009 has an electric handbrake, the model prior to 2009 has a normal handbrake. I don't like electric handbrakes either, seems to be a complicated (and potentially expensive) solution to a non-existent problem.
The good feature of the Avensis handbrake is that it has a separate drum brake for the handbrake as part of the rear disc assembly so it avoids the usual problems encountered when rear discs are also used as the handbrake.

In reply to sitefive, as far as I can recall the rear seat pads can't be removed but the seat backs always folded flat as long as the front seats were moved forward to enable the seat backs to drop down fully.
Having owned both a GD and now a GE the load area always seemed to be longer when using the Avensis but can't confirm for definite now that the Avensis has gone (and replaced by another Toyota).

[guest5505]

my S-type Jaguar that has just been sold to be replaced by my Jazz had an electric handbrake. I had problems just before I sold which cost £500 to fix, so I think it is well worth avoiding a car with an electric handbrake.