We keep coming back to a Mazda 3, prob a 2016-2018.

Still have another 6-12 months to figure it out but it's going to take something else that really impresses us between reliability and value to move off the Mazda.

silverado_lover said:

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FIDO*98* said:

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side mirror warning lights

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These do absolutely nothing if you have side view mirrors properly adjusted. I imagine at least 95% of people have their side views positioned so that the side of their own vehicle is visible.

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If you drive in a major city, the blind spot detection warning lights on the mirrors are a godsend.

I thought they were a waste of time until some lane splitting motorcycle rider tried to become road pizza as he passed me.

And these days, as many poor drivers as there are on the road, it's a nice extra feature to have.

It might be because I live in Los Angeles but there are so many people who obviously learned how to drive somewhere that isn't here that you need every little advantage that you can get.

tldr; - I thought they were a waste of time but now I've grown to appreciate them.

JBLHAG03 said:

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They will likely get in a wreck no matter what you buy , so keep that in mind.

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Friend of mine just had his parents gift their old Cadillac to his 16 y/o son.
3 weeks later, crashed.

sushi94 said:

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You might want to reconsider the LC as the choice. It should have dual air bags and 4 wheel anti-lock brakes if everything is working. The 212 HP is not going to be a race or speed demon. You could upgrade the bumpers assuming they are stock to heavy duty custom steel for added protection.
The only problem is that the LC is the only one in your fleet that will maintain or increase in value imo.
They will likely have an accident. I'd drop in a carplay stereo with back-up camera.
Ultimately as you teach them how to drive you may change your mind on what is safe for their driving style/habits. Adequate spacing is one of the hardest things for young drivers to learn. My son had 2 accidents - one was his fault and the other was some idiot running a red light and t-boneing the car 2 cars away - the smaller modern cars were totaled and not driveable - my son's was driveable and repaired. My daughter had 2 accidents with in a month of each other both were rear-end accidents caused by women in the mid-30s on their phone and not paying attention in stop and go traffic.

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I have a 1999 Ford Expedition that I drive fairly regularly.

Has airbags, anti-lock brakes, etc. And there's no navigation or XM radio to distract from the road.

The only real complaint I have is - everybody and their mother assumes that you have a backup camera and they'll walk right behind you when you're trying to back out of a parking space. It's amazing how little people value their lives.

We bought my daughter an 05 BMW 325i for $3k last October. Car runs like a top.

Lots of good comments and suggestions but I am nowhere close to making a decision. I might, however, be leaning toward a CX-5 or maybe a Tacoma.

Reasons why I am leaning away from the LC:
* It is my DD
* No side airbags
* No front collision warning/blind spot monitoring
* Poor braking distance
* I dont want it to get banged up

Reasons for the LC
* Slow
* It freaking awesome
* I dont want 4 cars and I dont want to sell the LC, and I also dont particularly want to sell the Cayenne (but I would if I buy something else)

Neighbor kid just bought himself his first car with help. Infinity G37s sedan. He's already asking me about turbo kits, intakes, tunes, exhaust - ahh to be young again.

I really hope he doesn't crash it soon, because it is a pretty car.

Sounds like it'll be in sideshow before too long

E46 is the second most reliable platform if that means anything.

I replaced the radiator and the driver side window regulator at home. Other than that, it's a fun car to drive and get her to school and back.

If you are concerned about your teen's safety and want the latest tech to assist with that especially if you are somewhat of a helicopter parent, then you can't go wrong with either a used Tesla Model 3 or Model Y. 5-star crash rating which is assisted by their heavier weights with a low center of gravity because of the battery packs making them much less likely to rollover. Just make sure they know how to manually open the front doors in the case of an emergency.

And on the technology side, we all know Teslas and EVs have fast acceleration but you can actually limit that yourself to where it can never go more than 85 mph and have a 0-60 time closer to a Civic. Blind spot cameras, automatic emergency braking, stability control, and automatic lane correction are additional tech features that aid your teen from crashing. But if something does happen, you can view any of the 4 dash cameras that are built into the Tesla (front, rear, left fender, and right fender) to see what happened. And if you want to go full helicopter parent, you can not only view their location and speed in real-time through the Tesla app, but you can also save/view a history of all their driving telemetry (location, speed, temperature, etc.) through the use of a 3rd party app like TeslaFi.