I bought a 1999 1.8 auto Avensis after a not so great experience with a Renault Espace. It was a very low mileage and was great value from a Toyota dealer near Edinburgh. Our second car at the time was a 1993 corolla 1.3 auto so that led us in the what turned out to be in a good direction. I also found the dealership experience very good.

I maintain the car myself and have nothing but praise about how easy it is to work on and how little needs attention. Oil, filter, pads, brake disks, air filter, timing belt and thats about it. It even has the original exhaust and is 13 years old!! The car is kept outside and has no significant corossion and is 13 years old!

I have driven a wide range of cars all of which are compromises - as a inexpensive family car a good mark 1 Avensis is difficult to beat if your not bothered about the Jonses next door go for a good one of these.

The suspension compromise between comfort and acceptable handling is particularly good. The noise levels are on a par or better than Focuses, Passats, Audi A4's. Yes that surprises me too!

Annoyances are an intermitentently rattly steering column at slow speeds (not safety related) and some rattly trim, but even Passats have a bit of that going on.

Surprised no-one has done a review up till now of these being as there are so many about still.
I was given this Avensis by a family member free after my previous car was written off. It’s a W reg 2.0 CDX (pre-VVTi engine). It had 81,000 miles, FSH.

It definitely has a retro feel – upright windscreen, short dashboard with a 80’s style fascia. As it’s a CDX it has all luxuries of that era – alloys, leather, cd auto changer, a/c, leather, electric most things, walnut dash and also 4 airbags, which is not bad for a 12 year old rep-car.

Since getting it, circumstances meant having to travel increased distances so I have put on 12,000 miles in 7 months. It needed a new clutch but other than that nothing has gone wrong at all. Considering I got the car for nothing, one clutch replacement for a couple of hundred quid ain’t bad.

It still drives great – refined and plenty of power, delivered smoothly, so it’s a superb motorway cruiser, very spacious and very comfortable. The downside is that economy is not brilliant, and tax and insurance costs (group 13 – old index!) are high.
Broken things: electric sunroof, rear window heater elements and I hamfistedly broke the autochanger in the boot.

However the air con still works very well and there is not a speck of rust.

It was intended as an interim measure but apart from costing a bit more than I’d like to run, the trade off of a totally dependable and comfortable car means I can’t find a reason to get rid of it – brilliant!