My brother has had a venga since new, 2010 basic model with AC. not much more mileage and passes every year with no problem. Has no intention of changing it.

I've thought about changing out my (now) 19yo Mazda3 for one of them, after seeing lots of unblemished 8-10yo ones (and 1.6 6-spd auto petrols in '3' trim) Pxed at my local main dealer at between £8k - £12k.

For me, the main downsides over what I already have would be the backwards step in handling ability and how well they'd cope in a rural environment with our not-so-well paved roads. Whilst the 1.6 auto has a not so-good mpg compared to other makes offerings 3-4 years newer (but better than their old 4-spd unit), it's not the end of the world if its reliable and practical.

Unfortunately money being rather tight made the final decision for me.

Aww give our lovely roads some credit, they will get around to shredding your car in a couple more years. We test our cars for road worthiness. We ought to test our roads for car worthiness, they'd fail.