Even Doge agrees that the Sonata is a great value.
I’ve never had the highest opinion of anything Hyundai makes, starting with the $600 heap my sister bought way back in 1996. It was a 1989 that looked a lot like this:
Only difference was it was red and didn’t have taillights quite that nice. One of them was translucent red tape that was sufficient to pass as such. That old car burned oil, had belts go bad, and I think eventually just seized and stopped working.
As mentioned in a prior post, I know of more than 2 Kia’s that have suffered the same fate of engine seizure. With the two companies being so closely related I was not excited to hop in our luscious new Sonata but the swap was going to save us $500 over the convertible we had the first few days of our trip so switcheroo time it was.
Immediately I noticed the 2017 Sonata wasn’t as crappy as I thought. High praise! But really, the button’s weren’t as bottom-shelf as I would have thought and ride quality was a couple steps up from 1989.
Overall it didn’t suck and if you’re going to keep the car for fewer than 80,000 miles I might even recommend buying a Sonata if you need cheap everyday transport. Resale value on these things is in the gutter so luckily you can pick one up with 25,000 miles for about $14,000. Not too shabby given it should be mostly trouble-free driving for at least 3 years.
All in all I was impressed with the car’s ability to get up to speed, work cruise, and use bluetooth audio all with relative ease. It’s absolutely not a luxury or performance car, but you wouldn’t expect that from the brand or the price.
Trunk space and ground clearance also weren’t bad which is nice when you’re in Maui and you’re not familiar with the area – sometimes needing to drive over a curb or through sandy area every once in a while, with the trunk full of luggage.
