[armaan_singh]

I haven't actually sat down and pondered over this, but what an excellent thread GTO.
Yes, a lot of things have changed in terms of vehicular decisions since the years have passed. Back when my dad was footing the bills, I used to take my Honda City practically everywhere it wasn't designed to go too including some near off road experiences (College immaturities) and would send the car back to the hometown to have it repaired. However now a decade later I know how important it is to have a beater car in the house. 1 trip to the service center for my Civic, and I feel half my salary go down the drain. Hence I've purchased an Spresso for daily trips and more.
I also used to be an out and out sedan guy, but now when the time is looming to change (not upgrade) my Civic, I see myself constantly gravitating towards the likes of the Magnite/Kiger duo.
While sedans remain the closest to my heart, if anything the last decade has taught me that decisions taken solely with the heart tend to be disasters.

Thanks,
Armaan

[KaurDiCar]

With changes in times I've understood the importance high seated cross overs over sedans.
I'm now a Thar girl and absolutely adore the high seating position and despite a lot of back clash from the family, I actually bought the petrol manual version, which should give me 15 years of fuss free service in Delhi.
Earlier I never used modify anything in the car and used to just go with the top end model, but this time I saved a ton of money by going with base variant and adding things a la carte as and when the need arises.

Thanks,
Kaur

[RoadMonkey]

The change in my automotive preferences largely mirrors yours.

Transmission

I got my first car in my early twenties. Being a young one, I used to mock people who drove automatics and didn't consider them real drivers until they drove a manual. I also used to take pride in my smooth gearshift-ing skills. Now I drive an automatic, manuals seem like unnecessary work. I've converted to the extent of even having uttered these words - "idk why MT cars are even made".

Ride quality

I never would've cared for it, but I have had the displeasure of driving on particularly bad roads. My father's job takes us to all parts of the country, and well, keeping back pain at bay seems more important than a little handling fun on stiffer cars.

Reliability

I love my VW. I've not had any problems with it, I may continue with VAG cars for the time being given the lack of good options but I'd happily take a nice Toyota car if I could afford one or if they came up with a Yaris replacement or Brezza competition - provided it is safe. And I mean a Toyota engineered car, not rebadged Maruti. Having a reliable car certainly eases the stress when going on long trips and remote locations, I'm always worried about maintenance and troubles of a VW or similar cars. I doubt I'll keep it beyond the warranty period, but I'd prefer to keep any car I own for at least 15 years.

Ride height

I'm a sedan guy. I love the way low slung cars drive. It shall remain my preference if I ever go abroad, but given the high beam menace in India, my next car will be a taller one. I'm absolutely tired of having white light flashing in my eyes, people are absolutely careless with high beam on congested city roads and I'm worried about having vision problems in the future.

Tl;dr

I used to consider the Innova Crysta a utilitarian car, something a person with character will not even think of buying. Maybe it's just me getting older, Crysta seems like the perfect car right now.

[condor]

Relatively Steady, and steady changes I would say. But with a wider view now, I think somethings could have been different.

We started with Padmini and then the Indica. When I started buying cars, it was about good sedans. As things would have it, I had to replace my Acura and the one available was a CR-V. I didnt have anything in mind, and the CR-V felt very good. So that was my first SUV. Coming back to India, I again ended up with a UV - the Sumo Victa. And that gave way to a Safari Storme.

A longtime wish has been a pickup. That still remains

One key factor has been - clean lines, and as much as possible. And this continues with my choice of two-wheelers too. Example: the KB100.

I dont like overdone styling. Squarish/A little angular but not too much. No funky styling.

One thing I did miss along the way is the fun hatches. The one that I missed was the Honda Civic Type-R, back in 2000 when I was in the US. May be if I had been open about my choices then, my current choices may have been different.

[vjbox]

Great thread. Its funny how we change or rather evolve our preferences as we age especially when married with kids. Dial back a few years, we were happy with a Civic. But when we were in the market for a new car, we sort of prioritised safety of our family over other aspects and hence the decision of going with a Volvo. While we loved the Superb that we considered in the budget, we had to go with something that assured a lot of more sense of safety and in that regard we were ok with a smaller car. This is also due to the fact that its mostly just my wife and I along with our little Son in all our journeys, occasionally joined by my father at the back seat and we find that rear leg room ok enough for that.

Now when we are again the market for another vehicle, our preferences continue to evolve and now are in the order of Safety >Comfort>Space>Performance as we would now like the next vehicle to have greater room as well. This is solely the reason why I haven't been able to sell the M340i that I absolutely loved. The question that gets asked from the Home Ministry is whether I want to comfortably cruise at supreme comfort with a brilliant music system with the family or drive like a maniac and keep showing that grin to the family members on board all day? When I continue to wonder, the answer from the other end is "S90" or "XC60". So now I am weaving a different strategy to see if I can get a fun pre-owned car after the new Vehicle is sorted. Not sure if I will succeed there!

The whole idea of buying Automobiles change when you are married and ageing. Harsh truth?

[carthick1000]

A nice thread and a very good timing for me to introspect a bit. Though I would like to write a lot about this topic, I refrain from doing so just because it is about change over a relatively longer span of life. The years are circa, but more or less coincides with 15/10/5 marks. I added my preferences in the order of priority over the years and also the things which added up over the years.

~15 years ago (End of my teens when I just got my driver's license)

1. Fun to drive stock car

~10 years ago (Finished college and started making money)

1. TCO should be as low as possible
2. Fun to drive used and inexpensive stock car

~5 years ago (Got Married but no kids)

1. Safe
2. Reliable
3. Fun to drive used stock car
4. Should have second row of seats
5. Minimal TCO

Now-a-days (Our kid is almost a year old)

Car1:

1. Safe
2. Reliable
3. Fun to drive used or new EV for regular commutes
4. Should have second row of seats
5. Trunk and Frunk
6. Minimal TCO

Car2:

1. Safe
2. Reliable
3. Fun to drive used lightweight NA ICE roadster
4. Minimal TCO

[Simhi]

Around 20 years ago, the sole criteria were price and space and ended up with Hyundai Santro.

After 8 years of ownership, together with the spouse realized the need for an affordable automatic and ended up with i10 TC Automatic. Not much importance was given to safety even then.

Around this time, got membership of team-bhp and got exposure to wealth of information.

During the last purchase of Yaris, the main criteria were Safety + Automatic. Bonus with the purchase was proper Sedan, Ride and Handling, NVH, good after sales experience, reliability, lower TCO etc.

I haven't thought about the next car yet but most probably would be an EV.

[Huzi]

@GTO, interesting topic, thanks.
I have owned these cars over the last 24 years of my driving :Ambi>omni >wagon R>Honda city. These choices were influenced by budget. Reliability & FE, was favoured over other “expensive” cars.
Zoom to 2021, it’s about what & how I feel while I am driving. The earlier cars that I owned, provided reliability at the cost of driving pleasure.
No more.
I want to experiment with pre-owned cars, German brands, and automatics.
Inspite of the gaps in each segment or short comings in most vehicles, there are still gems, in the market out there.
Future purchases are going to be about experiencing, better ride & comfort. (I am not into triple digit speeds)

Thanks

[drjumbo]

My preferences are more or less the same, although manufacturer's might change. So I'll change my brand if need arises. I haven't tried fast German autos but the CVT baleno I use is a decent family car but a ghost without a soul for the driver. I always run back to my manual city ivtec for pure pleasure.
We all would obviously have multiple preferences to have each kind of a vehicle provided the pocket allows. Afterall "the more the merrier"
Real question is if you have money for only one car what would you choose.?!
I'll still put my hard earned middle class money on a long lasting NA, with a fun manual gearbox, decent riding capabilities, adequate safety and rock solid reliability. Which brand offers me that package, won't matter.

[condor]

Forgot to add. VFM aspect, like others have said, is also there.

Simple example:14L for my Storme. vs 14L for a Duster. Duster may have more features, and a better suspension. But the Storme has been very good. Just short of 98k now, and going strong. Though the resale value is better for the Duster, I have no regrets about getting the Storme.

[Sankar]

Preferences what has changed for me?

1. 1997 2w - Modify
2. 1999 2w - Modify
3. 2002 2w - Stock
4. 2004 2w - Modify
5. 2005 4w - Modify
6. 2007 2w - Modify
7. 2008 2w- Modify
8. 2009 - Doctors modified me
9. 2010 4w - Modify
10. 2012 4w - Modify
11. 2014 4w - Modify
12. 2015 4w - Modify
13. 2015 4w - Modify
14. 2016 4w - Modify

Each year is for a 2 wheeler or 4 wheeler that I got (hand me down/used/new) for myself which was eventually modified mechanically in some way. 2009 was special where I was subjected to some mechanical modification by the docs No new additions since 2016 since I like what I have now. Modifications have been one of my preferences and I think an EV can be a cure

[glovins2004]

This is my buddy but future preference will be definitely a similar breed with AT

[arindambasu13]

From a wannabe boy racer back in 2006 (when I bought my first car, an 800) drooling over modded Zens and Citys, my tastes and preferences have certainly changed a lot for the saner and better. Today, my top priorities are reliability, comfort, performance, fun to drive (not just fast), safety and practicality. Many of these considerations would not even have been in my list 8-10 years back, but age and consequent wisdom certainly mellow down the adrenalin to a large extent

I enjoy the drive much more today, rather than trying to get ahead of everyone on the road all the time. Maintain 80-120 km/h speeds on highways, to ensure that I am comfortable with the speeds and not always on the edge to go faster. Enjoy cruising on great roads rather than setting personal speed records!

Overall, a change for the better, when I compare the driver that I am today with the driver that I started out as. What has thankfully remained completely unchanged is the enthusiasm to get behind the wheel every single day, whether it's for a short grocery or mall run or a 500 km road trip.

[AKSarkar1]

What a beautiful thread this is to reminisce about the good ol' days! Cars are truly an extension of ourselves and in my mind changed automotive preferences reflect truly about the changes in ourselves. For me, majority of the changes have been boring changes, indicating growing older

I find myself with the following changes over the years:

1) Colour preferences: Be it owning a swift in a burnt orange shade, a Santro in Green or a Polo in Red, I have covered the entire primary colour palette in my younger days. These days I go in for more sober colours, mostly darkers shades of blue, black, grey and the white of course.

2) Switch from MT to AT: For the same reasons as GTO pointed out, also because it is leg day for your left leg everyday when you drive a MT in peak Mumbai traffic. I find myself taking out my MT Vento on the days I feel too 'uncle-ish' to drive an AT.

3) New Cars vs Pre-worshipped cars: I still find a peculiar appeal in getting a new model of the car before others have, but recently with the car prices absolutely breaking the roof, I have found solace in picking up pre-worshipped cars. The appeal of spending big bucks (60-70L and above) for a new ride seems to be fading away with age.

4) Driving style: My MID has switched from the speed figure to a the FE figures. Gone are the days when I was trying to reach foolish speeds on public roads. Now I get happy when I see Avg FE over 15/20 Km/per litre. I think it has been over a year since I last slotted my car into sports.

5) Accessories : If any BHPian from Mumbai has seen a black Scorpio with spinning chrome rims and pitch black tints lurking around Lokhandwala in from 2006-2009, there is a good chance that was probably me. However, these days mods are strictly OEM and pragmatic, e.g. LED headlight upgrade etc. My mods have definitely become more sober!

Although some things have not changed, I am still a die-hard sedan guy and +1 to what GTO said about the importance of driving dynamics and looks, these are factors that yet matter the most for me. While my external mods to the car may have stopped, a bonker music system setup is yet my guilty pleasure. I have even pimped out the music setup of my government issued car as that is where I spend 90% of my time in a car.

Thanks again for creating this wonderful thread!

[COMMUTER]

Most of vetting of my preferences had been influenced by the accidents thread.

How my preference has changed:

- I find bikes to be highly vulnerable especially after some world class bikers succumbed to road accidents.
- I find speeds above 80kmph to negligent in contributing to the increased average speed.
- I find driving in the 80-90kmph range to be highly comfortable with rare burst of acceleration seeing 100kmph on the speedo
- I find speeds higher than 110kmph to be downright stupidity on my part.
- I find the aux lamps and lights to be essential after trying to keep my car bone stock for 12k kms because of rampant misuse of high-powered lamps on our highways.
- I have found loud horns to be an important safety gadget on our roads.
- I have started considering small blips of loud horns to be more effective and less polluting than long bursts from stock horns.
- I have started focussing on the rough toading capability more than pure on-roaf or off-road capability.
- I have stopped using ASS after finding them to be fradulent and have found FNG to be more prompt in maintaining my car and bikes.
- I have decided to be less peeved about people choosing or advocating less capable cars at a higher price and have trained myself to smile and walk away.
- I have started admiring engine swapped sleeper cars over exotics.
- My dream car is the Unimog as against the faster road cars I had dreamt about during my early years.



I started out as a biker, with a dream to buy the Ninja 650 with my first month salary and dreamt about graduating to the Ninja 1400 at the earliest. I despised cars at the beginning. I was privileged to ride over 40k kms on our highways in my Apache before my first job. This was the time when the Highways were getting laid and their work made riding highly messy. The Apache started leaking with my frequent 300km 80/90kmph rides too. This made me rethink biking. When I joined my first Job I was using our petrol Indica to move about looking to buy the Ninja 650 but I could never commit myself to it since I was loking for better prospects for sometime after joining the same.

When I finally decided to buy my vehicle, I had a toddler and petrol was selling at twice that of a diesel. I decided to buy a Figo 1.5D. That was the fastest car under 25L at that time and I got it for 6.19L on road.

I tried buying a Tata Xenon (7.45L OR then) but I couldn't get the dealer to get it registered in white board for me.

Now after 1.3L km and 6 years with the Figo, I am focussed on keeping the car fit to the longest extent possible and then shift to a Nissan D-max S cab.