Personally I would go the Mitsu 380 they are a well built car. The reason they are going broke is because Aussies dont want a large family FWD car as they have had Big RWD for 80 years or so, so try breaking that tradition their biggest mistake is changing from Crysler to mitsubishi (wich means 3 tough diamonds)
The awd would be the way to go as the magna has some pretty huge torque steer. and they are cheap to buy and also offer a factory gas option (if you can find one 2nd hand) so it would be reasonably powerful (165KW i think) and you get about 8cents per KLM on Gas so its better that a peterol variant.
BTW I am a Holden/ Datto man
Camry and subuaru dont waste your time. Camry resale is good and you will pay over the odds for an older car. Forester well if you like the sound of a lawn mower a gear box that will feel like stiring porridge after 100,000 klms oh and the extra cost of running an over weight under powered all wheel drive go for it.

car that have good resale are good cars

subaroos are a exelent car i dont know where you got your info on the gearboxz

if the foresters arent powerfull there is the gt forester nice car

subaroo have great after sales service , they wash and vac your car evry time they service it and a follow up call a few days after the service to make shore you are happy with it

Yeah i used to sell cars a few years back and worked for a holden dealership.

They do these comparative stats with other car dealerships as to the ratio between cars that come in for general service and repairs vs the amount that come in for warranty work.

A good ratio to have for a manufacturer is 65:35. So 65% of the cars that come in get general services and repairs and 35% get warranty work done.

Subaru, honda and toyota are the best at this ratio by far!!!!! Some of them even get as high as 90:10. And my old boss who was the dealer principle at our dealership only ever bought subaru's just simply for the aftersales service and reliability.

Ford is one of the worst with their ratio being as low as 30:70. Holden is not much better with their ratio lucky to get to 50:50. Mitsubishi are also around this mark i believe.

And perthute is right. GENERALLY good re-sale means good quality, but usually with more mass produced or widely sold vehiciles. For instance saab's and peugots have absolutely terrible resale. It doesn't mean they are terrible cars, although i wouldn't say they are great either, it just means that there is no real second hand market for them.

Trav

Mmmm 20g ah well i have alot to pay for but i reckon that i would buy a nice r100 and put a rotary in it maybe buy a few recked datos and use them for spare parts and crap.. the list goes on...and on....and on.... but it would be nice to have that kinda money spare to play around with one day..put the rest in me bank and make sum interest on it.....

Toyota Camry all the way. Best family car for size and reliability. When i worked on cars for a living, it was the only make that mainly came in for service only without major repairs. Any Toyota you cant really go wrong with.
Magnas I would not touch with my money unless it came fitted with a toyota engine. Seen to many with engines replaced under warranty with various problems.
Subarus I only ever really saw wrx's and liberties come in with young drivers and blown gearboxes.
Most other makes always came in with various problems. I wouldnt even waste my money on a pulsar.
Camry is the best quality, reliable and good safe size for a young family.

i've just got out of my Gt forester, i owned it for two years, spent a shirtload on it and sold it for 10k less than I paid for it. that said, i'm 23, have had 18 cars and it is the first one i've missed

I'm a die hard subaru fan, (only reason i sold up was it was for too easy to mod/spend money on) and my pick of the bunch is the toyota camry or a corolla sportivo. i love those later model toyotas! the quality and feel of them is so nice. i considered getting an aurioun but have wanted a 1200 for ages and my wife told me that i was allowed one more project and the datto is it!

corolla sportivo, only good for the ngine 2zz all the way baby, had one sold it for the gt... the sportivo is built in south africa (no offense here) but the build wuality is ####e! steering woobles, creaks graons and a lot have elctrical gremlins, hence why toyora australia vows never to bring cars in from sa any more. Loved the engine, hatted the rest, would prefer the mazda 3 sp23 like we originally wanted.

Frank, $21k for 2004 euro but $1k over the limit.