My wife was t-boned in her Dodge Grand Caravan last week and it was totaled (she's awfully sore but OK). We've been looking around for replacement vehicles and overwhelmed by the options. She decided she'd rather have a mid-size SUV rather than another Minivan (last kid going to college in the fall so other than moving him to his dorm our need for large cargo room is somewhat (not entirely) diminished.

We found some Toyota Highlanders and Hyundai Sante Fe's that she liked but I know nothing about them. Since folks here are car people, thought I'd solicit your opinions. I figure our settlement should be $7000, plus or minus a grand depending on how well I can convince the insurance company on how good of condition the Dodge was in. I figure I'm willing to spend up to $15K on a replacement to keep my payments doable, but $11-12K would be better. This likely means a used vehicle more than 5 years old or so (in general).

Questions:
1) Where can I go online to get quality assessments of the reliability/cost-of-ownership of these vehicles? Most sites I found are full of people complaining or some hard to read table that makes no comparisons.
2) Any others I should look at?
3) Any personal observations about these (Highlander, Sante Fe)?

Thanks

 

Countryman?
Just got the highest safety rating. We love ours!

Annette

 

Not big enough and WAY outside our budget. There's a reason this was in the "other car" category

 

I couldn't resist .
My neighbor has had a Highlander hybrid for about 2 years and loves it. It creeps me out when she pulls up in the driveway and I'm occupied and then she'll say Hi and I just about jump out of my skin. It freaks the deer out, too. This could be considered a bonus feature.
Annette

 

If it is not too late the suzuki sx4 crossover. It's 15k and frankly everything the mini is (good wise) and isnt (bad wise).

If I had known they existed I would probably have bought one for myself instead of the mini.

Not to knock the mini mind you. It's just a fantastic car for a lot less money. If you need more room for the 0.00001 percent of the time you are moving supplies to the front, consider a hitch with a shelf that is removable, ad a really big turtle on the roof.

We end up with 60 cubic feet of storage for those times, and 5 seatbelts too.

 

Too small. But thanks