Wow those Hyundai Accents are dirt cheap...I didnt look at those but they are definitely worth a look. Offroader, I'm back in So Cal now, and working for a medical air systems company down south from where I live. Been building huge vacuum systems for hospitals the last couple weeks.

Sorry I didn't really take anyone's advice, and I may end up paying for it later, but for now very happy with the car I got. Its a 2000 Passat with the 1.8 turbo and a manual trans, and cloth interior (the leather ones are really all torn up bad at this age) with 133K miles. picked it up for 2700 bucks. It Nets about 30 MPG on the highway. The little turbo kicks in when I need it to on the highway and the car handles really nice.

Changed out all the fluids this weekend with high quality synthetic, as I'm aware of the oil sludge issue with the 1.8 if not maintained. Changed out the transaxle oil as well. Still needs a new snub mount in the front and I have that on order with a bunch of other small bits.

I test drove a Civic and a few other econo's (that were more $$ and miles) but they were just not comparable in ride quality and the road noise was all over the place IMO they felt like go carts.