Family car recommendations please

I've been considering a Skoda Octavia Estate for the my next car, seem like good value for money and have reasonable room inside for the szie of them.

VW and Audi used to make really logical cars in terms of fixing them (I'm taking back in mk2 golf era) and somewhere they became daft and almost dealer only jobs unless you're willing to invest in time and more specialist tools, even the oil filter on my TT was pain to get out. That said they are all like that, my wife's sidelights have gone in the Clio and it's looking like I'll need to move the battery to get to the bulb. Madness (or cynical side says this ties you into not being able to fix it yourself).

I wish someone would make a basic old school car for tinkerers that actually had space in the engine bay and no fancy electronics.

My mate has a Volvo estate, one of the 2.4d ones. It's cavernous, that's for sure but also has the turning circle of an oil tanker, which is the main reason why I'd never get something large again. It's bad enough trying to get around most supermarket carparks in smaller cars.

As for the AC, how did we all make it through winters before it? I didn't even own a car with AC until 2005.

Mate of mine has a S-Max and loves it, although he does complain about fuel consumption.  Would have suggested it, but it fails the three seats up front brief.  You'd get a very nice example for that five grand budget.  I think I'd still go the van route though, with a copy of The Sun on the dashboard and "I wish my wife was this dirty" scrawled into the grime.

Ford S Max. Have since switched to a 5 series estate but I really miss the boot space and the flexibility of the seating arrangement. Drives really nicely and there are some neat little additions you can get for the familiar eg seat back tables, built in blinds and the panoramic roof. 

Don't buy anything diesel

Hyundai i40 estate is one I've considered to get to replace my B5.5 estate which has been laid up in the garage since last October (doing a year without the car). My son has a V50 which has heated seats and a lovely drive but IMHO too small for three plus three bikes so V70 is the only suitable Volvo

A quick look on Autotrader brings up a 2010 SE with reasonable miles (109k) for £4500

£5k also gets you

'11 Passat bluemotion estate/94k

'11 Sharan/109k

There's a '10 Citroen C4 Grand Picasso VTR+ with flappy paddle gearbox and 37k on the clock for £3400!

As above, we've always put the bikes in the boot, we've often gone self catering to France and stack bikes upright and side by side where the two rear seats are folded down and then secured to the loops/hand hold. We usually fold the third seat down but it'd be no problem leaving it up for a third person to sit in.

You just need to be good at planning where stuff is going to go and thinking about interlocking frames but taking things like seatposts/saddle off and wheels plus protecting chains/derailleurs.

Oh and if the car hasn't got heated seats, get a coat and a heated cushion to pop in the car

luck hunting

Are you sure your Passat needs to be replaced?  My Golf estate is a class smaller, yet takes three bikes in the back, upright, with only half the rear bench folded down, after removing the front wheels and seatposts. I have a piece of board with some front fork hitches bolted onto it to keep everything stable.

The only "cars" I can think of with three seats up front are the Fiat Multipla and Honda FRV, but to be honest, if you need three seats up front and want easy bike transport, I can't see why you wouldn't get a SWB van.  I doubt you'll get heated seats in a five grand van, but modern vans are really quite comfy.  Heated seats can always be retrofitted anyway - it's only a heating element and a switch.