My sister is having me help her look for a car. She doesn't care what it looks like, as long as it'* cheap, gets good gas mileage, and... doesn't break. Well I've told her that'* going to be tough to find, but I'll try my best. How reliable are early 90'* Civics and Corollas?

If anyone knows of any tried and true small cars that you could get for around 2000 bucks, please post!

This car would also have to take a LOT of abuse fairly well, she'* horrible about oil changes, etc

Believe it or not, the Festiva is a damn reliable little car. They are super cheap to fix, and go forEVER. Geo Metros are also a good choice, yet another that can go forever.

What about a Bonneville? You can get a SE for cheap, gets good gas mileage, and... doesn't break. I find 87-95 Bonnes all the time for under 2k.

Oh trust me dude, I've shown her some NICE-*** 87-91'* for about 1000 each, and she just won't bite She just has her heart set on a weeny little import car, can't convince her otherwise. although for what she wants it for, it'll be the right thing in the end. Don't Geo Metro'* ue Toyota parts?

The Metro had a Suzuki 3 cylinder or 4 cylinder. They aren't exactly the fastest car in the world, but who cares when you are yielding 50mpg?

The Festiva was a Kia/Mazda. It used Kia and Mazda parts, and were built in Korea by Kia.

Actually I think a Geo Prizm is a rebadged Corolla. And probably less expensive than a Toyota.

Nope, Suzuki. Metro is AKA Suzuki Swift.
Either way, Festiva or Metro, they tend to get driven until something goes bad...you can still get good ones, just make sure to get it inspected at a dealer before buying.
BTW, the Aspire is a Festiva, just with a fresh body and fuel injection. If you want to have real fun, Festiva and Aspire both can accomodate some of the Mazda inline 4cyls...

The compact nova was also a rebadged corolla. That thing only had 102k mi on it, but we beat the CRAP out of it, including pulling a jeep grand Cherokee off the side of a mountain and through a ditch. Did have an oil leak, and the carbs are known to just kind of not function properly and begin hesitating. Either way, it blew up at 105k by another owner because she decided to drive to philly and back (in a 3 spd auto) while missing like 3 qts of oil lol.

those old novas kick ***, i had one for a few weeks, and i couldnt kill that thing, my sister bought it for $200 and drove it for like 15000 before i got it, and one time she ran it so dry that when i pulled out the dipstick it was perfectly dry that little thing still kept on kickin too

saturns arent a half bad car either imo, get some pretty sweet mileage and arent horribly unreliable either.

i had heard that saturns varied in reliability, as in some were total lemons and everything ever fell apart on them, and others were complete gems that ran forever with no issues. the people i know with saturns didn't have any bad luck, other than my cousin'* 97 SL cooking a water pump (but it had dex-cool, what can you expect?).

Look for a civic cant go wrong with a Honda.