'I have four kids, a farm and a busy life - now I need two new vehicles'

Paddy Comyn

AS THE FACE of DoneDeal Cars and with 25 years’ experience in the industry, Paddy Comyn is ‘the’ car guy to everyone in his life and he has widened out that role to you, The Journal readers.

In his Car Clinic series, he answers all your motoring questions and queries. Have one? Send it to with the subject line CAR CLINIC to motoring@thejournal.ie – we will publish all answers on Mondays on The Journal. (Your questions will be anonymised.)

Please let Paddy know what your budget is if you’re asking about your next big purchase.

Here’s this week’s question:

Hi Paddy.

We’re a family of two adults and four kids.

I drive a four-year-old Jeep which is heavy on diesel. I’m a full-time farmer.

My wife drives a five-year-old, seven-seater SUV. She has a one-hour trip to and from work, five days a week.

I do a lot of runs with the kids in the evenings – and weekends are mad. School, sport, farming etc… just one evening off from driving. I travel roughly 20,000 and my wife 50,000 – afraid to look at fuel bills.

I need to change. But I tow a 12/6 cattle trailer at least once/twice a week. Can be 2.5 ton when fully loaded.

I’m considering a Transit Custom hybrid six-seater. Don’t know about them. Jeep has five seats but we need six. And we need a large boot. We go camping and bring kids’ bikes occasionally. We have a small trailer for towing but it’s limited.

My wife wants to go fully electric. We’re going to consider all options. We’ve just installed solar panels. Budget: €60k. Roughly €30k each. 

Wow, well this is certainly an interesting one. You need two vehicles that do two very different jobs and you have €60,000 to work with. The Transit Custom / Tourneo Custom plug-in hybrid sounds like a near fit on paper – six seats, but the tow figures don’t stack up well against a 2.5-tonne loaded cattle trailer.

Ford’s own numbers for the Custom PHEV range from as low as 1,850kg (Tourneo Custom PHEV) up to a claimed 2,300kg for some Transit Custom PHEV derivatives, and ordinary diesel Customs with the automatic gearbox can drop as low as 1,100kg-1,950kg depending on spec.

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That’s a lot of variation within one model line, and none of the PHEV figures give you the safety margin you want above 2,500 tonnes – you never want to be towing near a vehicle’s rated maximum, especially loaded with livestock. A van also isn’t built for what you’re actually doing week to week – that’s a 4×4 pick-up or 4×4 SUV territory, not FWD van territory.

If you want a seven-seater that will comfortably tow what you need, then a Land Rover Discovery would be your best bet. They aren’t known or coveted for their reliability but if you keep on top of servicing then they can be fine.

For €30,000 you might be getting an older vehicle than four years, so this might feel like a backwards step but you are getting up to 3,500kg towing capacity and decent-sized space too, plus it does look pretty posh and upmarket too.

One of these would probably be your best bet if you want a seven-seater that is going to handle the towing you do without major issues.

When it comes to your wife’s car, then there can be decent savings made on the fuel bills given the amount of miles she does.

For me, I would recommend a car that I’ve owned myself, which is the Skoda Enyaq. It is really well-made, has excellent levels of equipment. I am not sure if you meant that your wife is doing 50,000km per year, but that is serious mileage and you would see incredible savings on fuel if that is the case.

My concern, however, would be that you are going to properly hammer the value of any car doing this sort of mileage in a year if you are doing that. Remember that most battery warranties cover up to 160,000km and after that you are getting into the Wild West a little in terms of EVs as if there is a major issue then things can get expensive.

Other options would be the Kia EV6, a really excellent car with generous space and really impressive battery performance, especially in winter – you will get a 2023 with average mileage for your budget or one of my personal favourites, the Polestar 2 – you will get a 2023 for your budget.

You would get the Tesla Model Y, again from 2023, which is a really excellent family car for your budget and they are proving to be really reliable.  

None of this really gives you a perfect solution.

Another option if it worked could be that you get a five-seat pickup truck like a 2022 Ford Ranger, perfectly suited to your farm needs which you would get for your budget and your wife gets the seven-seater EV. The choice isn’t great, but you could have a seven-seat Mercedes EQB for your budget.

Food for thought anyway.

Paddy Comyn is the head of automotive content and communications with DoneDeal Cars. He has been involved in the Irish motor industry for more than 25 years.

Journal Media Ltd has shareholders in common with DoneDeal Ltd.