As this year more than any other has shown, the price of a new car is an important consideration. In fact it is sometimes the only consideration. I remember the boss of the company which imported Ladas to the UK telling me, not long before it became economically impossible to sell the wretched things over here, that the only reason any of his customers could possibly have for choosing his cars was that they were cheap.There is a tendency to assume that any inexpensive car built on the far side of Vienna must be lousy, but there are many exceptions. To my great surprise I find myself including the Kia Sedona in this list, having just driven 800 miles in a 2.9-litre SX turbo diesel and been unusually reluctant to hand it back.This particular Sedona costs just under £16,000, for which you get a very large vehicle indeed. If you happen to park it, as I did on one occasion, among half a dozen Range Rovers, the effect is of a swarm of drones clustering round a queen bee. Six claustrophobic and unsociable adults can be transported in it without any problem whatever, and although this reduces the luggage space almost to zero, the Sedona also has a phenomenal carrying capacity if you start playing around with the seat layout. I took this one to a race meeting and could quite happily have used it as a changing room if I had been able to park nearer the garage.Of course the quality is bound to suffer to some extent. You know the sort of thing: you can have any two of large, cheap and well-built, but you can never get the full set in the same car. Certainly the Sedona produces enough graunches and squeaks to remove any suggestion that it has been carved from a solid chunk of Kia-stuff, but if I had paid so little for so much practicality I'm not sure I would mind too much about this.Although it looks like an unusually aerodynamic bungalow, it doesn't drive like one. I thought the suspension department had done a very fine job with the Sedona, giving it sufficiently smooth ride and sharp handling to make it far more relaxing to drive than might have been expected.The big diesel engine is one of the smelliest I have come across for a long time, but you can't argue with the performance it supplies. A selection of The Lads, following along a country road in a Mercedes estate, were amazed at the spriteliness of the large object in front of them (meaning the Sedona, before you come up with any smart remarks).Is this in any way relevant to how the Sedona will normally be driven? Well, yes, I think it is. The point is that unlike other cars of similar bulk, this one is not at all difficult to drive, which means you can cover long distances in it without tiring yourself out. My only criticism in this respect was that to begin with I didn't think the seats offered enough support, but after a few days I had realised that I no longer considered this to be a problem.Ask me at the end of the year what my favourite car of 2000 has been and the Sedona will not figure in my answer. It is not, after all, designed to be anyone's favourite car. But as a low-budget workhorse it has far more to recommend it than I would ever have suspected.Second opinion: If you look at the 17.3-second 0-62mph time, you'd wonder how this car can possibly be called spritely. Of course, it's a big turbo diesel, and the answer is partly in the storming 249lb/ft of torque the engine produces from 1950rpm. The Sedona certainly handles far better than expected, and the diesel, like the petrol version with the Rover KV6 engine, just eats up the motorway miles. Space is one of the major attractions in this car, and the sliding rear doors make a lot of sense in such a sizeable MPV. Bear in mind, too, that Kia was one of the first importers to lower its list prices, and that the Sedona came top of two classes in the CAP whole-life costs index, with a lower cost per mile than any other other full-sized MPV, petrol or diesel. Ross Finlay. Engine 2902cc Power 125bhp Fuel 34.0mpg Acceleration 0-62mph: 17.3 seconds Top speed 104mph Price £15,995 Details correct at publication date
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