Faults:

Very thin sheet metal. Parking it near any type of trees results in dents from acorns and such.

General Comments:

This car was pretty comfortable overall and it never felt cramped for my size (6'3"). I was pretty disappointed, however, in the overall quality. The sheet metal was horribly thin on it. The car was parked in the same lot our other car was, and the lease inspection guy thought it had been in a hail storm when he checked it over for the lease turn in. There were at least a dozen dents on the top and more on the hood. This was caused from acorns coming off the trees. Our other car has not one mark on it at 5 years old. A car built for use in the NE should be able to withstand acorns dropping onto it.

The other disappointment was the interior. The rattles and squeaks were ridiculous and started before the car had a few thousand miles on it. The seat squeaked all the time I had it, and there was such a bad rattle in the dash, it drove me crazy every time I drove it. Those are always the type of things dealers can't duplicate when they look at a vehicle, so I never did get them fixed.

It seemed to me they wanted to trim weight off of the car to get it to get better gas mileage, but they sacrificed too much in the way of quality to do so. I had an '05 that was much better. The worst part is I was still getting only 24 MPG while the car was rated 27/36. I drove it slow and easy too... what else can you do with a CVT after all?

All in all, it is a good looking car, but I lost my enthusiasm for it pretty quickly. I was really glad it was my first (and only) lease. Luckily Subaru has a good turn in program and gave me a $1K credit for damages. I got out of it unscathed!

Faults:

Nothing yet, it's still practically brand new.

General Comments:

I really like the way it drives. I compared it to a BMW 3 Series and an Audi A4 (both are at least 10k more expensive than a fully loaded Impreza Sport), and I can honestly say that this car drives better, feels like it's on rails, plus you get better gas mileage than in a BMW or Audi.

Of course the fit and finish are much better in a BMW or Audi, but if you are judging pure driveability, then Subaru wins.

I bought this car to replace my 2004 Honda Civic. I was looking for similar MPG and more substance, and I got it with Subaru.

I don't really enjoy the Bluetooth, and road noise in a new Subaru is pretty bad, but everything else is quite nice and enjoyable.

The design is OK, better than the old one, and definitely better than the 2004 car.

In short, it's a good work horse; fun to drive, slow, but good on gas. I would recommend it as a first car for a teenaged kid, because it looks sporty, has plenty of safety features, is cheap to own and to maintain, and is very forgiving for a new driver; great stability control.