You may want to reconsider this one. We have owned the following VWs, all new: 2000 Jetta sdn, TDI; 2001 Beetle, TDI; 2002 Jetta Wgn, TDI; 2003 Eurovan; 2003 Beetle, TDI; 2003 Passat. Of these the 2001 Beetle was a nightmare repair wise, which is why it has been trade for the Passat. If you look in a Consumers Report you will see it gets terrible marks. Ours pretty much mirrored that report. The car had just over 41,000 when we got rid of it. Just a few of the things I can remember off the top of my head:
brake caliper disintegrated, loss of brakes, damage to rotor @ about 5000 miles. Electrical problems including premature failure of nearly all headlight, tailight etc bulbs (turnsignal and fog lights both went on the same day); Glow plug harness shorted out. Typical power window issues (NOTE: they use plastic clips that WILL break and contrary to what is implied in the letter from VW re: extended warranty on these items to settle the class action suit, VW will not authorize replacement until total failure of part MEANING your window will probably be down and you will not be able to get it back up until part is replaced. Imagine damage, theft etc that could ocur). Premature tire wear/replacement with stock tires (in comparison with our other VWs; several issues with remote lock, headlights on chimes quit working; faulty manual transmission syncro (2nd) that the dealer could not repair correctly even with a new trans, shifter, cables, etc. Trunk latch up and quit; dealer fixed with new mechanism. 6 disk CD changer skipped like crazy, difficult to load CDs properly. (a different changer using the identical magazine worked flawlessly). However, on a positive note, the bud vase never broke! /images/graemlins/wink.gif