BEST CARS FOR BAD CREDIT

Best Car Research Sites

Portals

MSN Autos has excellent information on reliability and Yahoo Autos has information from Consumer Reports, the most trusted name in the business.

Specialty Sites

Lots of competition about who's the best, so we'll list them in alphabetical order, including cars.com,, edmunds.com, Kelley Blue Book and AutoTrader.com. At Auto Loan Central you can find recommended cars by price range.

Pure Fun

Take a moment to read Dan Neil's 50 Worst Cars Of All Time. He's a Pulitzer Prize winner and probably the funniest writer of which you've never heard.
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We'll Start With New Cars and Proceed To Used Car Deals

Welcome to our research on best cars for bad credit customers, cars in the $10,000, $12,000 or $15,000 range.

The reason we tout cars in this price range is simple. If you have bad credit, your chance of getting approved goes up if your price range goes down, and that's crucial in these credit-crunched times. At a smaller total price, your downpayment is a higher percentage of equity, which helps, too.

In terms of new cars, the lower sticker price does not always represent the best value. You will see rock-bottom prices for the Chevy Aveo, Nissan Versa, Hyundai Accent and Kia Rio, but add air bags or air conditioning or power windows and the price climbs thousands of dollars. While experts would pick the Versa as the best value in that group, cars such as the Ford Focus, Honda Fit or Toyota Yaris would carry a higher price tag but contain more features.

Now not everybody wants a tiny car, and we get that, but here's something to think about. If your new car gets 10 mpg more than your old one, you'll save, on average, $45 a month -- and that's a big chunk of your car payment right there!

Bottom line: You don't have to drive a hoopty to save money. Look at some of the deals available on used cars. >>

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