What Car: 3 Stars, Cheap, good equipment, let down by engine

I'm not sure that "Low Rent" is necessarily against; depends what you are looking for and since it is cheap...

urbandictionary.com wrote:
Low Rent: Michelle wears a baja jacket when she goes to the market and flies a NASCAR flag on her car. She is low rent.

Anyway, the What Car? readers rate it equal to an Audi A3...

MG3
What Car? says ***
What Car? readers say ****

MG3 rivals
Audi A3 Hatchback


Audi A3 Hatchback
What Car? says *****
What Car? readers say ****

Audi A3 Hatchback rivals
Kia Ceed Hatchback

It's interesting, isn't it, that in these days of Volkswagen Group component sharing (a sort of "badge engineering") you can tell what kind of review the same car would get with each of the badges Audi; Volkswagen; SEAT; and Škoda. The Polo is made in Spain and for a while a small SEAT was made in Wolfsburg, but the Spanish car would be praised for Teutonic durability and the one made on the rain-lashed plains of Saxony noted for its fiery Latin temperament.

The summary sounds far worse than three stars: The MG3 is cheap to buy and insure, but it’ll cost you more to run than many rivals because it loses its value more quickly, uses more fuel and emits more CO2. It isn’t particularly good to drive, either.

That's not true. There may be a higher percentage depreciation, but as list is so low, the real pounds we lose on depreciation are saved. e.g. if a £10k MG loses 60% in three years and a £15k Polo loses 50%, the MG has lost £6k and the Polo has lost £7.5k. So the fact is that the MG3 is a low-depreciation car. (Slightly different with the MG6).

patpending wrote:That's not true. There may be a higher percentage depreciation, but as list is so low, the real pounds we lose on depreciation are saved. e.g. if a £10k MG loses 60% in three years and a £15k Polo loses 50%, the MG has lost £6k and the Polo has lost £7.5k. So the fact is that the MG3 is a low-depreciation car. (Slightly different with the MG6).

When buying it as a second hand car it is very likely that a 3 year old one will be cheaper than a 3 year old Polo, but since it started off much cheaper it will need to end up very cheap in order to depreciate as much as the Polo. I'm rather doubtful about these claims of high depreciation and it appears that the experts expect fairly low depreciation. (What Car? obviously are not experts!)