Muffler has come loose twice in the life of the car. Going to have to take it in again to get it hooked back up again. If you buy one of these, ESPECIALLY if it's a manual, expect to have to take good care of the exhaust system. 1st time it happened at 40,000 miles, 2nd time at 79,000.
Plastic siding dropped off the door. It cost two dollars and 5 minutes of my time to put it back on again.
That's been it as far as repairs go.
From what I have heard from other people, and what I have read, you'll likely have less trouble with this car if you get a manual transmission.
You need to be very vigilant about taking care of the exhaust system. If it sounds like your muffler might be loose, IT IS, and you need to get it tightened up otherwise you will be paying a lot of money to have another couple of mufflers put on, because this baby has 2.
These cars have pretty decent engines in them. Seem to be quite reliable.
Be careful if you live in the rust belt, because with any scratches or nicks in the paint, these cars have a tendency to rust quite quickly.
This is a very small car, and I think that it's rear-wheel drive. During the winter this tends to lead to traction problems. It DOES NOT handle winter driving well, unless you have a good pair of snow tires on it, and a good amount of weight in the trunk.
Never has there been a golf that was rear wheel drive.
Nice review, but in answer to your half question Golfs are front wheel drive, they just don't drive in the snow well at all. I could see why you would think it was rear wheel drive though if you didn't know, since it drives so nastily in the snow. So a good pair of snow tires on it will do it good, but you can throw all the weight you want in the back and it won't make a bit of difference. :) Take care.
I bought my Golf GL about three and a half months ago and after the second day of purchase my engine light turned on, and still is! I had it priced and they gave me an estimate of approximatley $450.00 to fix, which isn't too bad for me. But also said that there was 3 other diagnostics for it which would still be in that price range to fix. Other problems consisted of side panels falling off, which was mentioned a few times in other comments, not a huge deal either. Also, depending on how tight the turn is, shifting into reverse makes a horrible grinding sound. Yuck! And shifting into first can be tricky at times. So far my car has treated me pretty well! :)
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