Mondeo still good

After fruitlessly trying to find a recent and decent Mondeo in the auctions for a relative of mine, I gave up and made a phone call to an old fleet manager friend, Alan. Sure enough, Alan had one in stock, but it was the only one. This is a far cry from a decade ago, when I was buying one a fortnight and always had a choice of at least six.

Alan offered me a real beauty: a 16/16, 2.0 TDCI Econetic, Titanium X-pack estate with full leather, finished in Magnetic (ie, dark grey) with 58,000 miles and FFSH. The black leather was immaculate, the paint shining and there was not a mark on the alloys. Top-of-the-tree and, aside from the Vignale, the best spec you’re going to get in the real world. He wanted £10,465 from me. Not cheap compared to the equivalent Insignia, but what makes this fleet manager worth his weight in fish-heads is that his cars are fully prepared for retail and always come with a decent amount of diesel in the tank.

What’s more, a TV road-tester friend of mine hired one over the summer for a fortnight around Italy with his wife and two kids. He couldn’t stop raving about it on his return. I’ve no idea if his holiday home was clean and well furnished or if he found Tuscany as nice as everyone says it is. All he talked about was the rental Mondeo and how much better they are than any SUV.

He’s not alone. Another friend of mine – a genuine rep and one of the few left – has just returned his Mondeo estate after a hard four years to be replaced by a MINI Countryman hybrid. He misses the Mondeo terribly, but such is fashion and why we no longer see the Mondeo owning the outside lane of the motorway.