Many of these Suzuki derivatives that GM sold under their own brand were quite durable. A girl down the street still drives one (from the 80s), and it sits outside all winter, and never fails to start.
Many of those were built in Ingersoll, Canada by a joint venture of GM/ISUZU/Suzuki (CAMI). They put enough upgrades in to make them reliable. Agree that they were not comfortable or powerful.
“What would you guys suggest for a ‘small ish’ SUV or 4 wheel car that’s good in snow and mud, pretty good in the MPG department, and is under or around the 10 grand mark?”
You would be hard-pressed to find vehicles with a better combination of those factors than Subarus.
For around $8k-$10k, you should be able to find a Forester, Impreza, Legacy, or Outback of the 2005 model year or newer.
The Forester and Outback will have better ground clearance than the Impreza or Legacy, but they are all equally capable in winter weather conditions. While their AWD mechanism does reduce their mpg in comparison to FWD and RWD vehicles, they do get respectable gas mileage. An Impreza is capable of ~30 mpg on the highway, and the others should enable you to eke out 27-28 mpg on the highway, with 21-23 mpg in local driving.
All of that being said, I would advise someone buying a used Subaru (or any other AWD vehicle) to exercise a lot of caution. I say that because failure to consistently keep the car equipped with 4 matched tires will wreak havoc with the AWD mechanism. This means that the previous owner(s) had to have rotated the tires on a consistent basis (every 5k, or 7.5k, or–at the most–every 10k miles), and to have replaced the tires in sets of 4, so that all tires are the same brand, size, and tread design. If you see an AWD vehicle with any mis-match on the tires, just walk away as the potential for very expensive repair issues is in the immediate future.
Older Subarus have also been known for head gasket problems, particularly the ones from 1996-2003. AFAIK, the design problem was finally resolved as of the 2004 or 2005 model year.
I would advise limiting yourself only to used vehicles that come with full maintenance records that you can compare with the mfr’s maintenance schedule that should be sitting in the glove compartment. And, even if maintenance records indicate a well-maintained car, you should still have a finalist for purchase vetted by a mechanic of your own choosing, prior to purchase.
“What would you guys suggest for a ‘small ish’ SUV or 4 wheel car that’s good in snow and mud, pretty good in the MPG department, and is under or around the 10 grand mark?”
Subaru Impreza sedan.
VDC. Gives some excellent advice on AWD foibles. Let me add a few thoughts as Our family and neighbors have lots of experience driving AWD cars in deep mud, snow and ice.
First, the Legacy and the Outback are outstanding road cars, but even with the outback’s added ground clearance, as with all independently sprung cars, it disappears quickly each time you load it up or even hit a bump. The overhangs on all subaru’s, excluding the Forester are really poor. The Forester has some how with it’s shorter wheel base and slightly different valance design, managed to be a little more acceptable. If you do much heavy snow mud travel, choose the Forrester then the Ouback. The Impreza, legacy will be the absolute worse in deep snow. Con sider them only in conditions you would take an ordinary fwd car. The Rav which has outstandingly better approach and departure angles can a deep snow/mud road animal with the right tires. The CRV is good too, but the drive train provides the least consistant traction.
If you routinely rotate from winter to summer tires, that takes care of ALL rotation requirements, so find a used one where the driver actually used winter tires. All the awd cars can be significantly different in other ways. The CRV does not have a center differential per se and runs on the slip and grip with a rear clutch pack. My daughter paid little or no attention to tires, sometimes replacing them just one or two at a tire. It made no difference in 250 k miles when it rusted out. My RAV manual says Same axle replacement is fine. Differences of up to 2/32 inch is fine on the tires and using a tire gauge to measure tread depth and pressure gauge on similar tires is more important then arbitrarily rotating them.
Heavy loading and attention to tire pressure are in my opinion, as important. I would make sure I knew that history first.
In summary, CRVs are the most bullet proof, followed by the Rav. The Subarus have the best overall traction, but need only slightly, more attention. It must be noted,that the new CRV for 13 is reputed to be more full time…with probably a less reliable system. IMO, if I were to buy used awd, it would be a CRV.
The last thing I would say is…always use snow tires with awd and never buy one from a previous owner who did regular snow travel without them. The extra single wheel spinning with poor tires wears an awd system too. Great tire traction is need more in awd cars with the false sense of security they give you in being able to accelerate so well with almost any tire.
Oh, any teenage drivers who got to use them a lot? Run, don’t walk away from any deal. As with most awd systems, mud and snow yes, rock crawling, no.
Oh, pay little attention to the utube traction differences between Subarus on ice up hills compared to other cars with a locking differential switch. You can bet the switches were not engaged. Otherwise, they would climb as well or better.
look 4 a toyota ist from japanese car importers or a nissan micra of both 2 and 4 doors…i have toyota ist …its a king of tiny hatchbacks
If the OP resides in the US, neither of those models mentioned by Amit are available in this market.
Thanks so everyone for their responses!! I didn’t have my email alerts set up so I thought no one was responding my query.
Imagine my delight when I log in this morning and read all these great ideas. Keep them coming.
I am sifting through your answers today and will keep you updated. Really looking forward to getting my, “new” car.
And thanks for taking time to answer here!
add the Mazda 3 to your list
Geo Metros were fun to drive though lol!
Thank you to everyone on for your responses! I’m looking into your suggestions 
I cannot disagree with the criticisms of the Smart car. It must be like driving an old Beetle. But, a year or two ago, I got curious about the safety issue, and spent quite a while searching for information.
The passenger compartment is heavily reinforced. I saw video of crash tests, like into a brick wall at high speed, and more.
And, fatalities per million miles is allegedly lower than the average car.
However, that seems to be the end of the good stuff. I am reminded of a woman I knew whose grandfather was an, um, interesting man. She said at his funeral the pastor said in plain English he had spent considerable time finding something good to say about him, and the only good thing he found was the time he sold a man a blind horse, and told him it was blind.