I was in the market for a compact over the holidays, and looked at the Skyactive, Elantra and Civic. Sticker price on the fords was too high and nothing else has the fuel economy I was looking for.
The Mazda was the best driving of the three, but I was looking at a "sunroof" trim level and it could not compete on price with the Civic. Not just the list price, there was an extra $900-1000 in delivery/ PDI that was a deal breaker, (2400 vs 1300!, thats a big percentage on a $20k car!) The less competitive interest rates over 5 years were also noted.
People give the Civic a hard time for its hard plastics, but the Mazda interior has a lot of hard plastic in places too. Of the three I looked at the Elantra had by far the nicest interior, seemed to have more room in the back, and had the best toy count (Fog lights, heated REAR seats!), but it drove like a pudding, totally boring and uninvolving. The elantra also still has 6000km service intervals, compared to 8k for the mazda and active monitoring in the civic (I get 11k between changes on my 08 civic), all of which factors into cost of ownership for me.
In the end I put my money on a Civic EX, and paid the extra $1000 for heated seats (an unadvertised option?) and fog lights, it still worked out cheaper than the other two, comes with the expectation of little to no mechanical trouble and high residual values, and no concerns over long term rust. The fuel economy is about as good, the ride and handling close to the mazda, and the overall cost of ownership will likely be less. With returning customer interest rates of 0.99% Im looking at $400 a month over 5 years. The fact that much of that money will go into canadian pockets as its an Ontario built car is also a side benefit too as far as Im concerned, its nice to support the local economy and canadian jobs given that they make a decent competitive product.
Time will tell if I made the right choice, it took me a 2nd test drive to come to terms with the new civic interior, but second time around it didnt seem as cheap as first comparison with the outgoing model... In the long term though the Civic needs an extra cog in the box to get highway revs down and further improve the mileage numbers. If they put in a 6 speed with closer ratios like in the Si that totally defeats the point, the 1.8 if a great engine (especially paired with the manual transmission to push it up into the sweet spot), its got more than enough torque to push a longer gear when cruising the highways. Worth considering though that even with the "old" engine and 5 speed boxes, the civic still has class leading fuel economy.
I should have added that I bought a standard not an auto, but the only dealer around here that actually has a standard in stock to test drive was the Hyundai dealer. The Civic box is unchanged, so I know what I am getting, and I hear the Mazda box is one of the best in class with short crisp shifts.
