Dacia Logan MCV review

This is a proper head versus heart car. All the words you’ve read thus far should reveal which of those two camps it falls into. But put simply, to get an estate with equivalent load space but a posher badge (or equipment levels more in keeping with the current decade) you’ll either have to spend twice as much new – perhaps more – or take a fairly hefty gamble on the second-hand market.

It’s easy to see the Logan falling into the lives of small businesses that require something with tonnes of room but sturdy dealer back-up and a nice warrantied comfort blanket should the worst happen. If you can barter a deal that gets one close to £100 a month – about as little as you can reasonably spend on a new car – then you’ll end up with an astonishing amount of metal, plastic and glass for a weeny handful of pounds.

As for running costs, it seems to do what it says on the tin – the 0.9-litre petrol claims 43 to 45mpg, and we achieved 44mpg. Bingo. The sensible numbers don't vary much depending on the version you buy, and their small rises are in line with the actual price sticker: the 75bhp Logan claims 113g/km of CO2 emissions, the 90bhp is on 120g/km, the 95bhp diesel pumping out 136g/km. All should be painless to run going by our experience of these engines elsewhere.