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I appreciate the "make 'em work for it/pay for it crowd". But every geography is different. In my neck of the woods, you need to drive to work. My wife and I both work full time, so he can't borrow a car (if I even wanted him driving either of ours regularly, which I do not) and we can't sign up to transport him. So, either we help him out and seed a car, make the use contingent on working, help pay for insurance, pay for gas, maintenance, AND keep the grades up (both for the insurance discount and more than one youth has lost some GPA when the scent of gas and perfume starts to kick in).
The flip side is that I neither have the time or wherewithal to do maintenance, so for my own concern I want it to be reliable and in decent shape.
A Civic LX fits the bill. Not fancy, or fast, or especially fun to drive. But decent looking, comfortable, reliable. If he wants to upgrade, that will be on him to deal with. Around me, 12 - 15k will get a very nice, low mileage Civic LX that should last well past college years with decent maintenance and even a little abuse. I'm preferential to Hondas over Toyotas...
He has a little money saved, so if he wants to take out a "bank of dad" loan to turn that LX into an EX, EX-T (he really wants an Si, and I love that he wants a manual, but .... ), well then that's a negotiation he can manage.
Every kid is different. My oldest bought his own Focus ST, got a loan, etc.. He still treats it like crap, blew the engine doing mods he had no business doing. Learned to fix it himself... But "having skin in the game" doesn't actually guarantee anything.
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