Prior VW/Audi enthusiast here. Prior as in, no longer an enthusiast. I used to get paid to repair TDIs of all generations. I can tell you, TDIs are decent engines, if the owner did not follow the manufacturers service recommendations. The oil needs to be changed more often in the older ALH engines as the recommendation was too long. Also, the timing belt, water pump and nearly all rubber components should be changed on the engine every 60k. The EGR cycles too much, causing the intake manifold to carbon nearly shut resulting in reduced power and mpg. Cleaning is a pain too.

The newer BHW engines are total crap. They are plagued with similar problems of the previous generations, but with the addition of a poorly designed oil pump drive assembly that basically uses a bicycle chain to drive the pump and the tensioner goes bad and essentially starves the engine of oil. Costs nearly $300 in parts and twice that in labor to remedy if you can't do it yourself.

There's also the fact that the G12 coolant is very touchy, they take special auto transmission fluid and must be changed every 30k to get any life out the transmission.

If you buy a gas VW or Audi, expect more of the same. Especially in the turbo engines. They are prone to oil seal failures due to low tension piston rings allowing combustion pressure to create blow-by accelerated by a pcv system that cannot handle the amount of crankcase pressure. The also use a "variable" can timing setup that essentially creates slack in the timing chain to make the exhaust cam lag behind. this loose chain rides on a plastic guide that, if cracked, can allow the chain to fall off and the engine is now junk. It's very, very poor....

My opinion, buy a 2012+ Hyundai Accent with the 1.6L and the 6 speed auto. They are good for 31 city and 38+ highway and have no timing belts or out of the ordinary services to worry about. I have one right now, a 2012 with 60k miles on it that I just did the first major service on. It required 5 quarts of Mercon IV and 30 minutes of my time.

 

Wow, I think I'll stick with my older ones!

 

My sister-in-law had one. I'm not sure what year it was. Only problem she ever had with it was this sensor (can't remember what it was for) that was about as reliable as our CPS except it wasn't a critical sensor. After the 3rd one failed, she just decided to live with the CEL. There was no noticeable change in power or economy. She was getting 28-32 mpg depending how hard she drove it.

Then she got stupid thinking that 28-32 mpg wasn't good enough, and traded it for some Honda hybrid POS that was supposed to get 50+ mpg. Ha, try 35 mpg for the first two months. Then it dropped to 25 mpg. The dealer wouldn't repair it. They claimed nothing was wrong. She traded that car in after just 3 or 4 months, lol. Now she has an Elantra that gets 32 mpg. IMO she should have stuck with the Liberty.