Evoque buying help, which year?

[SDarks]

• Moved this from the Land Rover Thread*

Posting for a friend who is looking at buying a second hand Evoque.

He is open to buy any year up to 15,000 miles. I have heard a lot about reliability and gearbox issues what are the facts behind this?

Also what has the facelift, engine update, major update schedule been from release to 2016?

He had been offered a high spec 16 plate for around £35k from main dealer, I have also seen competitive lease deals from around £270 a month.

Any input would be greatly appreciated as I have little knowledge on the Evoque, Thanks.

[kuro]

My sister bought one from new a couple of years ago and the gearbox went after about a year. Can't remember if it was manual or auto but land rover tried to blame her driving style? She kicked up a stink about it and eventually had it replaced with an overfinch version of a similar age. Unfortunately this got stolen late last year and cost her insurance £15k to put right.

[steve-5snwi]

They are ok but I prefer the Freelander. We had one that caused us problems, it came up with the fault code transmission fault on the dash, it all started with a flat battery and a jump start. For some reason it lost the ECU for the rear diff, well the chassis number was deleted. It also went through the stage where the gear selector wouldn't drop down and it lost park.

A new battery, and 1 hour in a specialist saw the ECU coded with the chassis number and it was normal service resumed. Given most seem to be in the 20k upwards I would spend as much as you can and buy one from a main dealer or someone that sells Land Rovers and knows them inside out.

[JimmyConwayNW]

Looking at buying some of these into stock for my used car business - reading up on them it does seem they are plagued with all sorts of expensive problems.