I was looking at a 2014 Nissan pulsar CVT Automatic transmission car here in Australia which is $16,999 Australian dollars and looking at trading in my 2012 ford focus 5 speed manual that has had an electric power steering failure which needs a new steering rack. the dealership where I purchased the ford from offered me to trade for this 2014 pulsar instead of fixing the Ford. my concern is the reliability of the CVT Auto as I have done a google search and been reading that some people have had the transmission fail in the 2014 pulsar. Am I better off staying with a Manual and not getting the Nissan
Do not do the trade with Nissan. The transmissions are piece of crap.
your concerns about the Nissan CVT are valid. They have nothing else to offer? If not, push for a new steering rack.
From what I know (and Scotty's comments) Nissan's CVTs are not all that great. They're known to fail much faster than say a Honda or Toyota CVT.
You don't say which Trim it is, but it seems like about $12,000 Australian is average for a 2014 Pulsar so $16,999 seems a bit over priced (the range appears to go from about $7,000 all the way up to $20,000, with $20,000 being the high end model).
If you don't have your heart set on the Pulsar, I would see if you can find a Corolla or Civic (or equivalent car from either brand, perhaps around the same age)
If it was me, I would look into seeing how much it would be to fix the Focus first. Since you have a manual, you obviously are suffering from the DCT issues that many of the 2012's had so it might be worth fixing.
