Hello, I live in Europe and I want to buy a Civic hatchback. With the insane price rises, a dealer 2014 Civic goes for about €10-12k, a 2016 one for about €14-16k, and a 2018 one for €18-20k. For 2014 & 2016 ones I want to get the 1.8 i-VTEC engine and for the 2018 one the 1.5 i-VTEC (these are the most powerful petrol engines available in Europe). I know the 1.5 i-VTEC had some issues with oil mixing with petrol and it also has a turbo so I believe it's not as reliable as the 1.8 one, but the price is almost the same. Should I stick with the older 1.8 in order to visit the mechanic less often? If so, is the difference between the 2014 and 2016 one worth around €4k? Because I feel like it isn't. Yeah you get the facelift version which looks a bit better and is euro 6 but at the end of the day €4k is a bunch of money. Thanks.
Here's some info on relative reliability here in the States, based on about 7K owners: (looks like you should stay away from the 2016)
https://www.carcomplaints.com/Honda/Civic/
You can look at this site to see what problems are most frequent - which are the ones you should look at closely on a used example:
https://repairpal.com/2014-honda-civic/problems https://repairpal.com/2018-honda-civic/problems
Oh, yeah, check that any safety recalls have been performed
https://repairpal.com/honda/civic/2018/recalls
https://repairpal.com/honda/civic/2014/recalls