 I wanted one of these cars for the last year. After having a 2011 Tiguan, which I loved I decided to get the Golf. It's been a disappointment!The looks of the car, and the engine are wonderful. The interior is really nicely done. I love the sunroof. Power off the line is a little slow until the turbo spools up, but after that it has plenty of power. Fuel economy is a little less than I expected for the size of the car, but I can live with it.I purchased the car about 8 months ago, and now have almost 6000 miles on it. Around 4700 miles the transmission started to shutter when shifting  gears. In sports mode it shifted much better, but had a real hard downshift. Took it in for maintenance, and they replaced both front axles. I was told that VW was aware of the problem and that this would solve the issue I was having. They told me usually most customers don't start having this problem until they have around 15,000 miles on the car. When I got the car back, for the first 600 miles it shifted better, but still did not shift like it did when I first purchased it. Now it's doing the same thing again. It's bad enough in drive, but in sports mode it's terrible. It's going back in the shop tomorrow. Maybe I'll be lucky and they'll get it fixed correctly this time. Sure hope so. If it wasn't for this issue I would be very happy with the car, and probably give it a 4 plus start rating.If you decide to purchase one, before doing so, get on some of the VW forums. There are a lot of people that are having the same issue that I'm having, and VW has not stepped up after the initial repair and solved the problem. Many are die hard VW owners that have had VW vehicles for years.