 My wife and I bought this car at the end of 2014 with a baby on the way and needed to trade in our 1997 Subaru Outback. We needed something more reliable and we were thinking we would get a Kia Soul, but I wanted to check out what Hyundai had to offer before we settled for that.The Elantra GT is a world apart from our previous cars. The cabin is quiet. The Bluetooth is fantastic and I've never had any issues making calls or replying to texts (it's speech-to-text, text typing while driving is a stupid thing to do). I also steam music. We have the mid-tier package with sport pedals, blue interior, heated leather seats, and push-button start. The power is a little overwhelming sometimes (I usually drive a 90HP Saturn S-Series), and I catch some (snobbier) drivers by surprise at lights. I'd be nice if Speed Limits were higher to put this car through its paces on twisty roads. I do have fun slamming it through gears and body roll is barely noticeable. The car feels fairly wide, so it corners well, is very responsive, just watch out for curbs with the Passenger-Rear/RR tire. The seats adjust every way you want or need, and the steering wheel adjusts forward and back, up and down. There is plenty of leg and head room and a car seat fits well in the back. It's also very easy to enter and exit, like getting up and sitting down in an office chair (not low like a couch (sports car), not like mounting a bar-stool (SUV, truck). I have noticed though that putting our daughter in her rear-facing seat is cumbersome; hard to avoid hitting her head on the top of the door opening. That's due more to the fact that it's a lower to the ground car rather than an off the ground SUV.I recently was in a Versa Note as a rental and it and my Saturn make the Elantra feel refined, luxurious, and top notch. I don't see how after going to the most recent new car show here that Ford Focus can compare; The Chevy Sonic and Spark are much smaller with no Cruze hatchback; Same for Dodge; VW Golf/Audi A1 is more expensive. Subaru punishes Manual drivers with lower MPG when compared to automatics. I'm sure there are other comparable vehicles that I missed.I only have a few, small points of contention; 6th gear should be lower so that it's below 2,000rpm @ 60 mph (it is hard to find a manual these days with appropriate gear spacing). The infotainment screen brightness is tied to the instrument brightness; I do not like that with DRL lights on the instrument cluster lights are comparatively dark compared to no lights on. The average mpg calculation on the trip odometer is off (errs lower), and instant mpg reading is just a throttle reading: it seems to always be suggesting that I shift into an unreasonably high gear while going uphill (my 2001 Saturn shift light will go off when the accelerator is depressed past a certain point). I do notice wind-buffeting when the rear windows are down which is annoying.