Personally, I think you're going to need a CR-V or something similarly sized. My youngest was four when we bought our Fit, but I had a Protege for ten years and both of my kids came home in it. However, we always had a bigger car: a CR-V, then a Mazda MPV, and now a Mazda5 (downsized from the MPV - too big for us). We do have a dog.

Others have posted that you need to make sure the car seat fits. The biggest challenge is when the child outgrows the infant car seat (which happens around 5-6 months) and you need to use a convertible car seat facing backwards. These things are huge and don't fit well in vehicles that position the occupants largely upright; I had just as much trouble fitting such a seat in the MPV than the Protege. In a car the size of the Fit, it's easiest to fit that car seat in the middle, in which case you have no room for the dog.

The Fit makes a good second car for a family, and yes, I think you can make it work as a primary car if you tried. However, it would be a huge pain in the butt. We've taken our Fit on vacation (minus the dog), but kids need less room as they get older, ironically. You don't have to go up to a Tahoe in size to get the room that you'll be thankful for.

 

Docz:

Thanks for the thoughtful input. It seems that most are saying it can be done in a Fit. Some say comfortably, some not. I'll have to chew on this, and see what I can find.

I saw a used '10 Fit sport manual with 7k on it for $15k at a local dealership, and an '05 CRV awd LX with 48k on it for $13500 pp. Guess I got some test driving to do...

 

My friend Christian had a Mazda 3 and he is having major tranny problems that the local dealership does not want to fix - so I would definitely get rid of it - Honda has a lot of nice vehicles that would work with you famiily and what you need to do. Please let us know what you decide to purchase.

Cat

 

I think it's doable but depends on what you're willing to put up with. The biggest question is the 6-12 month range when you have the rear facing convertible car seat. Plus, on a trip, consider the diapers, portable crib, and stroller, on top of everything else, and that's before you consider the dog. One plug: do not underestimate how nice sliding doors are when you have children.

Still, it's a testament to the Fit's practicality that this option of yours is even being considering, and I commend you for thinking how small you can go, rather than how big you can get. The Fit does work nicely for us. It's interesting sitting in car pool lanes surrounded by hulking Suburbans, Siennas, and Expeditions, and occasionally carrying more kids than those vehicles.

 

Update:

Hi all, so here's what's going on. I'm looking for either a crv or fit. The deal is still the same - can I fit everything in a fit? 1 dog: yes. within 2-3 years, a kid too? Maybe. So... do I want to have a larger vehicle (CRV) for several years, with a larger capacity which I don't need, or have a smaller vehicle for now and see what I can stuff into it later, with a worse case of selling the fit when I have a kid and it's potentially too small.

There's a 2010 fit sport with 7k on it for $14k (manual). There's a 2005 CRV lx 4x4 with 48k on it for $13500. This also becomes an issue of do I want to spend $14k on a 5 year old used car, vs the same for a 'new' one? Gas costs and maint will be lower on the new car, but insurance will be higher (sort of - CRV gets insurance incr due to awd, ironically - because of all the offroading potential of the CRV I suppose). I'll see how much I can get for my mazdaspeed. I have two potential buyers for my S, which is good, but sad, too. One day I'll get back into something fun.

 

Well I fitted my 180lb Mastiff. But no kid, yet. If it's anything smaller then a Mastiff, you should be OK.

 

The Element's doors require you to think ahead a bit. In crowded parking lots, there was a dance involved - open driver door, open rear door, close driver door, step back.

The back seat in the Fit may be a bit small for a carseat, unless you are short enough that you can slide/lean the front seat forward. My exwife had a Toyota Echo when our first kid was small, and it was decidedly uncomfortable for me. Also, since the Echo didn't have LATCH for the center seat, we decided to use


Re: the Element.

The front seat space isn't much different - there's more space between the seats, and and a bit more headroom, but the legroom is about the same. The cargo room is a bit more (25 vs. 21 cubes) and the room with the seats flipped up is greater (75 vs 57 cubes), but the biggest area of difference is the back seats. They have a TON more room than in the Fit. You can mount a rear facing carseat, and you'll never have to worry about it intruding on your seat reclining space.



Now that they have side curtain airbags, there's no need for concern about the C-pillar.

I had my Element for 3 years. Mostly, I got tired of the tippy handling (it handles better than a body-on-frame SUV, but despite its car chassis, it doesn't have carlike handling. I'd describe it as a Jeep Wrangler with tighter steering. Short wheelbase, choppy ride, flat windshield, upright seating.

As far as safety goes, from a passive perspective, the thing is built like a fortress. The sheer weight of the doors make you feel like like you could withstand a nuclear blast in that thing. The construction feels almost German - heavy, dense, purposeful, solid. Considering it's a <170" vehicle that weighs over 3500 lbs, it's pretty "dense" so to speak.

Over three years, I had zero issues aside from a seat-height adjuster that had to be replaced (under warranty, and there was a TSB out for it. That was the pre-07 seat design, so it has probably been fixed by now).

I don't think there's a better affordable, compact vehicle for active "dirty" lifestyles. Dog gets it dirty, mop it out. Kid spills something, mop it out. Snow, slush, mud, sand, whatever... no problem.

Mileage was typically around 20... 18-19 in my almost all-city driving (where the Fit rarely gets more than 26). On the highway, it was usually only 22-23 because of Aerodynamics. I once got it up to about 27, but I was driving <55 most of the way.

Go check out ElementOwnersClub.com and ask the same question over there, for perspective.

 

We have a 2010 Fit and a 2008 CR-V (2wd) .

I am 6'3" tall and the Wife is 5'10", the kid is a tall 10 year old and the Dog is a 60 lb Standard Poddle - we all fit into the fit with no problems.

With the CR-V we can add the Cockatoo and his travel cage, a weeks worth of luggage for all of us, snacks, books, DVD player for the afformentioned kid a half ton of other crap and still be comfortable on long trips - and still get good gas mileage. The car has averaged 28.2 mpg combined city/highway since new (43k mi). It has plenty of power, and once we replaced the stock Bridgestone Dueller tires, road noise was significantly reduced. The CR-V is a GREAT family car in our exerience. Getting a car seat into and out of the CR-V would no doubt be considerably easier than with a smaller/lower car like a fit. (important consideration!!) It is obviously larger than the Fit but is is not like driving a Bi-gass SUV around town.

 

Fun fact: a Fit is more or less a 9:10 scale CR-V, which puts it at approximately 3/4 the size of a CR-V.

 

There are safer cars out there than the Fit (with regards to the kid situation.) Our cars weigh about the same as a miata. Just saying.

 

Agreed! There are too many suv's roaming out there. You may have a 100 airbags and the latest safety ratings may convince you otherwise but in a real life accident I would not bet on the Fit winning against an suv. The CR-V appears to be a better ahem...FIT among your choices if safety is an important consideration.

 

http://www.iihs.org/externaldata/srdata/docs/sr4204.pdf

Detailed information on fatality rates on classes and models of cars. The fun part is picking out pickups and SUVs built on similar frames.

It looks like Detroits POS small cars have done wonders to give small cars a death-trap reputation. And that's just the way they like it.

Example:
2100 lbs Toyota Echo had 53 fatalities in multi-vehicle crashes per million vehicle years.

The Mini Cooper had 48.

The Civic had 47.

The Dodge Neon had 107

The Honda Accord had 19

The Dodge Stratus had 60.

The Crown Vic and Grand Marquis had 34 and 50 respectively.

The Pontiac Bonneville had 53

Even the monsterous Ford Excursion had 35, and the Chevrolet Suburban had 40.

THere's lots of fun to be had digging around in there.

Note that these are leaving out single vehicle and rollover crashes - this is exclusively metal vs. metal. Note the order in each category... makes you feel great about American steel, eh?

 

Man, I couldn't agree more with you. Americans are just spoiled and brainwashed that they NEED huge ass SUVs. They have this urge to fit the image of success by driving a more expensive bigger car, and they sense that it is safer (only marginally true).

It irritates me how people claim that you NEED the big car while it's just a want, a big greedy WANT.

Look at the rest of europe. Enough said.

 

As everyone has already piled on....you sound like a family on the "grow". The Fit is absolutely amazing for it's size and configurability with it's cargo capacity.

But if I was looking at adopting a dog...and at least 1 child coming up? (This sometimes leads to future siblings) I might look at a bigger vehicle.

The Fit is a great vehicle...and it's even doable for a family or small family but if I was making a choice as "only" vehicle for growing family...I'd go larger.

 

I would say that for a lot of Americans they buy the vehicle they think they WANT not necessarily the best tool for the job.

This ends up with a lot of single people, or couples, driving to suburban convience marts and Malls in huge SUV's....which to me is a waste of resources...

That being said, I have spent time in Europe, and my observation was that a lot of people own the small vehicle for a majority of driving situations...to the store...back and forth to work...but many will also own a second far less used bigger vehicle...for weekend drives and comfort.

I wish people would approach their vehicle choice with a more realistic eye towards picking the tool needed to do the job...but people get caught up with ego and self image...and simply wanting more....

 

Europeans refer to the Fit as a "Supermini" or B-class, just one step above a minis ule city car. For families, they love their MPVs, which would be most closely paralleled by the Mazda5, Toyota Matrix, or Kia Rondo. I have to agree that the Fit is on the cramped side for a growing family. Car seats are bulky, and will interfere with your ability to put the front seat in a comfortable position.

The CR-V would be a far more enjoyable vehicle at this stage. I speak from experience on this one - when our first daughter was born, my then-wife had a 4-door Echo. Everything fit, but not well, and bot enjoyably. Once #2 came along, she swapped the Echo for a CR-V.

At the time, I had an extended cab GMC Sonoma. We all fit in there too - put the infant seat in the front pax seat with the airbag off, and one of us riding in the side-facing jump-seat. Again, workable and ideal are not synonyms.

 

If you keep things organized you should be able to manage with the Fit. I never even had problems fitting the family in my old Civic. Functional, compact and thoughtful packing is key and it'll pay off for you.

There's a lot more room in a Fit than it looks.

 

Geez, a girl I like has a CRV, maybe I should try to make a family with her to compare the cars and report on the results here?

 

Here's an idea: Mazda5. I can't think of a better car for a young growing family. There is a TON of space in a tidy package (if you throw down the third row, the cargo space expands to 44 cubic feet, and you still have the two large middle row captains chairs). The handling is great, and the sliding doors make it very easy to access the kid seats in crowded lots. It got good marks with CR, and the mileage isn't bad in real world conditions (bout the same as a CRV). Definitely not a bad idea to check it out!

 

I lived out of a pack on my back for a year and people can't pack a dog, kid and another adult into a 5 door 2500lb car for a weekend.....You can put anything into a Fit that you can a Forester so don't get a Forester because it has more room. It is more comfortable if you are over 6'2" and have a messed up back though.