Volvo S60 comes fully loaded

Add to that the invention of the residual and you'll find almost everyone is driving a 3 Series. You might even be thinking of buying one too, or an Audi A4, or Mercedes C-Class, or if your company is particularly flush or if you happen to work for an oil company, a Lexus IS.

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But, I'm here to tell you that you'd be making a mistake and what you should actually buy is a Volvo S60. Specifically a Volvo S60 T6 like the one I've had the pleasure of driving for a week.

While the Merc, Audi, BMW and Lexus wildly compete for attention in a sort of automotive version of Super Smash Bros, the Volvo quietly flies under the radar attracting almost no attention whatsoever. And this is a good thing. You don't want to get into something sporty. You don't want to worry about fuel bills either, or that what you're driving is just an expensive Toyota. What you want is to get in, put it in drive and relax all the way home.

The Volvo does that - it's super comfortable, it's a Volvo after all. Sure it'll do the sporty thing when provoked, very well in fact. Flick the gear lever to the right and you fire off gear changes to your hearts content via slick steering wheel-mounted paddles. The T6 version is powered by Volvo's new four-cylinder, turbo-supercharged engine, meaning it's endowered with 225kW and 400Nm of torque. Combined with the Swede's new eight-speed automatic, you have an effortlessly comfortable cruiser. I have no doubt you could drive this Volvo to Joburg without stopping and feel as fresh when you got there as when you set off.

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It's frugal too - this little four-cylinder turbo promises just six litres per 100km and if you feather the throttle and pay proper attention, you will easily achieve that on long distance runs. With every day city driving you'll see that figure rise to around 8-9l/100km - still, not bad...

The Volvo S60 T6 costs a whopping R539,900 but before you dismiss it as ludicrously overpriced, let's look at the competition. A 328i automatic costs R525,770, the C250 is R536,649, the thirsty Lexus is R507,400, and the Audi by comparison costs R473,000.

What do you get for your money?

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Quite a lot actually... Electrically powered front seats - the driver's seat comes with memory function - full leather all round, climate control, two TFT displays - a dynamic instrument panel screen and a large centre dashboard unit - cornering lights - which help you see around corners at night - keyless entry and drive, engine stop/start function, park assist sensors, rain sensing wipers, auto light on and off, auto dimming rearview mirror, Bluetooth, a high performance sound system, city safety - which stops you front hitting other cars at low speeds, collision warning with full auto break - again stops you from hitting other cars and people, and airbags everywhere. Phew! Safe to say that the S60 comes pretty fully loaded.

Okay, let's wrap this up...

The Volvo S60 is understated, but not in an Audi A4 kind of way though. It's classy, make no mistake, restrained and trustworthy. Kind of like what middle-management should be... There's no pent up anger and shouty overtones in a Volvo. It's very comfortable, well-specced, powerful yet frugal, and very safe.