Punto Emotion or Avventura Active

@anonexpr, within your budget Punto Evo 90hp fits well in the budget.
Ground clearance of 90hp seems to be at par with Avventura according to my SA, he seems to be confidently mentioning a Ground clearance of 200mm in real as oppose to 185 on paper. By look itself the 90hp stands taller. Size wise I don't see any obvious difference between an Avventura and Punto Evo. I park my car usually next a Avventura in my office parking and always compare both.
Getting a 90hp Punto Evo atleast makes sure that you get the best range in the Punto Evo and no regret whatever so like "wish I had that extra 20hp and black interior" in future. Because, this is the best Punto Evo you can get from Fiat stable.

If you are going to hit the highway more than, you will surely love the way 90hp takes on the highway effortlessly.

Still, take test drive of both the 75hp and 90hp and make your choice.

Good luck.

@anonexpr . Go for 90 HP Evo.Its more practical and will fit your budget. Even if you can afford Avventura Emotion its not as practical due to the spare tire set up. Besides at the very end Avvy is still a psuedo SUV even though its better than competition in all respects. Unless you plan to use the car predominantly on highways and do mild off reading Evo 90 HP should suffice. Do not worry about sluggishness. MJD will become smooth by 15 k service and will stop bothering you in sometime. Modern ECUs anyway adapt to your driving style. Keep revving all the way till 4.5 k RPMs and see the engine opening up beautifully. I see no value of buying a Avvy over 90 HP if your usage will be city/highways mostly. If its going to be mostly city then even 75 HP emotion is enough. Buy Avvy only if you are interested in mostly highway drive with some offroading to the mix. Only other reason I can think of is stand out in a crowd. Dont worry irrespective of whatever you buy FIATs will stand out in the crowd. They hardly sell 1000 copies a month. LOL

Today went for test drive of Evo 90HP, Avventura and Linea MJD as they all share the same engine. Started with Evo 90HP and then tried Avventura. Personally I liked the comfort in Avventura though the performance was quite same in both. Then just like that wanted to try Linea MJD as it was also available for test drive. Personally I felt the comfort level and driving dynamics a notch higher than Avventura and Evo. Sales person and my friend said that more you drive the car, you will get used to it. In Linea, I moved to fourth and fifth gear much earlier and I felt that car was not moving even though I was full on the accelerator. My friend said that I shifted too early before getting into the right RPM and hence the lag. Linea was the car for which I went for two test drives today. My friend was saying that hatchback and sedan certainly have a difference in driving dynamics and hence should not compare Avventura/Evo with Linea. Oh man, I went with an idea of trying out Evo dynamic variant but now Iam falling in love with things beyond that.

TD Tjet also .

During test drive, personally I felt Linea to be more comfortable than Punto or Avventura.
Is it because the car dynamics are different - sedan and hatchback or it is just my illusion as I drove Linea more than other cars during test drive?

Now Iam stretching my budget a little more and now torn between Avventura Dynamic/Emotion and Linea active variant - both MJD. Did a test drive of both, Avventura and Linea, and now Iam confused. Loved Linea for it's space and comfort, while loved Avventura the way it went over roads filled with potholes. During test drive, over one of the humps Linea's bottom scraped while Avventura went over it as if no hump existed. Though I personally like Avventura lot more than the Linea, whenever I go for test drive I end up driving Linea more than Avventura. Then I feel that next time, I need to drive Avventura more than the Linea.