For the past few years, my beater of choice has been the old Volvo P80 chassis - the 850, S70, and V70 through 1998 (1999+ had some issues). Great aftermarket support, pretty easy to work on, tough as nails, pretty reliable, very comfortable. A very nice highway cruiser in a very similar way to the old Mercedes. Also, very cheap to acquire if you don't mind turning a few wrenches on your own.

My wife's daily driver is a 1998 V70 (wagon) I picked up in late 2013 with 170K on it. It now has in the range of 255-260K miles on it and is still going strong. We expect it'll be in service with us past 300K miles.

My current daily driver is a 1998 S70 (sedan) I bought in fall 2016 with 199K on it. As of now, it has 216K on it and once again, I expect a good number more years and miles out of it.


Bonus, these cars are INCREDIBLY rust resistant.