Hello Volvo owners or ex-owners!

So i was looking for a daily driver car for all seasons. I'm in the north-east canada, so winter is pretty harsh.

I went to search with some criters as follows: AWD - 12k $ max - 200hp min - 4 seather - Good looking - clean interrior - manual tranny.
Well the research gave me the Mazda 6 AWD, an audi, a caddilac sts, subarus, ford fusion, G35X, some BMWs, and the S40 / S60.

Since mazda pillars are a real pain in the... , id never own one personally. The Infinity G35X 4 door is the ugliest of all. The BMWs repairs are just never ending on used.
Used Audi problems are like stroboscopes, working - not - working - not in a span of one day. The caddy is well... not comfy, ugly interrior, auto-trans only. The fusion has no resell value. Subarus eat more fuel than my SRT-10 truck and differentials are made of paper.

But what about Volvos... i mean around here no one has em, so i cannot really tell what are the major issues. So far they really are in my tastes and my research criteria, i do my own mechanic and would probably love it from what i've seen on the net. I've found out the fuel pressure sensor tends to be faulty on the T5 AWD. But that's about it. Any tips of what i should inspect precisely on a Volvo that would be different of any other car ?

 

I have a 2005 T5 AWD with auto trans. Just remember the AWD is not "all the time" drive like a 4 wheel drive truck. It uses a Haldex unit that powers up only when the fronts lose grip. It's supposed to be near instantaneous but I don't know personally. I do know that 2005 was version 1.0 and 2006 had version 2.0 which tells me maybe version 1.0 needed improvement quickly. I believe we are now on version 3.0.

No real major issues on mine other than what the PO had broken and half-a$$ fixed. Overall I'm pleased. I think mine is showing 24 MPG total.