I drive a 2004 Santa Fe. It's a quality vehicle with good gas mileage for a SUV.
I helped a gal by an Elantra GT a couple of years ago. While, for me, it's a bit short on hp, it's well made, gets 33+mpg on the highway, comes with every option you'd want and has as much cargo room as most SUVs. A heck of a buy for $15K.
The early Santa Fe V6s had a problem where the aluminum engines would sieze up at while running at high RPM. They would literally tear themselves apart while the car was cruising down the highway. This would destroy the engine, and tranny, but hopefully the driver would keep things under control.