I have owned most 4x4 variants over the years and to be honest the all have there faults in one for or another, landrover is good because there are tons of parts around and they are mostly cheap.
Suzuki sj absolutely amazing off road with choice modifications I currently own two as well as my freelander one is spoa with a chassis cab pick up body that I am just about to tube, it runs a 1600 vitara engine 413 gearbox and samurai axles 33x13 tyres and goes almost where I point it. But it's ****e on fuel and not much better on the road. Owned loads of them over the years and will include a pick of my old tinny
Series Humm tough one that. I sold my series 3 petrol to buy the freelander. I loved it to bits was fun to drive and cheap to insure as it's a classic but again fuel cost killed it for me. I painted mine up a funky camo and fitted a winch and stuff used to get use as an airsoft combat truck
300tdi disco... Good truck again owned one for a couple of years mine was lifted 4 inches 35 inch rubber winch etc etc all carpet removed fuel turned up turbo turned up stereo turned up but rust is the killer if you can't weld if you can buy an mot fail and repair much cheaper.
Had a v8 es too but I regret selling that to much to talk about it
Nissan.... Japanese reliability I had an old leaf sprung patrol but parts were hard to come by for my year again juicy but my one was a 3.0td
Freelander td4 well bloody good on fuel fits in car parks (not for much longer mind) drives well easy to work on will be getting offroad action and towing my boat
Lots to choose from 😀
Insurance try Adrian flux not to bad for young drivers just make sure it's a brand name you use. A bud of mines lad had £3000 quid taken from him by a fake company of course never got it back
Goid luck and pics for inspiration