I finally got a chance to drive the Flex a few months ago. I rented one for a week’s stay on Hawaii’s big island. I had just spent time on Maui driving around a Tahoe and I hated how huge it felt and how soft it was to drive. I was looking forward to something a bit smaller a tauter.
It was clear that Ford was putting very little effort into keeping the Flex fresh. Sure, it had Apple Carplay, but the entire interior looked and felt like a ten year old design.
However, I really liked it. It drove REALLY well. It held two adults, four kids and (with a bit of tetris-ing), ALL of our luggage for a week. It was comfortable. Mileage was decent. It could fit into normal sized parking spaces.
Refresh the interior, maybe give it a bit of an exterior facelift, drop in the new 3 liter ecoboost engine paired to a DCT, and this would have been a great counter-argument to SUV’s or minivans.