Is it a time span or is it a mileage?

Is six months from new to wear indicator bad?

Is it still bad if those 6 months cover 12,000 miles?

Is a set of £60 a corner mid-range performance tyres every six months better than a set of £120 a corner endurance tyres every 12 months?

Are there actually any long life enduro tyres avaialble in 205/45/16 fitment?

Depends on quite a few factors, mainly driving style and tyre compounds.

12K out of a set of front tyres on a FWD car is not great, but it's not terrible either (i get about 20K out of a pair on my Superb) i have heard of people wearing them out in just 6K!!

Personally i would stick with what you have as you may not get 24K out of the endurance tyres costing twice as much (although you will probably get better mpg with them - at the cost of a slight loss of grip).

I'd consider mileage over just age. After all, if someone does 30k a year on m/ways and replaces tyres once a year, he's still getting more tyre life than someone who does 6k a year, and replaces every 4 years.

Which is a significant point; steady speed dual cabbageway cruising will give you a longer life from brand X than I'd get when I rarely even see, never mind use, a dual more than about 5 miles.

The harder-wearing a tyre is, the less grip it will provide. My Fabia's got through 8 sets of fronts in 87k, so 12k probably isn't so bad. The Megane I had before was still on its first set of tyres when I got rid of it. They must have had 20k on them, but were total ditchfinders...

I have just replaced the contis on mine at 24500 miles and 3 years, they were swapped front to back at about 11000 miles and were proper fooked. Fitted rainsport 2 all round after reading good reviews, only done 2 miles on them so far but they do seem a lot more compliant and less crashy than the contis.