Is There A"payoff" Period??"

It's a pretty simple calculation. Figure out how much your car costs you in fixed costs, how much it costs in running costs, plug in the years and miles, and set the equation equal to the same costs for a Prius. You will have two variables for one equation: miles driven and years. Adjusting the two variables up and down will give you the range of possible break-even points.

Tom

 

A 50% increase in the mileage at some know gas price gives you a quick calculation. You gotta factor in some for and increase in gas price as well.
Figure the maintenance cost of the Taurus vs the Prius and I would guess the Prius would be less over the lifetime.


Assuming you are going to keep each car 'till it drops, I suspect the Prius wins hands down.

1200/30 times $3.00= $120/week
1200/45 times $3.00= $80

$40/week times 52 = $2080

150,000/30 times $3.00=$15,000
150,000/30 times $3.00=$10,000
Savings 5,000

Factor in some increase and the advantage gets better and better.

BTW We average 51 mph. Use that number and the advantage gets better faster. We did 52 mpg on average on a 5000 mile winter mountain trip. So those that say you can't get that in ordinary driving are just plain wrong.

Icarus

 

Icarus' post above gives the basics. It all depends how much detail you want, and how much data you have. Tires and oil changes are pretty much a wash. In general, the Prius is otherwise a less expensive vehicle to maintain. Brakes last much longer than normal cars. Even so, if you want to give the Taurus the benefit of the doubt, you can figure maintenance is going to be about the same. That leaves fuel cost, insurance, and the cost to purchase. Fuel cost is easy to figure. Take the number of miles he drives every year divided by the mpg difference times the price of gas, and you have the extra amount he is spending each year on gas. As Icarus points out, you are going to have to guess at the cost of gas, but it's a fair bet that it will go up with time.

The ownership costs are much more variable. It all depends on where he lives, how long he keeps his cars, and whether you are talking about replacing the Taurus with a new Prius or just playing a "what if" game about if he had bought a Prius to start with. If you are suggesting he sell the Taurus and buy a Prius, then it will take a very long time to recover the difference. It's almost always cheaper to run an old car into the ground than buy a new one. You can buy a lot of gas for the cost of a new car. If, on the other hand, you are talking about him getting a Prius the next time he gets a new car, then just figure the difference in how much he will pay to own the Prius.

The reimbursement rate from his company is completely irrelevant.

Tom

 

Let's "do the math":

If he gets 30 MPG in is Taurus, that means that in a week he burns 1200 miles/30 MPG = 40 gallons of gas.

Assuming that he gets 45 MPG average in the Prius (a conservative estimate, I think), in a week he will burn 1200 miles /45 MPG = 26.6 gallons of gas.

That's a difference of 13.3 gallons a week or, at gas prices of $3/gallon, a difference of $40/week.

If we multiply this by 52 (# of weeks in a year), this works out to a little more than $2K per year.

But, none of this takes into account the fact that the Prius will almost certainly have lower maintenance costs than the Taurus. The Prius has no starter motor, no traditional transmission, and brake pads that last 100K miles+.

There's been no evidence that the battery will not last for the life of the car under normal operating conditions. There have been only a handful of reported battery failures and most/all of those failures have either been through driver negligence or manufacturing defects. There have been many, many reports of batteries lasting 150K+ miles, with a few people even reporting 250K+ miles.

Also, I find it a little hard to believe that he's getting 30 MPG in the Taurus. The EPA numbers for that car are 20/28. However, if we assume that he *is* getting that mileage, that suggests that he's driving his car in a very fuel efficient way, suggesting that he'll probably get better mileage than 45MPG in the Prius; 60 MPG is definitely possible, and 50 MPG is easy.

Edit: Ummm. . . yeah. . . I guess icarus already did this. Although, I guess what I added after the math is still valuable

 

Hi Jiw395,

One of the national labs ran (are running) two 2004 Prius cars and both are up over 100 K miles so far. The cars were run around as bank courier cars in the Phoenix area. There results so far are that the lifetime costs were about $.22 per miles total ownership costs. Which included gas, insurance maintenance, and purchase price/fees.

If his company reinbursts him $.42 per mile, he will make $.20 a mile.

In comparison to a new car of similar size and performance the common published results are between a 3 and 5 year break even considering a 15 k mile year. At a three year break even, well, its gravy for the next 5 years or ownership. Used cars are a different issue, or course. And right now the used Prius is holding allot of its value, so the break even is not comparable.

One of the reasons for the new car break even is no brake routine maintenance for at least 100K miles in non-mountain driving, and most likely much longer for allot of highway driving like it sounds your friend does. This is because the braking is electric in typical service down to 7 mph. Also, the transmission which has shown good durability provides the starter and alternator functions. So, one does not need to worry about those repairs either.

 

If it remains true that the Prius holds value better than the Ford, then the residual value of the Prius should largely offset the higher up front cost, making payback very quick. In other words, the math should take residual value of both vehicles into account. You are comparing the next Taurus purchase (new or used) to the Prius. With higher residual, the only extra cost is the opportunity cost of tying up more funds versus a used Ford.

 

When will your flat screen TV pay itself off? When will that latte you got pay itself off?

The question really makes no sense. The Prius pays itself off with that big smile you get every time you hit the Power button.

 

If you are really going to drive a vehicle until it drops, then residual value doesn't matter. I just scrapped an '78 suburban that had ~400k on it. It's residual value has been ~ 0 for decades!

On the other hand I'm still driving a '82 VW Rabbit Pickup truck with ~300k on it. It gets more valuable every day.

The Taurus will run to $0 way faster than any Toyota.



Icarus

 

Those residuals are very relevant, imho. What one is trying to do with these simple approaches is to estimate the present value of cash flows over some assumed fixed time period. Your suburban at 0 is very different than the Rabbit at more than initial cost.

 

Jesse had 349k on his original traction battery when the car was totaled by a collision with another driver. He had a 2002 Prius.(NWH-11) The battery design in the 2004+ (NWH-20) has design improvements that theoretically could allow it to last longer (lower internal resistance).

http://priuschat.com/forums/prius-m...ter-349-531-miles-but-not-natural-causes.html

 

The thread dogfriend referenced does not mention it, but I believe that Jesse's insurance payoff was in the $12k - $13k range. So it had some residual value according to 'the people who sign the checks'.

 

I got into a heated discussion at work with one of my guys whose going to college and is taking an evvironmental class. He started spewing this cradle to grave thing and kept quoting that silly study which shall remain nameless. There were facts flying all over the place. Then one of my civies told me it cost him less to drive his 78 Chevelle than for me to drive my new Prius. His fact was only that he didn't have a car payment anymore. So it got me interested in lifetime cost/mile.

I traded the Jag in at 80k and with all the stuff I put into it it cost me .90/mile to drive. 4 years 60k miles were mine, not bad. Other than maint was going to go into the K's, I got out when I needed to.

I've had my Prius for 3 months, $27K plus $1500 in toys, $320 in gas and had 4338 miles at my last fill up. That comes to about $6.73/mile so far. Naturally the farther I drive the less it'll cost. I'm averaging $.07/mile in gas right now and with winter being over that should drop as well. It's cool when you have Excel working for you, don't have to remember to carry the 1.

 

OK, I'll bite.

Steve-O raises a valid point.

Your friend should be more interested in what his car and miles do to the environment as opposed to "how much is this gonna cost me".

The Prius not only has plenty of intangibles, but nobody can argue with the fact that it runs clean.

You could try to convince your friend to buy a Prius, but then he will resent you when he realizes that he doesn't like it.

Instead, you should try to pull him away from strictly "dollars and cents" thinking.

If you are successful, he will want to buy the Prius on his own. And he will love it so much that he will wonder why he didn't think about it sooner!

Switching from a Taurus to a Prius myself, I can vouch for the fact that there is really no comparison. Apples != oranges.

My payoff period was over about halfway between the dealership and my house. And I live very close to the dealership.

 

My payoff is the better environment I'll leave to my son. In fact he his not born yet... but like 2 weeks after I've learned my wife was pregnant, I went and bought the Prius. Ok, we needed a four doors car but the coming baby made me think a whole different way about the future.

Also going from 9.5L/100km (25mpg) to 4.9L/100km (48mpg), with no change in my driving habits, was really great!

 

While I carried out your little math exercise for you, I think that you've really missed Steve-O's point. As far as I can tell, it was not an "tree hugging rant," but just the point that he enjoys the car.

From a financial standpoint, a new car never makes sense as a money-saving purchase. If your friend is just looking to save gas, he should buy a used Civic or, better yet, a used Kia. If he's looking to save money he should not buy a new car. If he was truly looking at "payoff time" for the Prius, he should look how long it would take to pay off the purchase price (say ~$20K to make the math easy). This would take roughly 10 years driving 1200 miles/week. Of course, after that time, the car would have 624K miles on it, which is likely beyond the lifespan of even the prius.

The point is that people don't buy cars just to save money. Otherwise, the streets would be full of Kias and no one would ever buy a BMW or Mercedes.

While the environmental stuff was important to me when I bought the Prius, I also bought it for things like the hauling space, the safety, and the tech-y stuff. Do I "need" the tech-y stuff? No. But it does make me enjoy my car a hell of a lot more than I would without it.

If your friend is just buying the car to save money, he'll be disappointed. He should buy something like a used Corolla, Civic, or Versa. My point (and, perhaps, Steve-O's point) is that most people on this forum bought this car for much more than just saving money or "saving the environment."

 

The real factor in if it is environmental or if it has a payoff period is the driver:

Will you total the car before it can offset the damage to the environment during the construction process?

Will you maintain old driving habits or embrace some hypermiling strategies?

Will you maintain or neglect the maintenance of the car?

It's a like having a child, will it be killed in its infancy or nurtured to grow and give back what you invested?

 

Yeah, that was my point. Asking when a Prius will pay for itself is like planting a rose bush and being asked how much CO2 it will offset.