Advice from a Prius owner

Wow. That's a whopper of a post to try and digest. :blink:
Just get the dang car! You obviously really want it and we here at PC want you to get it.
--except for maybe one guy who I won't say his name except that it rhymes with "forlorn."

 

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

 

After seeing your censored post, I thought you would especially enjoy that little joke, maggieddd. B)

 

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

 

lol

I have never been attracted to spreadsheets, but your post made we wonder if each of your two cars is driven 25K miles, or that is a family total ? Your calcs are based on each car driving that amount.

 

This got me ROTFL too! :lol: :lol: :lol:


In response to the original post:

It's always simple to see the savings. I think what makes it a bit more tricky is when you compare to another vehicle that gets close mileage. In Comparison to the Jeep I used to drive, the Prius saves me a ton of gas. But what about in comparison to a Corrolla? Or a Honda Civic (gas model)?

My brother in law went with the gas version of the civic since it still gets very good mileage and was cheaper than the hybrid.

Don't get me wrong, I strongly support the Prius and think it's worth paying extra, but to do a true cost comparison, it's only fare to compare it against comprable vehicles. If you want a hatchback though, there's not too much to compare to.

 

When I did my calculations, I based them off of a comprably equipped (ha!) Camry. Even the 4 cylinders get cruddy milage these days - with the prices so close after the tax break, I really will be better off with a Prius than replacing my aging Camry with a new one. Where I'm losing money, and I'm fully aware of it and making my decision anyway, is that I'm not buying a two year old camry. I consider this 90% the car I needed and 10% voting with my dollars. They built a car that has everything I want and more (yay hatchback!), is much nicer on the environment, and locks me in consuming about half the gas I would have been consuming. I think it's worth the so-called 'premium.'

 

Which makes it difficult to do a true cost comparison for the Prius. If you do a comparison with a Camry, the Prius looks good, if you do it with a Corolla, not so good. In size though, it is bigger than a Corolla (and trust me it is bigger-I tried one out), but slightly smaller than a Camry.

All payoffs are probably in the long term (5 years+) and since, from what I remember, the average car owner keeps a car less than 5 years, it may be moot. however, they probably don't look to see how much money they are losing swapping new cars every 4-5 years.

 

Your comments mirrors my assessment as well. I was actually looking at a 2 year used volvo that would have landed around 22-24k. A loaded prius after rebates will be around 25k. Looking at the few times I reallu need a station wagon compared to a hatch back and the fact that the prius has almost all volvo features (and then some) it wasn't a hard choice. The Prius will save me some money in the end and is a very quiet and comfortable car. I will miss the seats from the Volvo though!

Now I just need to wait several months to get it... sigh...

 

I am buying the Prius because I like the features (gas mileage being only one of them). Buying a new car is never a money saving venture because of how much value you lose by driving it off the dealers lot. I've finally gotten to the point where I can afford almost any car - and it's the Prius which "makes me happy".

 

Excellent! I'm very impressed. By switching from my old Audi to my new Prius I estimated that I will save over $700 in gas per year (more if I drive efficiently). I'm pretty excited about that. Considering I only lost $700 selling the car and I'm paying off the Prius fast, I will realize savings in just over a year's time.


Oh yeah....and that whole "Helping the environment thing...well...that's good too!" j/k That's half our reason for ownership. B)

 

I agree that a car is not an investment, but the Prius didn't seem to follow the "lose 20% after driving it off the lot" rule. I looked up the bluebook value of my car after having it for 2 or 3 months, and it was actually higher than what I paid for it. First time that's happened to me. Don't think that'll last long, though. I haven't checked lately, but I suspect that after 6 months, the car is probably valued below what I paid for it.

-Roger