I still wouldn't buy it. It's not an economical car to buy. It takes forever to make up the difference. If you want a hybrid, wait for the Chevy Volt later this year. It has a lot more emphasis on electrical power. It's essentially an electric car with a generator to give it an unlimited range.It will go 40 miles entirely on electric power. The Prius will do 1.7. The Prius has an electric motor and a gasoline engine that work together to power the wheels. The Volt has an electric engine with a generator to keep the batteries charged once it has been nearly depleted. I've heard from unofficial sources the generator will be E85, with a diesel option. If there is a diesel. get it. Not only is it more efficient, but you can fuel it for free with used oil from restaurants. The Prius gets 51 mpg city, which is respectable, but the Volt gets the equivalent of 230. That's a lot more. Plus it will probably be better made, and is a helluva lot better looking. Just look it at. It makes the Prius wet it's pants.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/22380333@N05/3612156646/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/2238033...7607038955164/
If you drive 40 miles a day, which is the national average, you save around $2.85 by driving a Volt instead of a car that gets 30MPG. Most cars arent even rated that high for city/mixed driving, and most barely meet or pass that for highway. My car is rated at 22 city and returns 16.5. I'll give you benefit of the doubt and use the 30 for this calculation. So if you're doing the average of 40 miles per day, you save $2.85 by driving a Volt. Multiply that by 365 and you have $1040 saved in an entire year. The Prius is much less efficient than the Volt, so the how small are the real world savings going to be on a 51MPG car vs one with 230? The cost of gas is $2.5 in all equations. The Prius would be $2 a day to operate. Over the course of 1 day here's what it looks like:
30MPG sedan: $3.30
Prius: $2.00
Volt: $0.45
Over 1 year it would be:
30MPG car: $1204.5
Prius: $730
Volt: $164
So with a Prius you save roughly $500 a year in fuel, a Volt about $1000. Take the price you would pay for a Prius or Volt, subtract the amount you would get from your current car, and then divide that by the fuel savings you get each year, and then your answer is how many years it would take to balance the difference. So it would look like 23,000 (cost of new prius)-$10,000 (value of your current car)/$500 (yearly fuel savings)= 26 (number of years it would break even).
That's at 40 miles a day, but depending on the fuel economy of your current car and how far you drive it'll change. On a side not, you can probably tell fuel efficiency and cost to drive are not a linear relationship. Driving 40 miles a day in cars with these efficiencies on $2.50 for a gallon of gas would cost this much per day.
15MPG: $5
30: $3.30
51: $2
230: $.45
As you can see there is a $1.6 saving in the 15MPG difference between 15 and 30, but only a $1.3 saving in the 21 MPG difference between 30 and 52. The rate at which you save declines as the MPG's go up. Switching from a 15MPG car to one with 30MPG is a bigger difference than switching from one with 30MPG to one with 51.
So, yeah. I hope this helps you out. As you can see Hybrid's take forever to pay off. Whether or not it's worth it depends on how much you drive, how much your car is worth, how many MPG's your current car gets, and how long you plan on keeping this car. I know the Volt comes with a $7000 tax rebate. The Prius comes with one, but I believe it's smaller and about 3-4K. Also keep in mind electric engines are much more reliable. Practically invincible. The Volt is going to be a lot cheaper to maintain because the gas engine gets used much less and all the driving power comes from the electric motor. It'll be faster too, since electric motors give instant torque and you have all your power off the line.
What would I do? Buy an Audi A3 TDI. It's a clean, turbo-diesel. It was won "Green Car of the Year", competing against the Prius and honda Insight. It's not as efficient, but it's more likely to pay off. It's 29K to start, more than a Prius, and is also less efficient at 42 MPG. But, you can fuel it on used vegetable oil for practically free. You would need to pick it up from a restaurant, filter it, and then add a tiny bit of solvent. This all adds up to a few cents a gallon. It's clean, efficient, and as close to free motoring as you'll ever find. Using the same formula for the A3 on used Veggie oil it's only a few cents a day. That's better than even the hyper-efficient Volt. This is so because, you're basically eliminating all costs of fuel. Plus, it's an Audi. Email me if you want some more information about this method.
How much would a Prius cost right now?
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