I'm researching Prius' and suck at car buying. I want to make sure I don't overspend. I have cash for the car. What year, miles and price is in a reasonable ballpark? I'm seeing 2005 or 2006 on CL with 115000 miles for $8k ish. Thoughts? I know I need to ask about the battery and whether it has been replaced. Anything else I need to consider?
Will you have to change your poster name to KBPrius?
Heh. We have one of each in that model, although they have a lot fewer miles than your candidates. The brakes are good for ~100K miles, so you'd want to see the receipt for new brake shoes. The engine coolant is only good for ~100K miles too, so you'd want to see a receipt for that too. The coolant replacement requires a lot of venting for its weird flow channels (especially around the inverter), so if the seller claims that they replaced the coolant on their own then you could ask them to show you the venting procedure. Odds are they'll suddenly remember that they didn't really replace the coolant after all.
Ask your questions on PriusChat.com. You'll be able to network with other Prius owners in your area for mechanics, dealers, and checking for good prices. You may even find someone there who's interested in selling theirs.
Kelly Blue Book (KBB.com), Edmunds.com, and Craigslist.
Pay for a CarFax five-VIN account. When you call sellers, ask for the VIN up front (a legit seller will happily give you the VIN) and run it through Carfax. You'll be able to verify the title is clear and you'll also have a list of recalls or other tech service bulletins that you can check with the seller's records.
As mentioned, check the age of the 12v battery. When that starts drooping its voltage then the car won't behave correctly.
At a minimum verify that the Prius has had its recalls done on the accelerator, the inverter cooling pump, the steering wheel, and the driver's display. (You can learn more about these recalls by running the VIN.) You may also want to bring along an OBDII code reader to check if there are any minor trouble codes, but if there's no "Check Engine" light during the test drive then you're fine.
You may want to take the car to a mechanic to check the air conditioning charge. We had a leak on one and we refilled the charge with no problems. On your test drive you could crank the A/C thermostat all the way down to 65 to see if it can handle the load. I guess that in a cold climate you'd want to check the heater too, but we haven't used a heater in our cars for over two decades.
If your longoard is bigger than 10'6" then you're going to want a roof rack...