Author Topic: Has there been a more recent discussion on "Cars for Smart People"?  (Read 34910 times)

DarinC

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Re: Has there been a more recent discussion on "Cars for Smart People"?
« Reply #50 on: May 11, 2015, 08:33:26 PM »
My Father in Law has not one, but TWO Priuses that he purchased to save gas. He's got a long commute, and is fairly intelligent, but I nearly couldn't put myself together when hearing the cost of those black holes and the justification for purchasing them.

Does everyone outside the MMM community simply forget about the vehicle cost when saving money on gas? It strikes me as profoundly stupid to plop down $10-15k just to save a grand or 2 per year in gas.
That sounds like a decent deal to me. There are very few things that return ~10-15% ROI. It's likely more than that, since Prius owners pay far less for brake work b/c of regenerative braking and the cars in general are as or more reliable than other yotas, but still... A car that pays itself off via savings sounds like a good thing to me.

Replacing the batteries are a whole different ball park of cost for a prius vs a regular car. Just because the electric batteries have come down in price doesn't mean they are anywhere NEAR as cheap as a regular car battery (especially because regular car batteries are common... I can wheel, deal, and barter for those. And less likely to be damaged in a crash, so it's easy to get one out of a parts car up here).

So I would say the whole supply/demand (scarcity) thing is an issue here.
It depends on where you're located, but individual replacement modules for a Prius run about $40 each in large metro areas, which isn't too bad. My Prius recently threw the usual error codes for pack failure and I ended up replacing a pair of modules (one of them is still good) for $80. The pack itself is also pretty robust. It's located under the rear seat and has 3 brackets holding it down between the rear strut towers, so they don't tend to be damaged unless there's a really really bad crash.

Having said that, as time goes by individual module failures become more common and sooner or later it'll be less time consuming/frustrating to replace all 28 battery modules rather than play whack a mole with individual modules, which runs ~$1000+ for a ~1-2 year old salvage pack. That however, should get someone another decade or two of trouble free driving, at least from the battery pack.

cerebus

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Re: Has there been a more recent discussion on "Cars for Smart People"?
« Reply #51 on: May 12, 2015, 12:17:48 AM »
I have found that if I buy a car at a good price, I can drive it for about a year and lose nothing to depreciation. In all honesty, I have sold my last 4 cars for more than I paid after driving it for around a year.

Cars are my hobby, so I have only had fun or fast vehicles, but do all my own maintenance and repairs.

My last 4

2006 Corvette- bought for 22,800 sold for 24,500
2005 Silverado- bought for 8,500 sold for 10,500
1965 Cobra (Factory Five)- Built for 26,000 sold for 39,000
1999 Corvette FRC- Bought for 14,250 sold for 15,750

It takes time and patience but I really enjoy it.

After finding the forums and MMM, I decided that my 2006 Corvette (which was paid for with cash) was too much of a luxury. I wanted something that was still "fun" but got better mileage.

So my current car 2010 GTI- bought for 9,900 expect to sell it for about 11k in the next couple of months.

Not for everybody, as I search Craigslist multiple times a day, but again for me its fun.

Just my .02

I'm not a car guy at all but that's pretty boss.