Another Need Advice Thread - New Prius or Used Car

No brainer: Prius C trumps GM POS every day. I doubt you'll be able to keep the Saturn as long as the Prius without having to restore it.

 

I have never owned a Saturn. However, all the saturns i have seen are smoking and sounding like they are on their last leg at around 100-120,000 miles or they are in junk yards.

Although the Prius C is relatively new.... If you read more on here about prii, you will find that a lot of owners, such as myself have over 100,000 miles on their prius and they are still going strong. There is on gentleman on here that traded his prius in for a new one and I believe he had close to 500,000miles on it.

My parents have been buying toyotas for over 20yrs. (non hybrids) when they hit around 180,ooo-200,000miles they trade them in and still get over $3500 for a trade in....

Not sure where you are from but I honestly think a taxi cab company would not invest into a fleet of POS, NY is full of Prius taxis....

If you can wait, I would go for a prius....

 

was in your situation for the past month mulling whether to go used or new. We ended up leasing at 0% a prius v. We opted for predictable and stable monthly cost over having to save up and worry about unexpected maintenance of an used vehicle.

That said. If i was (or had close friends/family that were) more car savvy, i would consider a used car in good condition. Not a Saturn though (have not heard a Saturn lasting longer than any Toyotas ever).

 

see if you can negotiate for 0% if you put a security deposit down

seeing how this is a Prius forum. i'd doubt many would suggest the Saturn over the c

 

when I was weighing new/used - prius vs other cars, it seemed like the more miles i drove each year the cheaper the prius became over the lifetime of the vehicle (we plan on keeping at least 12 years / 150,000 miles). Just setup a spreadsheet with estimated lifetime costs for fuel, maintenance, insurance, loan costs, registration, etc. - then add in the up-front ownership costs. extrapolate out for however long you plan to own the car, subtract whatever you think the sale price of the vehicle will be when you sell it, and then you have a good starting point for total cost of ownership.

 

I did some number crunching to try and help you with your decision.
From what I saw online, the Astra has an average fuel economy of 27 mpg, the Prius c has an average fuel economy of 50 mpg.
Here are my assumptions:

1) You can buy the Astra for $7000.
2)You can get the Prius C for $19,000 (I used the approximate invoice price from TrueCar.com).
3) Price of gas is $5 per gallon.
4) You drive 15,000km per year.

It will take you ~14 years from the fuel savings to break even. (Of course, I didn't account for insurance and maintenance costs)

Of course, the Astra might require more repairs over the time you plan to keep it, but the price difference is $12,000 so you can use some of the money you saved from buying the Astra and use it for potential repairs.

If you're going to buy used, just get a mechanic to check it out first.

In the end it's up to you...if you have lots of money to spend on a car and you like the Prius C, go for it. If you feel that your money is better spent elsewhere, then the Astra would probably be better.

I hope this helps a little.

 

Can't figure out why you'd even bother w/the Astra other than it being cheap. It had below average reliability in Consumer Reports. There are conflicting reports about whether the 08 model year was the only one.

IIRC, in one review I read, it didn't even have an aux input jack, which is odd for a car of that age.

Yep.

Given how terrible the Chevy Cruze's reliability is (where Opel played a role in its engineering), I wouldn't bother w/the Astra.

If you're going to consider a used Saturn, you may as well consider other used cars, including used Priuses.