Not all Costs and Benefits are Measured at the Pump- Traded 2012 Prius Level 5 for a Truck

Yeah, Prius is not for everyone. The way you word it seemed like the Prius is the only vehicle in your family. For single vehicle family, Prius is not enough to do everything especially with 2 adults and 3 teenagers. It doesn't even have room for a gun rack. It's good for a second vehicle daily driver to and from work. Road trips with the family definitely need a larger vehicle than a Prius. A Prius v is borderline big enough for a family of 4. For me, I won't take my Prius if there's more than 3 people. For 4 people or more, we take the Sienna. that sucker seats 8 people comfortably and still have room for strollers and luggage. The first gen Sienna bottoms out with 7 people but the second gen doesn't.
There's no sense of trying to rebut your reasons why the Prius is not for you. Yes there are some cost to driving a Prius but not monetary cost. If the monetary cost justifies the amenities and your emotional ties to a a larger vehicle then you've made a right choice by ditching the Prius and switch over to a larger vehicle. Prius is not for everyone. When the time comes for my parents to buy a new vehicle, I wouldn't recommend the Prius to them, not even the Prius v with 7 seats if it ever comes to the US. They'll be buying another Sienna.

 

what did you buy? i tried to read all the words, but didn't see anything but 'truck'.

 

If by truck you mean pick-up, you didn't get any safety. Despite the advantage of pick-ups have high rates of death.

 

I am very curious what truck seats 6 comfortably?
Kudos to you for standing up to the stereotypes and trying a Prius. Sorry it wasn't the right car for you.

 

It's a big, wide world. You gave it a try but it didn't work out. Perhaps when the kids are gone it would make more sense. Then, though, there are "kids moving out" duties, and "kids moving back in" duties, and "kids moving from place to place" duties that require trucks (and even trailers.) Each vehicle is a compromise of some sort, and our needs-meter go to different places.

Best o' luck to you.

(really, was there any need to mention gun racks?)

 

I agree that Toyota Prius sucks as far a quality spacious interior design goes... It could be way better without the center dividing console and bulky side arm rests and huge front dash that take up way too much space. And yes I get that having 3 teenage kids in your family is too much for you and you wife to haul in a Prius but 8 years from now when your Prius is still running perfectly and your kids are grown up and on on their own that won't matter anymore.

Most of all I can tell by what you write that you're more into spending huge heaps of money on brand new toys and getting instant gratification rather than being prudent in sticking with long term value. Long-term cost savings is just not important to you compared to the thrill of buying new vehicles often and wasting tens of thousand of dollars regularly when you could just buy a decent used Prius and a decent used truck that'll both last for a decade or more if you don't give up on 'em.

I could be wrong, but what you wrote gives me the impression that your intent is rationalize the wasteful financial management notions that Arizonans are famous for.

 

I appreciate the time you took to describe the reasons you found for replacing your Prius with a larger vehicle. It would be helpful to know which truck replaced your Prius, so if you can take the time, please let us know.

It does seem a bit strange you would not have considered all of these things before making the purchase, as you clearly knew what uses you intended for the car. Perhaps it turned out you were a bit too focused on the intriguing [apparent] irony of a Prius with an NRA sticker on it. If so, I applaud your willingness to consider something other than the oversized SUV as the go-to vehicle for American families, yet wish you'd have taken the family with you on a long test-drive before buying.

No doubt but that the Prius cannot be the car for everyone -- no more than an Escalade is the universal car for the masses.

I wish it had worked out for you, but I thank you for sharing the experience in a way that isn't filled with rude, name-calling tripe.

It is disappointing to see someone come to these conclusions based on one thread. Clearly, our OP is an NRA guy (2nd Amendment), but what else do you know about him except for the statements he's made in this thread?

He likely is a one-time poster and not a troller, and he doesn't seem to be setting himself up as a threat to the PC community. No need to make any further assumptions or incriminate an entire State of fellow citizens in the process.

 

Yea... I could of worded that better... It's not that he's a threat that I was reacting to... I'm just saying that people who buy brand new cars (in this case his 2012 Prius) and then changes his mind and buys (I assume new) truck so they can carry their Motorbikes around aren't people that spend frugally.

I can really relate to prius owners who buy used in order to maximize their savings on transportation costs over time and the Prius is a great car for that reason. So when it comes to all the people on here who buy brand new that seems like a huge waste to me. What's even worse is if they change their mind and then buy something else brand new, it just doesn't seem like they're thinking very clearly about how much money they're throwing away... I mean his entire message seems to be rationalizing that kind of wasteful behavior and it just doesn't make sense to me at all.

Of course I'm sure car manufactures prefer these kinds of customers!

 

My 07 Prius was for the teenagers to use as a pool car, replacing the family Sienna minivan. It has served well and one of the kids adopted the vehicle full time after it was retired from the pool. For getting three teens to/from school as well as the usual teen events, it worked well and provided the economical operation that teens can live with. It took the abuse of teen driving better than expected and the pretext of an eco minded drive seem to thwart the temptation to powersport through parking lots, albeit they did each receive a seemingly obligatory speeding ticket.

You went to a truck, what are your teens planning to drive ?

 

I can relate to your feelings, but I'm not so certain they are shared by that many people. Buying used has appealed to me for the basic fact that the first owner(s) already will have absorbed the majority of the depreciation on the car, and I will be the beneficiary (unless the car was abused). At the same time, and though I've bought a string of used cars, both Prius purchases have been new. For one, new has been easier than used, as at both times the demand on used Prius was so high that there wasn't much cost difference to go new. Second, I bought the brand new Gen III and had no option to buy that model used.

If you push the point of maximizing savings on transportation costs over time, I don't know whether the Prius is the way to go. I've always maintained that a used Civic is about the best way to go for low cost value.

 

Yea... I hesitate to even talk about the new vs. used debate because the issue probably has more to do with social-economic status / class structure than cost effectiveness.

And I know by bringing the issue up I'm going to upset some people for one reason or another, especially considering my writing style. As for what the best value is, that's specific to each owner, as well as to availability.

If you don't live in a big city in California an actual selection of used Prius to choose from isn't how it works. But that changes for the better anytime somebody trades their new Prius in for a Truck!

 

WOW, OP has made this rant thread and crap on 5 other threads last night. They all got deleted along with my response to one of his posts. I appreciate the mods keeping PC peaceful. I admit that I was a bit harsh in my response.

 

I'm grateful for the moderators.... There's many people I get along with here, but if we start talking about political opinions I'd probably turn on most of them. There is so much political deception and misinformation these days that if the right wingers on here revealed their true opinions I'd for sure become a crazed flame monster and say a bunch mean stuff because I know the difference between fact and fiction and I don't let TV and Radio tell me what I'm suppose to have for an opinion.

And though I certainly will never entirely agree with censorship, I'm pleased we're keeping the focus on what we can all agree on, which is the Prius.

That being said this particular anti-prius thread is obviously a great way to provoke alot of Prius lovers... But it's a good learning experience too. Specifically, through this post I've realized that we're all not just geeks who love Prius technology and want to DIY as much as possible. A great majority of Prius owners on here are not geeks so much as trophy hunters. As in owning a brand new car is a trophy, a statement of upward mobility, a vain way to show off wealth and sadly people are so desperate to do this that many will put themselves into an irresponsible level of debt just to create an artificial appearance of wealth. Can't say I can relate to that much. I'm more into the DIY folks on here that are used to getting 10 or 20 years of life out of each vehicle they own.

In other words, he who has the most toys when they die wins nothing and a Prius is not a toy, it's a technology in transition from gas guzzler to zero-emission vehicles... It's not just a good way to save money, it's also a good way to put far less poison into the air we all breathe!

 

I, too, am grateful for all of the work the moderators do to keep PriusChat up and running and valuable.

This is hardly a case of censorship. The moderators clearly found the OP was not following the rules. Even so, I thought this particular thread was not much of a threat to PriusChat. I don't know that it really was anything bad. The other threads must have been pretty ugly, though. Or the whole group of threads was evidence of some intent to damage the site and not help other members.

 

Well... I think it's important that moderator's communicate what they are doing to someone or somewhere... Is that happening?

Who is OP?

I see that so often but I don't ever see someone with that name? What is OP's username?

 

OP's username in this thread is 2ndAmendment. He had more than 3 posts yesterday.

 

OIC...

OP = Original Poster

Thanks!

 

"Truck" could still imply SUV, including an oversized one.

All SUVs, pickups, minivans, most "crossovers" and some vehicles that look like cars are all classified as "light trucks".

 

What American family that buys brand-new cars isn't a 2-car family? Of course the Prius isn't a great primary car for a family of 5 - that's what the OTHER car/SUV/minivan is for.