when should you trade in your Prius,before it becomes a money pit?

Exactly!

 

Off-topic but have you tried swapping homes with someone closer? There may be someone within a few miles of your workplace that would be thrilled to get out of their home and closer to where your home is. You are probably passing them going the other direction on the highway every morning.

 

Thought about it. But:

I like where we live (13 years now).
My daughter loves her school and would be really unhappy to switch.
My employer is the suburbs, We're in the exurbs.
I can still afford the commute (this might change).
I could find a job closer to home but most likely would have to take a cut in pay.

 

ok. from your post I thought you were trying, and ready, to move closer. there are a lot of folks, including myself, who picked a home based on $1 gasoline.

 

Yeah, I noticed that when shopping for my Prius. The car seems particularly robust and the demand for them is particularly high. Impressive as a current owner, annoying when I was a potential buyer!

Will trade my insurance bill with anyone at anytime. Been in 1 accident that was my fault in over 500k miles. Sun was in my eyes, and I was cresting a hill. Eh.

Tesla. Why on earth would anyone buy a Tesla?! It's a stretched Elise platform that is 1) heavier than an Elise, which means 2) it's slower and doesn't handle as well for 3) 3x the price. Seems to make no sense.

 

Because I never heard of an Elise b4 (until just now). And Teslas cost 100 large. I needed a really expensive car to use as an example of what I might have driven - not what I would ACTUALLY have driven with the savings. That would have been for blow and hookers (just kidding).

 

That makes two of us. Looks like the Elise is made by Lotus.

Lotus Elise - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Ron

 

Toyota's basic lease is 15,000 miles a year. Average US mileage is 13,000

By reading repair records compiled from hard data, see Consumer Reports for example. Something people should do before they buy or lease any car.

 

Probably more people who have had to take any job they can get no matter the distance from the home they cannot sell.

Our business closed and my commute went from 30 miles round trip to 96 miles round trip. Some mitigating circumstance, commute went from 5 days a week to 3 days. Getting the Prius meant I used no more gasoline on my new commute than I used on my old commute with my 30 mpg Escape Hybrid.

A hybrid with 50 mile EV range will eliminate even that gasoline usage. I should be able to get one in 2015.

 

Prius is one of THE most reliable cars on the road. It is even better than Camry in my opinion. My 2004 Prius cost very little money to maintain, and at 172K still going strong as 110K when I bought it. Of cause I take care of it, replaced transmission fluid, spark plug, serpentine belt, 12V battery, tire, oil, filters when it needs. But all those cost adds up not much at all. I average $0.98/100 mile so far, drive about 26K miles/year. I budgeted enough for a HV battery in future. Even that happens, I would expect $3/100 mile maintenance cost at most.

I plan to buy another Prius Gen II soon.

 

A local taxi company has a fleet of 5 Prii with 380k to 400k on them. All have original batteries and they tell me almost no maintenance costs. I plan to keep my 05 for as long.
Terry

 

That is pretty good, $0.98/100 mile. With gas and amortization of the 04 Prius included what are you running all in?

I think my 07 is running me about $20/100 mile, if I run it to 200,000.

 

I estimate the depreciation during the 2.5 year is $1500 ($8000 - $6500), gas average price $3.70/gal. Based on those, the major cost per 100 miles is about $12/100 miles (gas, maintenance and depreciation).

 

0-60mph in 3.7 seconds is pretty quick! I guess if you like to go over 125mph it could be considered slow.

 

Duplicate. DELETEME.

 

I think that idea is an oversimplification. People have a certain amount of disposable income and they choose where to spend it. It's not odd at all to be willing to spend money to get the benefits of a new car but be wary about TCO. Frankly, I think your advice was self-centered and unhelpful.

 

OP:

As far as I have read the Prius doesn't have a record of general failure. Maintain it, don't drive it after it's warned you of problems, check PriusChat for advice so you don't get ripped off by your dealer. Couriers and cab drivers have driven it over 300k without problems, generally.

Grumpycabbie (in the UK) reported a steering rack problem in the Gen3, but he was doing a lot of very tight maneuvers. Greek cab drivers had battery failures, but that was due to the vent getting blocked in their hot, dusty environment. What we aren't really seeing are persistent parts failure or wear problems that plague certain cars.

Basically, the more miles you drive the better off you are. It's expensive if you don't drive many miles per year because your per-mile traction battery cost would be high, but other than that, have at it.

For used-car buyers the battery cost issue is a big one. It can be $3.5k new battery+dealer install, but there are services that can rebuild a battery for less by just replacing failing modules (and some people have done-it-themselves). The result is that a high-mileage used Prius isn't the best for people with low cashflow, even though it's a good long-term bet.

 

I agree with almost everything that was posted except for the above statement. The Gen 2 Prius does seem to have a history of the inverter pumps going bad. There have been quite a few members here on Prius Chat discussing the pump, as well as having to change them. IIRC, there was even a TSB issued on the pumps for certain Gen 2's.

Ron

 

Yes, the HV electric water pumps don't last the life of the 04-07 liftbacks (for most of us). The one on mine pooped out at 181K miles on 9/13/12. A warning sign of its imminent demise was the cooling fan was running during warm weather (80°) which I had not noticed before. I intended to wait until Aug/Sept 2013 before replacing it under the LSC, which expired Nov 13.

After the first P0A93 code occurred, I made an appointment immediately and had Toyota replace it for free. There's a big difference in the flow rate with the new pump (fresh di-lithium crystals?) and it seems the car's producing more regen now with the new pump since the inverter is running at its optimum temp range.

 

Are they repeated faiures, or has the problem been fixed? There's a big difference.