Anxious for the test drive!

I got the C4, and after having it my wife then had to buy a new car just to have one feature I have. I do not think i can go with out it now.

The smart key. It just makes things very covenant.

 

The C2 will be great for him! He'll love it and the price is great. We have the C4 with moonroof and heated seats, etc. Love it and enjoy the bluetooth through the radio when getting a phone call on our iphone, keyless entry (touch of the door handle to open and close), satellite radio, and most of all those softex seats. But for a young guy, he doesn't really need all the extras. Good luck on your negotiations!

 

Tomster, I recently purchased a GenIII Two Prius liftback. Every new auto I've purchased has had its new aftermarket stereo & speakers installed because of the quality of the music. This prius no different than the others. For $1100 I had an Alpine IVE-W530 DVD reciever with Kenwood speakers installed at an aftermarket place. It simply has incredible bass and highs + many options. I'm sure you could spend more with nav and satellite or could spend less to have him install the stereo himself. Just a thought. Who says you must go with an OEM stereo...

 

When I was wheeling and dealing for the new car, I think each $1k translated to $18 month on the car payment, give or take.

 

I have the Two, and it's perfect for me. The other stuff would be neat bonuses, but I was pushing my budget as it was. Just having the Aux jack and Bluetooth for my phone were major upgrades from my last car (As were the power locks and windows, CD player, functioning door handle...heh)

Hope you both like it on the test drive! Driving a hybrid feels a lot different than regular cars, so keep that in mind while you're driving. It might feel like it's not accelerating briskly because you're used to the sound and feeling of gears changing during acceleration, but keep an eye on the speedometer. (This, at least, was my experience. The continuously variable transmission took a few drives to get used to).

 

The three reasons for my C4 purchase are:

1. Alloy wheels: don't care about style of alloy just don't like steel wheels.
2. Seats: hurt my eyes with the stripes in the middle.
3. Fog lights: the most important thing to me. I love brightness, lumens so I changed both headlights and fog lights to HID: 55W for headlights and 35W for fog lights. Amazing bright like from a 747.

 

I have a C3. Etunes is nice and connects to an Iphone easily. Nav is ok, seen better and worse in a car. I think the reason I really liked the 3 was the smart key. Everyone has thier options that they put value on. Mine was the smart key. Kinda nice just walking up to a car, opening the door and start going.

The CVT was the thing that actually took the most getting used to. I thought because of the high revs on acceleration I was pushing the car hard. I am not at all, it just moves the CVT to where the most power to gas is for acceleration. Took a couple of weeks for me to get used to it.

I drove the new Yaris for a test drive as well. Acceleration was higher on the C. Ride was better on the C. Road noise was about the same.

If he drives it like his current car, without any changes to his driving style, he will see a significant increase in fuel economy. If he starts to drive it for economy, it will go higher. I am just learning now the best way to eek out a bit more, but I am also used to autos with higher performance so have a bit of a lead foot at the green light . Even with that, I still get 49-51 with mostly 40-50 MPH drives to work each day.

When he is getting used to the C if he decides to buy it, he may want to leave the econ mode off for a bit. I have found overall that it is a wasted button except for highway cruising overall. It changes the way the accelerator feels and responds to eek out more milage. It also makes the car feel sluggish as you have to push further down on the accelerator to get going. I actually do better with it off for MPG except for highway cruising, but, I do have a heavy foot.

 

Price was a major factor in my decision to buy this car. I'm glad I was able to get the Prius name and hybrid system, because I believe it is the best that is available.

Before buying, I compared all the models and decided the 3 was as low as I would go. I started with a quote from a car buying service (I used USAA. Truecar would be another one). I was happy with the starting point of $21,700. Granted, my dealer had a few add-ons (tint, door protectors, alloy wheel upgrades and fancy floor mats) that drove the price up a bit. I was able to negotiate on these, and remained very happy.

Why the 3? Convenience. The SmartKey system. I absolutely love it. The nav/entune/touch screen and voice recognition. If I were going for pure economy, the 2 would have been great. The 3 is a nice balance between economy and a hint of 'luxury' (read: convenience) features. The only thing that makes me jealous of the 4 are the seat warmers... and maybe the outer mirror warmers. But I didn't see the value balancing the cost for the 4.

All told, I still walked out the door with a loaded 3 (with tax, tags, dealer fees etc) for less than I could have bought the baseline Prius 3rd Gen with tax.

 

Just thought I'd put my input

Originally I wanted the C2 but due to lack of inventory, I knew haggling with dealers would be harder to do. I didn't care for the entune/navi/etc. because I knew that I could always replace the headunit with an aftermarket one later. The smart key didn't mean much to me since I never had it before, I wouldn't be missing it right?

But due to timing and inventory, I ended up with a C3. I'd like to think I got a good price for that time(July $21,700 + destination&taxes&fees*)

For the test drive, I would make sure that he takes the car onto the freeway as acceleration seems to be something people have a problem with.

After having my c3 for 4months and 5k mi, I'm happy I got the c3. I'm always trying to do push start in other cars(by habit) and the part that I really love... opening doors without taking out my keys. This has helped so much when I have my hands full with groceries/packages!


*Please don't tell me if this was not a good deal... I'll cry.