Considering Purchasing a 2017 Prius Prime Advanced

welcome!

prius are known for bad seats too, so figure out a way to do a good test before committing.

prius are more reliable than honda, thats not an issue.

price is a question mark, and can only be verified by shopping.

new primes get a $5,000. rebate in the northeast, another few grande in discounts, $4,500. irs tax credits and more credits in some states.
so keep that in mind vs used.
there is a prime pricing thread here

all the best!

 

I have a 2017 PP Advanced. I like it but don't love it. From a performance standpoint it's great. But in every other respect it ranges from meh to absolute hate. What's to hate? The GIANT functionless screen that consumes your interiour with distracting and hard to use "features". The whole Bluetooth system sucks. My 2015 Ram truck has far superior system. The PPA does not even have Apple or Google connections and the native system is frustrating beyond words.

The cost of selling and buying cars is high (taxes, fees etc... ) I wouldn't do it unless you were really convinced that this was THE exact car that you want.

 

Hi there! I'll reiterate a little bit what bisco was saying upthread. For $24k (I'm assuming this is the sticker price, so it'll be $25-26k with TT&L) you could easily get yourself a new 2021 LE model (the base trim) or even the middle trim XLE by buying one from out of state and having it shipped to you in GA cheaper than what Carmax is offering here (case in point, I bought my 2021 LE two months ago for a hair under $21K once you factor all costs and rebates). But it seems time sensitivity works against you here per your final sentence. Any particular reason why this is such a quick turnaround?

Some other things to consider between both cars: if this means anything to you, 2020s and 2021s are 5 seaters while the PP's before 2020 are all 4 seaters. Also, buying new means you've got the full warranties, including the 10 year/150,000 mile warranty on the battery, plus 2 years of Toyota Care maintenance (I'm sorry if I sound like a salesman, it's just a really cost effective deal to buy from out of state right now).

 

For what it's worth, I find the ride to be comfortable. Granted, I've driven mostly compacts/sub-compacts and my last two vehicles were pretty bottom of the line, so anything bigger and fancier than that was going to feel luxurious by comparison. I commute 40 miles a day typically for about an hour total in the car.

 

Yeah I’m a little incredulous; the auto industry doesn’t thrive by handing out money.

 

Where you live, the prime might good, but where I live, I can buy a brand new PP Advanced at a similar price after the tax credit. The switch from CRV to PP would sacrifice a lot of cargo space. I hope that is OK for your use case. I don't know anything about CRV, but for us, Nissan Pathfinder Hybrid was a much more comfortable and useful car despite the fact it is far less fuel-efficient than PP. We had both cars and wanted to get rid of one. I ended up selling the PP.

That being said, if your Carmax offer is as good as you say and you are really ready for a switch, yeah why not. But for comparison, you really should include all the costs, comfort, and usability into the equations.

 

I don't doubt her on the used car offer. Used car prices are at all-time highs, both supply and demand pushing things up.

 

the prius prime is reliable, only brought it into the dealership for the radar calibration tsb. other than that it's just the typical maintenance.

try look for a new model, if you stack it with federal tax credit and if your state offers any rebates it'll be close to that price point.

 

So, last night I bought a 2017 Prime Advanced, it is what I have been looking for. When I arrived the salesperson said he noticed a noise and the service person said it needed rotors. At 34,000 miles that is odd. I got a half mile away and I got an alert about low oil. I took it back and they added oil, now we check and I am over. But, I got the same message 30 miles out last night. So I am very concerned I have a lemon or something very wrong. My 2010 with 291k miles is a trooper. The dealer is 75 miles away so I am not trying to run back quickly.

 

The warning was more likely low oil pressure? AFAIK Toyota doesn't have oil level alerts. Low pressure is basically when you've nearly run out of oil. Also: a Toyota dealership sells cars that are just about oil-starved???

 

If I were you, I would take the car and demand the money back. No reputable dealer would sell a used car without at least checking the oil level before it goes out of their lot. It has trouble written all over.

 

Also, new brake rotors at 34k miles?!?! I've seen many claims on this site about brake PADS lasting over 100k miles because the PP mostly uses regenerative braking for everything but hard stops and the final few miles per hour on normal stops. That's pads, a normal wear item, not rotors. Either the mileage is wrong, the car has been seriously abused or the mechanic is mistaken. None of these choices are good.

I found a brake focused website saying they did a brake life poll among original Prius owners and none selected "less than 60k miles", 60% lasted over 100k, 20% over 200k, 6% between 160k and 200k.

EDIT: In the comments of this article, there are a couple people saying they had short brake rotor life, ~30k and speculate it is from corrosion from lack of use in high road salt areas

 

Yes since Prius has regen braking, the brakes do not get used much.
So in some cases, they can go 100k+ on original pads/rotors
But in high snow/salted areas this can be detrimental to Prius hybrids, just ask @vvillovv

A lot of people will do the "neutral/braking" from time to time.
However, if the rotors get bad at all, they may get too far to "neutral/brake" to clean them.
Owners will put it in neutral and then apply brakes to "clean"
This can be done a few times when coming to a stop, going downhill, or some as they get off a freeway ramp.
Use with caution, and please make sure that your brakes are in good condition to try this conditioning.

@Jmfireman77
if that dealer actually sold you a car without a general looksee over it, that is not nice.
See if you can get full money back with the clause period.
low oil driving can do damage.

 

Yes front pads and rotors at 30k miles. But I attribute the worst part of the brake wear to what I found while cleaning the grease on the caliper slide pins. I'll know more in another year or two depending on how far we drive the car in the future.
@MonkeyMon I like our 2017 Prius Prime Plus a lot. I still drive our 2006 Civic Hybrid too. The wife didn't like the looks of the 06 Prius which I recommended, but I'm not too unhappy about the Honda in the long run although it's definitively been a long journey especially after warranty.
Best of luck with your car, whichever way you choose.

 

We have a 2017 Prius Prime Advanced with 203k miles (purchased new). I have a 60 mile commute each way, ends up being 4 hrs a day in the car with NY traffic. We also travel weekly 200+ miles each way to a vacation home. The car has been fantastic. We just brought our 2007 Prius in for an inspection (which it passed) with almost 500k miles.

 

Great news on both your 07 and 17 Prius's. Can you share your typical maintenance action? Do you follow maintenance manual guidelines? Thx.

 

I don't have all of the services performed, we have never gone every 5k. We change the oil every 10k, sometimes it goes to 12k. We have the 120k maintenance done with spark plugs and the coolant. That's it.

We brought it to an independent mechanic for an inspection. He said we needed brakes (the car had like 80k miles or less). I think he was not honest and we didn't need it. I'm only going to Toyota after that. Otherwise, we have brought the car to Toyota for everything except for an oil change or two.