Featured 2025 Camry SE HEV is lower rated than 2024 Camry LE HEV by Consumer Reports

i would say the same about the 24 vs previous generation. better fuel economy, but noiser engine, lower stance, donut instead of full spare, but better trunk space with battery reconfiguring .
it's always about tradeoffs

 

So an SUV is now necessary for a high rating? I know a couple who traded in a 4 month old SUV because they found it difficult to get in and out of. Honda Accord replaced it.

What subjective BS.

 

I wished I knew the difference between an SE and an LE. They seem the same to me.

 

I really wish there were a Yaris hybrid in the USA, one for some $5,000 cheaper than the Corolla. The Corolla hybrid is just a tad too expensive, yet so are all used Toyotas that don't have a blown engine or bent frame or a quarter of a million miles on them or something similar.

 

Guess CR couldn't find a 2025 LE to test.

The engine noise of these newer models is likely from the direct injection.

Had a 2016 SE. It is mostly aesthetics. Some minor features; I could view individual tire pressures, while the other trims could not. Go further back, and there may have been performance differences.

The Prius c was nearly $20k when it was cancelled.

Just getting a Yaris, Mazda2, or any subcompact would be nice. Won't happen in the next four years if tariffs are applied.

 

This is a hard adjustment for those of us who grew up when cars were simpler, more disposable and rarely leased. It meant that any kid could get a decent running car for a summer's wages.

What some of that nostalgia misses is that a base Corolla hybrid is quite a car. It has a good ride, sits four full sized adults comfortably is fast (look at 0-60 times from the 70s and 80s), wildly efficient, and even has AC and a radio. In the 1970s, that was a luxury car.

Leasing is a form of easy credit that has people drifting toward more expensive new cars too.

I do think there could be a change in the composition of the market if used car prices stick as close to new car prices as they have in the last couple of years. I could see Toyota continuing to offer the current Corolla with worse finishes and older tech while it still sells the new generation, something like what VW does in other markets by selling older Golf models, or what Ford used to do in South America. However that takes a critical mass of buyers who don't want the better equipped used cars and would be happy with a new car that just starts and runs without a computer game on the console.

 

it's true. i want most of those things, but at the right price, which often doesn't work out.
some people have little self control.
even in the 60's when most ofthose things weren't available, there were other goodies that were 'must haves' and now, most of those are standard.
when i purchased my '91 miata, they had a stripped down version with crank windows. cost me 12k.

 

Today's car buyers: "Well, if I'm going to spend a really unreasonably huge portion of my income, I'd better get..."

Today's carmakers: "Did you just say there was a way for us to get an unreasonably huge portion of your income? Okay, you're on!"

I have used some really old affordability rules to pick cars. There aren't very many cars on the market that still pass that criteria.

I still haven't seen a good reason to budge away from using those rules so I'm just lamenting the lack of choice.

 

The top trim was $25k in 2018- that trim was cancelled for 2019.

Edit: adding-

You have to go back to 2016 to find any Prius c that had a sub-$20k window sticker.

 

The first 20 minutes of this interview of the Savage Geese guys and the Car Care Nut bear in this. One notes that manufacturers say that need to keep evolving "infotainment" because people won't buy cars without a good version. AMD, a mechanic, says he hears his customers react negatively to the distraction and complexity.

I don't get why anyone would want a seat adjustment dependent on an electrically driven motor when a lever or geared dial are simpler and work. This business of replacing a rearview mirror, a bit of tech that worked two thousand years ago and can't fail without a repeal of the laws of physics, with an image from a camera that takes a different focal distance seems like a step backward.

I wonder how much of this is generational.

 

Next they'll criticize it for needing twice as many tires as anybody else's motorcycle. Harrumph.

 

Toyota supply has loosened up and is flowing better to your south. (CA may be a different story). I'm not seeing dealer mark up like I did even six months ago, and one can buy a prius under MSRP. Lighter interiors are easier to find than dark ones near me. Lower grades are relatively rare, and many of any grade will come festooned with lots of TruCoat-style port installed nonsense.

Part of the increase in car prices here is just monetary inflation. We increased our money supply by 40% coming out of the covid lockdowns. So you had a couple of years of supply disruption, fewer goods and more dollars chasing them, but with a lot of people driving less. Then when things started to really open up again and people wanted new cars, you had lots of buyers chasing a modest supply.

I think your idea that some manufacturers are raising their engine only model prices closer to their hybrid prices is true too. The engine only models really don't have that much less tech in them, if they were too much cheaper they might undercut hybrid sales.

 

I think the efficiency of manufacturing has reached a point that the costs to offer a less equipped car result in a price difference not large enough for most buyers to care about.

 

It would seem that modularity sort of requires that if the car doesn't have Attractive Option installed, it would need to have Blank Panel installed instead, and it sounds like you're saying the costs of the two aren't all that different.

 

Many options are just turn off this bit in the controlling computer. My every option model still has a blank panel where I wondered the other night what switch would have gone there.