the choice was really no choice given what we were looking for in a car; room for two adults, our two sons, and ample room for luggage and a cooler for vacations and road trips. the short list was the VW Jetta Sportwagon TDI, Honda CR-V, and the Toyota Prius v. we owned several VW's and we've never been happy with them, but we gave it the benefit of a look. the fit and finish haven't changed in a decade and the quality wasn't much better. strike that from the list. the CR-V was really, really nice, had some neat extras, like the release handle to fold down the rear seats, but the gas mileage is an 800 pound gorilla. i read the Honda lists and quickly found that the estimated 35 MPG on the highway was not really a realistic number. that left the Prius v. my wife really liked it, i wasn't so sure - i spent more time with the calculator then i did reviewing the specs, features, and ride quality. for me, the hybrid option was a numbers game - when does it make sense to speed the additional money for the hybrid technology. well, that answer was this past Monday. i ran through the numbers and it was clear, the initial cost of the Prius v was more than the CR-V, but that difference would be gone after 15,000 miles, if the price of gas doesn't change. i was more interested in the car now that my "analytical" brain was satisfied, it was time to entertain my "fun" brain. yesterday we took delivery of a Metallic Grey Prius v Three. my wife is very happy. after dinner i decided to get to know the car a little better and took the family on a nice drive on lesser traveled back roads. it didn't take me long to really enjoy the car, and i'm into hot hatches with powerful motors! it was very peaceful, and i found myself having to pay attention to my speed, it was easy to be 5 over the limit without realizing it. it surprises me to say this, but i'm loving the Prius v, i can't wait to drive it again
First of all welcome! I dismissed the VW TDI since the nearest dealer is 360 miles away and hearing horror stories of others trying to get things fixed. The only worse story was from a Mini owner where the company insisted that a warranty repair could only be performed at a dealer and told him to ship the car down to Seattle. I think the only thing we will miss on our v3 is AWD. Sure wish there was a system on the Prius like the Highlander.
thanks, my wife loves the car. she was able to run some errands yesterday without using the gas engine - that's money in the bank
My wife and I were in the same situation. Our final 3 cars were also those 3 (although I did consider waiting for the Mazda CX5 or new Escape). You made a great choice. I only have 500 miles on the car, but it has been doing awesome. We also got the Magnetic Gray...it looks really sharp with tinted windows!
Remember to review your state's Tinting laws before you go crazy on the tinting. Last thing you want is having to remove the tint cause your tinter didn't know better too.
Defintely!! We went with the Wincos 35 (legal in GA) all the way around. The heat reduction inside is incredible. Was in the high 80's here yesterday and with the sun beating directly on my side it was amazing. Warning though, it ain't cheap http://www.wincosir.com/
da-baron: Welcome to the group - I also have a v3. As it happens, I also went through a very similar exercise and the VW Jetta TDI wagon was also on the short list. I recently posted my thoughts on fuel costs about this particular comparison: http://priuschat.com/forums/prius-v...etta-tdi-wagon-prius-v-direct-comparison.html What I found was that even controlling for the same MPG, the Prius v is less expensive since diesel is costlier than gas.
i came to very much the same conclusion and the quality issues with VW real don't help matters. i will be looking for a new car in two or three years, so i'm really curious to see where the hot hatch market is - Mazda seems to be heading in the right direction but Subaru might have a hybrid out by then, maybe
How are you liking the wagon so far? Did you buy any extended warranty? If so, which package and how much? We just picked ours up today after placing an order 3 weeks ago. I just couldn't wait for what i ordered (prius v5 in sky color) and ended up with a v3 in that color. Loving it so far and am so glad I waited 3 weeks for the color I wanted. No idea how long the wait would have been for a v5. We did get sold on the extended warranty 7 years / 75K for $1050. Am now wondering if it's too late to return the extended warranty after reading all the posts on here about it being a waste of money. Now I just need to bring it back to the dealer to turn off the reverse beep. Thought it worked by setting it in the car setup, but that didn't work.
I had mine done at the 5000 mile service by the dealer - no charge for this. I have seen postings from some owners that some dealers will charge you if you bring it in for just this configuration change.
we declined the extended warranty but my wife wanted to maintenance package that covers 75k/5 years. it was $1320.00. i would preferred to have not got it, esp. since the first 2 years are free and after looking over the maint. schedule, not much to do other than oil and filter! are we going to spend $440.00 each year?
