Quote:
Originally Posted by Isaac Zackary
Thanks! It's always good to sit down and think, "why am I doing this?"
I'm kind of sick of having two cars. The wife isn't really able to drive. So right now having a total of three vehicles is ridiculous. I can't keep up fixing all three. Really I don't want to repair and maintain anymore. Well maybe a little. But not on three completely different vehicles with their +200,000 mile problems. So if I could sell all and go with one car, that would be great. And on top of that an electric car would seem like a good low maintenance option. No oil changes, no sparkplugs.
I'm not going after just the lowest operating cost nor the best fuel mileage. I need a car that fits the needs of a regular family of four to get around town, in a cold area. Short distances mainly, but an occasional long trip. The Leaf seems great as far as heaters go. Heated seats all the way around. I wonder what other vehicles have that. And for the occasional long trip we could either rent, or with the limited distance of an EV have a good reason to convince the wife we should just take the plane or bus to visit her mom who lives 600 miles away.
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It seems that you are leaning toward one newer car with the lowest overall costs of operation. Consumer Reports publishes the list of annual operating cost for all cars (including depreciation). I hate to say these words... but a one or two year old Prius is your best choice if you don't want to fix it and still want to lower emissions and higher gas mileage. Not sure where the Volt lands in that regard but it does give you the electric operation you want for local travel and gas for your ling distance travel.
By the way, I drove a recently for about 20000 miles and was VERY impressed with the 2014 Toyota Avalon Hybrid.
If you want a cheap, very underrated but good all electric. Check out the Mitsubishi iMeve