Is a Hybrid Worth the Money?
November 20, 2007 by Karen Weideman
Filed under automotive, saving money
People have been wondering if the extra cost of a hybrid vehicle is worth the savings on gas. Now Edmunds has done a cost analysis of some of the top hybrid models. We can know how much longer it will take to get a return on investment should you buy the hybrid versions of the cars in their study.
We have a winner . . . The Ford Escape gives you the quickest payback. Owners will break even in only 3 years. The Honda Civic and the Mercury Mariner tie at number 2. The Saturn Vue comes in at number 3, which allows owners to break even in 4.8 years. According to Clark Howard, any hybrid offering return on investment in under five years is a smart buy.
The Toyotas didn’t do so well. The Toyota Highlander takes 11 years to break even and the Camry takes 12 years. Eeeekkkk!!! Even worse, the Toyota Corolla will take you 17.9 years. Ouch! Toyota, the greenest of all the automakers, doesn’t give you a good payback on your hybrid-purchasing dollar. Sounds the Toyota is for environmentalists and not for the frugal.
I was pretty impressed with Edmunds website. They have some interesting and informative articles on their site.
Do you own or have you considered buying a hybrid?
Great snooping!
Thanks. Just don’t add snooping to my Thrifty Karen name. lol
Consider a “hacked” prius… they get about 80 to 100 mpg. They are just modified so that they can be plugged in to charge so you start the day with 100% charge on your batteries… normally you do not.
I am thinking about building my own electric truck..ford rangers have been done.. perhaps an S-10?…
I would buy a hybrid and am seriously considering the purchase.
What did Edmund’s do when there is not a non-hybrid version to compare the car/truck/etc to? I can’t seem to locate the comparisons you were talking about, so maybe I need to simply dig further to find the answer.
Jeff: Good for you. I’m glad you’re able to do things to the vehicles to make them more efficient. I hope those “things” are legal.
Maria: If you are serious about purchasing a hybrid, then I would suggest taking a look at this green car guide from Edmunds. They have a lot of interesting articles.
http://www.edmunds.com/fueleconomy/index.html
p.s. Maria- Hope it’s helpful. Good luck to you.
Thanks for this info. We are getting a new car next year and were interested in a hybrid, but we’re more frugal than environmental, so I think we’ll hold off on the hybrid!
The question is is a hybred worth the $
Maybe the analysis ought to be done on every car before buying. I purchased a $30,000 car 18 months ago that averaged 21 mpg the value of the car now is 14,000 with 28,000 miles.So far that car value has drpoed $16,000 I just bought a prius that is averaging 50+ mpg. I was spending about $14.00 a day to go to work I now spend less then $5.00 . Also The hybred will be worth nearly its today value if the gas trend of today continues. A 2 year old prius has only droped in value about 10 % on the internet as well as on the car lots if you can even find used one.
Where as my last car droped in value more then 50%. So for me $30,000 for a 20 mpg car or $25,000 for a 50 mpg car seems to me is a better deal. Gas is not going to get lower plus the added beneifit its better for the enverioment
Russel: I totally see where you’re coming from. When this article was written, I’m sure gas prices were about $1 less per gallon. Now that the price of gas is so high, I’m sure we can expect to see more articles comparing the different hybrids. This will be very beneficial for those of us that waited to make the purchase so that we can make the best decision for ourselves. On the other end of things, I don’t have a car payment. I can buy a lot of gas before I can afford to make a purchase of a hybrid car. When I do need to make the purchase though, it will definitely be something that we’ll check in to. Hopefully, by then we won’t need the extra room of a mini van.
Karen I do agree with you that no car payment is the best way to save money as you can buy a lot of gas for the amount spent on a car payment. My comment was for those fokes purching a new car might won’t to take a secound look at the hybred (Prius) from a different prospective. As a man we somethimes look at things in a differant way then the ladies but I too like savine whereever I can. I enjoy your comments keep up the good work. Russel
I am still heavily researching our car purchase options, but it is hard considering our current vehicle will be paid off in one month, and at this time, we really only need one vehicle. None the less, one thing that really bothers me in most of these analysis is that the externalities (i.e. environmental costs) are not compared/quantified… or even qualified for that matter. Some of these costs were unable to be dealt with due to the unknowns, but there hardly is a qualitative discussion available, much less quantitative.
Beyond the cost of the vehicle and externalities, there is little to no discussion out there on the recycling and reusing of parts that some hybrid producers employ– IOW– the discussions on life-cycle analysis are limited. With a little digging, you can find that Toyota reuses, recycles and reclaims a lot of their parts.
All of this to say that the true cost is not represented in the sticker price or cost of fuel, but rather is a set of complicated, often times unquantifiable, factors that require a complex and immensely personal trade-off analysis.
Maria: I would suggest paying off your car and then paying your savings account your car payments for at least a year, if not more. You may even want to have the money drafted from your checking account each month and transferred to savings so that you won’t be tempted to spend the money. Next year, you’ll have a good amount of money saved to put down on the car and there should be more comparison information available. I hope this helps.
Karen: That is the direction we are leaning already… but we will probably use that money to pay off some other things (like my student loans), and then reevaluate again each year. My husband is out of the country for nine or ten months a year, and if that continues, we could save up almost the entire cost of a new car prior to actually needing to buy said car. I’m sad, because I really want something more appropriate for me, but his Envoy (our current vehicle) is … well … what it is. About to be paid off.
And I do hope that time will bring more of an analysis of of life-cycle and externalities. Spoken like a true economist, right? LOL!
BTW– I love your website, and it encourages me to try to stay relatively frugal. Your site and a few others motivate me daily!
Maria: Sounds like you’ve got a plan and that’s important. I would pay off the car and start the debt snowball process. Have you read any of Dave Ramsey’s books? Last year we took the Financial Peace classes at our church and it helped to get us on track. We’ve paid off about $15,000 in debt in the last year. Some people that haven’t taken his courses say that his book “Total Money Makeover” is a really good read.
Thanks for your kind words about the site. We really enjoy saving money and getting the most for our dollar.