Quote:
Originally Posted by PLCZ4M
I just my as daily drive.. Need to get a mpg car for daily drive.. Z4M = awesome but expensive for daily drive.
|
I did the math on that, didn't work out for me.
If you drive 400 miles a week
- 15mpg on the M, 26.6 gallons of fuel ~ $110
- 50mpg in a Prius, 8 gallons of fuel ~$32
So after a year you spend 5720 on fuel for the M and 1662 on the Prius. So you save roughly 4k a year on fuel. Add in $500 a year for more expensive incidentals on the M (more expensive tires, etc.).
So if you spend 25k on a prius, you'd only break even in about 5-6 years without taking into account things like opportunity cost or interest payments.
So at least for me, it would only make sense if I could pick up the prius for 8k or less. I think that might be possible with a < 2005 model; but at that point you may have to buy a new battery for 3500 bucks and may have extra service costs on an older car negating all the savings.
With a longer commute, then the numbers start to make sense.