there probably arent too many 200k priuses out there now, but battery failure has been quite rare >100k, conceding the technology has been around for 9-10 years so we dont know for sure if/when problems arise in significant number at 150k if not 100k. we will see, i believe there will be a relatively inexpensive secondary market for them in 7 years as more of them are on the road.
is the prius a sure fire thing to “come out ahead”? no, but imho there is a pretty good chance. obviously a lot will depend on price of gas, and like every good freeper i want to drill baby drill and “coal keeps the lights on”. still, betting against the common sense and competence of US govt seems like a reasonable bet. even if we start drilling, it will take years to reap benefits from some of these places.
Re-reading my rant — her Toyota dealer was insisting that she rotate those tires every 5000 miles. That is, until her father talked sense into her.
Good to see that you took a logical approach to the purchase. I’m looking at the VW Diesel myself. The government is determined to drive the price of energy up. With the new higher fuel mileage standards, the price of fuel will rise so that we have the same cost per mile as we do with today’s cars. The only way to save money is to exceed the new average fuel mileage.