Cars I sat in today

[flea]

Went to Honda dealer at 4pm. Drive

2010 Insight. Hybrid, the Prius competition. Size for mr. flea was big enough, but not by much. The back seat is pretty darned small. Drove fine. Price: maybe 20K?

2010 Civic Hybrid. Was bigger inside than Insight. Drove like a Civic; barely felt like a Hybrid at all. More pickup than the Insight. Price: hybrid was 22K, non-hybrid, 17.

2010 Fit. My god this vehicle is enormous inside. The river's seat doesn't crank down, but it doesn't need to. mr. flea had miles of headroom, and the back seat was palatial. From the outside it looks tiny. I cannot imagine how they do it. We didn't drive it. Price: maybe 14-16? Must check. They do have a stick.

Got kids, went to Toyota dealer at 6pm.

2010 Matrix. Fine inside - felt bigger than the Civic, not as immense as the Fit. Is actually a larger car than either. Gas mileage not great. They have a stick. Price: 19K. 0% financing with NO money down seems to be available for this one - yoicks! mr. flea drove it - said it was fine, nothing to get excited about.

2010 Prius. mr. flea really just doesn't fit in this. He drove it. Price: 24K+.

I am a fan of the Fit, for space, price and value. We'd need to drive it, of course. About 15 people on Facebook who have them told me they love them.

mr. flea just isn't excited about much of anything. He likes the idea of the hybrids, but they are just too small. The Civic hybrid is a possible, but we need to look hard at whether the premium for a hybrid makes sense - we don't drive that much, so our gas costs are already on the low end.

It's really not that fun to buy a car when you're not buying a Ferrari, I must say. Also, I had NO IDEA that Ferraris cost $300K.

Comments

[minim_calibre]

The sales guy when we bought our Honda in 2007 felt the Smug Premium was not worth it for a hybrid Civic. The regular one is pretty efficient and much cheaper.

We liked the Fit. We just liked the Civic better in terms of how it handled. (A stick was out on either, as my clutch knee is my bad knee, much as I hated going to an automatic.) In 2007, it was around $18k for one.

[casperflea.livejournal.com]

mr. flea really wants a stick. I really want a hatchback, which is my main concern with the Civic. We've had a sedan for 10 years, and I never liked it!

[calligrafiti.livejournal.com]

I have an '08 Fit and I've had no problems with it. It is surprisingly roomy, and I've hauled quite a lot of garden supplies in it with the back seats down. It's not a car for a lot of long-haul, high-speed driving, though. I drove from Carrboro to Kernersville on I-40 a lot in 2008, but I wouldn't want to drive from, say, Carrboro to Nasheville every weekend. If you or Mr. Flea are planning on doing a regular freeway commute this might not be the car for you. But for around town and short-haul trips it's great.

[casperflea.livejournal.com]

Pretty much all our driving is in-town, stop and go (pretty heavy traffic a fair amount, too). It's a perfect driving setup for a hybrid, really, since they're best in city traffic.

[dxmachina.livejournal.com]

Also, I had NO IDEA that Ferraris cost $300K.

Yeah, that's why you rarely see them outside of a Magnum episode. The good news is that you can use this as an incentive to get Dillo to contribute to his piggy bank.

[casperflea.livejournal.com]

I gather the reason that Dillo likes them is that there's a guy who works out at the YWCO (where his daycare is) who drives one! The tax alone each year must be $6-7K!

[mskat.livejournal.com]

Lori has a Fit and she loves it. I will point out that Noah's carseat squinches against the seat backs which I'm not crazy on. So I think the Fit is great if you don't have safety concerns about kids in the back.

[casperflea.livejournal.com]

Is he still rear-facing? Dillo graduates to a booster this summer, but he's in a front-facing basic Graco model for now. That's a really good point, though; we definitely need to actually put the kid seats in the cars before we buy.

[mskat.livejournal.com]

Nope. He's in a front facing old model Britax Roundabout. I am not sure if I tried to put my Britax Marathon in that it would fit at all. He's very close to the back of the front seat.

[casperflea.livejournal.com]

I was thinking that if I could fit in the back seat a carseat could, but I guess that's not necessarily so - much depends on how the seat is configured!

[veejane.livejournal.com]

I think the Fit is cute. It is possible I am unreasonably enamoured of hatchbacks.

In other news, I got a close-up look at a Smart Car on Sunday, and it was like they cut a car in half and only gave you the front. The seats were roomy enough (to look at; it was locked), but they were the biggest part of the car by a long shot.

[casperflea.livejournal.com]

I also am enamoured of hatchbacks.

I've seen Smart Cars in Athens starting in 1998. They are indeed fairly hilarious half-cars. But great for parking in Athens (Greece).

[susanw.livejournal.com]

Only get a Fit if you don't ever drive up any hills to speak of. We test drove one, and the dealership happens to sit near the foot of a steepish hill. The first thing I did was drive up it...and by the time I reached the top, the car all but gasping for breath, I knew it wasn't the car for us.

[casperflea.livejournal.com]

Did you test an automatic? mr. flea really wants a stick, so I hope that makes a difference. We'll see - most of our driving is in-city, but I once had a car with terrible pickup (a 1993 Subaru) and I hated that.

[susanw.livejournal.com]

Yes, it was an automatic. My first car as a 16-year-old was a stick, and I try to drive one every few years just so I won't forget how, but I like automatics better here just because we have so many steep hills.

[wandsci.blogspot.com (from livejournal.com)]

We love our Prius, but neither of us is particularly tall. We just bought a Mazda 5, and that is one of those bigger on the inside than the outside deals, too. If they'd had a blue one, I was going to get a vanity plate that said TARDIS.

I have a friend who has a Fit and loves it.

[casperflea.livejournal.com]

I want to look at a Mazda 5, but the nearest dealer is in Atlanta, which makes it hard!

[noradeirdre.livejournal.com]

When we got our new car, the MPG of both the Fit and the Nissan Versa were in the same ballpark as a hybrid, and so much less expense. We loved the Fit as much as the Versa, we just got a better financing deal from the Nissan dealership. The Versa is also roomy in the back seat for sure. Don't know how Mr. Flea would fit in the front, but Tom at almost 6'2" does just fine.