So What's A Bargain Car Now?

[ekpolk]

Originally Posted By: 1sttruck
...
A good start on a bargain is asking people people what they would not buy and picking something decent from that list. We went thru this exercise with my son when he was looking for a vehicle, and when I asked what cars none of his frends would buy it was stuff like minivans, or domestic models like a Taurus.
...


Yep, this is probably a good time for contrarian "investing," so long as some out-of-favor vehicle meets one's needs.

 

[wapacz]

Originally Posted By: BrianWC
So are you saying we should all be driving these around:

Actually those drive pretty nice or at least what I remember of them they did. Though I don't think there gas mileage was to great.

 

[BrianWC]

heck, and take a look at eBay prices!

 

[XS650]

Originally Posted By: BrianWC
So are you saying we should all be driving these around:

That's a Montezuma's Revenge.

 

[1sttruck]

Can't ignore mpg, so below is a table of cost of gas over 200k miles, us dollars per gallon of gas vs mpg.


$3.00 $4.00 $5.00
10 60,000 80,000 100,000
20 30,000 40,000 50,000
30 20,000 26,667 33,333
40 15,000 20,000 25,000
50 12,000 16,000 20,000
60 10,000 13,333 16,667

 

[1sttruck]

Stupid formatting....try again

mpg $3 $4 $5
10 60.0 80.0 100.0
20 30.0 40.0 50.0
30 20.0 26.7 33.3
40 15.0 20.0 25.0
50 12.0 16.0 20.0
60 10.0 13.3 16.7

 

[98LS-WON]

I used to have Toyatoa Paseo (93) that got 40 MPG in the city, 38 on the highway (4000RPM at 80MPH). Sold it for $750 a few years ago. 160K miles and never had a problem.

 

[parimento1]

Bargain cars in no particular order: 1 year old Focus, Crown Vic, Taurus. As for Chevy's there is a year old Impala. These cars are unbelievable bargains used. However, with gas prices being what they are these days, the Crown Vic seems to be a less impressive option when you figure in the operating costs associated with running a V-8 in a heavy car.

 

[Mucho_MPG]

Originally Posted By: ekpolk
Originally Posted By: lovcom
...if you drive it with the help of a ScanGaugeII, you will get 47-48 MPG highway. ...


Not a snowball's chance in you-know-where of averaging 47-48 highway with a Yaris, unless MAYBE you're crawling along at 45-50 mph, and even then, I doubt it. New EPA on this car is 29 city, 35 highway.

{forgot I wasn't in the Hybrid thread...

} But the first part still applies. That said, for an ultra-low, up-front cost car, the Yaris is hard to beat, so long as you can live with its tiny size.


I don't think it is that far fetched actually. In extensive testing of my own, my 07 Corolla 1.8L fetches me a consistent 42 mpg at 65 mph with the cruise running on relatively flat road trips. This is all highway the entire tank from gas station to gas station. And I have repeated this over and over again.

 

[Mucho_MPG]

Originally Posted By: BrianWC
Yeah, that's ultimately why, even though I lust after high-tech Prii and bargain 90's Saturns, I will probably just stick with the 9-5 for a while. Nice and paid for..... Even a $1500 beater would make no sense for me....


Many of the 90's Saturns with the 1.9L can nearly match the Prius in fuel economy if driven gently. The single overhead cam model. I know some people who hypermile with these and get almost 50 mpg highway and nearly 40 city. And they are dirt cheap on the used market.

 

[ls1mike]

I had a couple of 3800 cars. A 2001 GTP and 98 Bonneville, both always ran flawess and would get near 30 mpgs highway.
I miss the GTP the most as it had headers, exhaust, CAI, and 1 size smaller pulley, it really suprised a lot of folks.
I put 230,000 miles on the GTP and 210,000 on the Bonneville.

I tell you I had (well my wife had, I married into it) a 2002 Jetta TDI. What a hunk. Carbon build up (common in them), 2 sets of glow plugs, 1 set of injector, 2 sets of front wheel bearings, 1 auto tranny and host of other things to include a bunch of funky electrical [censored] in the 80,000 miles we owned it (she got it new) and I was religious about maintenance on that thing, always got the proper 505.01 spec oil and VW fluids. Everytime I see one now I cringe.
The only good thing about was it managed to get 48 to 50 mpg.
If you look at one make sure you check it out good then move on.

 

[firemachine69]

I absolutely believe it. People utilizing a SGII, along with 'intermediate' hypermiling tricks, routinely record in the mid 40's, IF they do mostly highway mileage.


I use 'basic' hypermiling techniques (timing lights, DFCO, limit my idling in parking lots, driving close to the speed limits), and I get 34mpg (75% city / 25% highway)... Engine only has 4k miles to boot, and will get better.

Not to mention the use of drive-thru's.

 

[JohnBrowning]

older subcompact imprts drop like bricks the old Ford Fiestiva and Feista's, the older Hyundai and Kia's and the really old Toyota's like Tercels,Echo's,Carolla's,Starlets etc.....

 

[lovcom]

I just came back from a two week trip to New Mexico (from Cali), and I drove a total of 4,667 miles in my 2007 Toyota Yaris, and my trip average was 46.2 MPG, and I was nearly always driving faster then the speed limit. I confirmed this with my ScanGaugeII and manual math during fill ups. The car is not even an manual tranny'd either. Without the ScanGaugeII, I could not realize such high MPG numbers, as this device trained me to drive for best MPG, given a particular road, it's grade level, wind, etc...the reason the Yaris is not 6 month back ordered is because most American's poo-poo the ideal of driving a bottom of the line simple car....you see, the feel "too good" to step so "low"...but not me! ;-)

 

[lovcom]

Originally Posted By: ekpolk
Originally Posted By: lovcom
...if you drive it with the help of a ScanGaugeII, you will get 47-48 MPG highway. ...


Not a snowball's chance in you-know-where of averaging 47-48 highway with a Yaris, unless MAYBE you're crawling along at 45-50 mph, and even then, I doubt it. New EPA on this car is 29 city, 35 highway.

{forgot I wasn't in the Hybrid thread...

} But the first part still applies. That said, for an ultra-low, up-front cost car, the Yaris is hard to beat, so long as you can live with its tiny size.


You're wrong!

The EPA for a 2007 Yaris is NOT the numbers you wrote of. The numbers you wrote are for the 2008 and NOT the 2007.

Read my post for the correct numbers: 34 city, and 39 highway for the auto-tranny....40 mpg highway for the manual 5-speed.

Go to gassavers.org or CleanMPG.com and you will see many Yaris owners getting near 50 mpg from their cars.

Do the research ;-)

 

[lovcom]

Originally Posted By: MrCritical
What other fees are added to the Yaris price at delivery besides taxes and tag? Is shipping included?


Out the door with all taxes, destination, licensing, you name it is: $12,900 plus or minus a few dollars.

 

[lovcom]

Originally Posted By: javacontour
The Yaris just doesn't seem popular. I see few if any on the roads, and my local Toyota dealer seems to have ample stock. He doesn't have Corollas or Hybrids. However, that could be due to rolling out the 2009 Corollas and Corolla Matrix models.


What does a car's popularity have to do with anything?

In southern California these days, Yaris fly off the dealer's lots as fast as the trucks deliver them. Their sales numbers are 46% higher now over this time last year.

 

[lovcom]

Originally Posted By: JTK

We're getting all kinds of Yaris numbers now; 47-48mpg, 43, 38... At least they are getting more realistic. Now this is average MPG per tank? Gallons pumped into tank / miles driven on that tank?

Joel


Are you suggesting that many of a same make, model and year will get the same gas milage? Surely you'er not that green.

If you do your research, check places like gassavers.org, and cleanmpg.com and yarisworld.com you can find many Yaris owners getting near 50 and 50 mpg.

 

[Drew99GT]

I think anything 2004 or newer with the GM 3.8L Series III is a fantastic bargain. GM fixed the cooling system sealing issues.

You can find 2004/2005 Impalas and Montes with around 50,000 miles for well under 10K. These will do 20 mpg city and 30 mpg highway and they have balls!

We just got an 07 Impala with the new 3.5L VVT motor and with my mom driving it around town it recently got a tick over 22 mpg calculated by hand - the trip computer matched. Pretty darn good for a V-6 with 224 hp. Any 06 and up GM with the 3.5L High Value motor is a great bargain as all these cars depreciated 5 grand the minute someone signed the paperwork when they were new.

 

[lovcom]

Originally Posted By: Drew99GT
I think anything 2004 or newer with the GM 3.8L Series III is a fantastic bargain. GM fixed the cooling system sealing issues.

You can find 2004/2005 Impalas and Montes with around 50,000 miles for well under 10K. These will do 20 mpg city and 30 mpg highway and they have balls!

We just got an 07 Impala with the new 3.5L VVT motor and with my mom driving it around town it recently got a tick over 22 mpg calculated by hand - the trip computer matched. Pretty darn good for a V-6 with 224 hp. Any 06 and up GM with the 3.5L High Value motor is a great bargain as all these cars depreciated 5 grand the minute someone signed the paperwork when they were new.


Two or more years ago, I would whole heartedly agree with you, however have you seen the gas prices these days? Today gas is $4.69/gal regular in southern Cali. These days why anyone would still want a car with "balls" or that provides under 30mpg seems crazy to me. Buying such V6's and V8's as you described these days is not a bargain, and in fact it would be a really bad financial decision if you ask me.