Car sales are flat, dealers are hungry and the price of gasoline is still threatening to revisit the $4-a-gallon levels it saw in July. Does that make it an ideal time to sell the clunker and spring for a fuel-efficient hybrid?
Maybe not. It’s true that as gas prices rise, hybrids will pay for themselves more quickly than they used to. But the combination of getting a low price when you trade or sell your existing car and the extra amount you’ll pay for a hybrid means it’s probably more cost-effective to keep the heap for a while longer. Even if you need a new car, you’d probably be better off buying a regular-engine compact car instead of a hybrid, suggests Jesse Toprak of Edmunds.com. Those regular compacts are almost as fuel-efficient as most hybrids and cost far less. The best candidates for saving money on hybrids are people who drive at least 15,000 miles a year, mostly in city traffic, and “keep a car until the wheels fall off,” says Toprak.
Don’t just take his word for it; do the math yourself. At politicalcalculations.blogspot.com, click on “Should You Trade in Your Gas Guzzler?” to find a calculator that allows you to consider all of the variables: how much you drive, and where; how much you pay for gas; and how much it costs you to keep up the current car. At Edmunds.com, you can check the true cost to own any car. You’ll learn, for example, that over five years, you’ll spend $3,405 more to own a hybrid Honda Civic than a conventional one. Even at $4 a gallon, it will take 8.5 years for that hybrid to start paying for itself. The most cost-effective 2008 hybrids, according to Edmunds, are the Toyota Camry, which will start paying for itself after four years and three months, and the Prius. The 2009 Camry Hybrid will start putting you ahead in less than four years.
Of course, there are other considerations. Some insurers will give a discount for covering hybrid cars. Some models are still eligible for federal tax credits (find them at fueleconomy.gov/feg/tax_hybrid.shtml). And driving a hybrid will shrink your carbon footprint. That’s worth something, isn’t it?
