To Get Or Not?

Hi Guys,

I'm thinking about trading in my 2012 Honda Accord for a 2014 Honda Accord Plug-In Hybrid. My question - do you think it's worth it?

Right now my lease is $215/mo, it would go up to $270 for the electric.

I currently pay about $300/mo in gas. Do you think it would be a good move? Plus, it's kinda hot, and has some mad cool features. 8" touch screen, bluetooth, sunroof, etc.

 

Nope, not worth it --if you are buying.

If its a lease, why not?

 

sure is my reaction, I mean come on man, check out those MAD COOL feaures, dawg, *schwing*

but just for kicks, lets run the numbers, considering the sheer, overwhelming amount of data you gave us to work with


You spend $300 in gas a month
you life in NY average gas is $3.80
2012 accord gets 28.5 mpg
$300 on gas a month means on average you buy 79 gallons of gas to drive 2,250 miles

2014 hybrid gets 47.5 mpg
to drive 2,250 miles you'd need 47 gallons of gas

you'd spend (47gallons)($3.8)= $179 in gas PLUS$55(month cost of upgraded car)
so $234 on the hybrid total VS the $300 you'd spend before

So yeah, get the upgrade.:cool

 

My question to you Zack is do you exceed the allowed number of miles on your lease?
Most leases only allow you X number of miles and if you go over you pay X amount per mile. You need to figure that into your total expense.
I know a couple of people who went over on miles and owed a lot of money at end of lease.

 

Battery production is a lot cleaner than it used to be. Pumping oil out of the ground and having spills or blowing up entire neighborhoods doesn't happen from battery production, but we've grown accustomed to that and one person buy/leasing an electric car won't put any kind of slow down on that either. So environmental pros or cons aside here's what I'd ask.

Do you do city driving or highway? Hybrids don't benefit as much from highway driving over traditional counterparts of the same class. If it's mostly highway miles you'll be losing money.
Do you typically drive more than the batteries capacity on a daily basis? If yes then you'll be burning fuel or needing a charge anyways and you'll want to understand that. As noted above you'll need to find recharging points, but depending on your area that may not be as hard as other areas.