Tuesday, February 22, 2005 - 11:45 PM PST
After pretty much deciding on a Toyota Prius late last week, I set out looking for a good deal on a used 2004 model (the year they introduced the Prius' new look and the second generation of hybrid engines). But all of the cars I found online cost almost as much as (if not more than) the MSRP on Toyota's own website, despite having 10,000 to 20,000 miles on them.
So, I called up several Toyota dealers around the area to discover that ~5 years after they were first introduced, and well over a year after the newer generation was brought to market, there is still a backlog for these cars. I had heard of outrageous price gouging by dealers on these cars in the past, but had expected that supply would have caught up by now.
Nope. While it's better than it used to be, the most optimistic quotes I received promised I could drive it off the lot in a month, and might need to wait 2 or 3 months. And these are car salesmen telling me this. Run it through the BS filter, and that means 4+ months. At least most of the dealer surcharges seemed to be gone, though if I wanted to buy a fully-loaded Prius that just happened to be on the lot, I'd have to pay at least $2,000 extra.
So I thought to myself, "Brian, why don't you just take the bus while you wait a few months for a Prius order to come in? You've got a bus pass, and if you absolutely need a car in the meantime, you can use a Flexcar." (Yes, I have such conversations with myself.)
And the Flexcar is an amazing system: A co-op car system on digital steroids, Flexcar lets you reserve one of hundreds of cars parked in permanent locations around Seattle from the web, get into the car using a keycard, drive off, and be electronically charged $9 an hour (or less, if you buy hours in bulk). The rate includes gas, insurance, maintenance, cleaning, etc. There are three Flexcars parked around Fremont, including one in the basement of my own building.
You can probably guess what I thought of next. No, not that. You should be ashamed. I thought "Hey, why not try not owning a car for a while?" And the more I thought about it, the more it sounded crazy, but I'm going to go with it anyway. Sure, I'll need to take two different bus routes to get to work, plus walk a bit, for a travel time of probably somewhere around an hour each way. But at least I won't have to fight traffic and I'll be able to work on my laptop most of the way. And it will save me an embarrassing amount of money -- no monthly car payments (~$600+), no insurance (~$200), no gas ($50+) and no underground parking fees ($120). All in all, a thousand bucks a month. I'll remind myself of that every time I feel inconvenienced.
Most importantly, this is the best option to reduce my impact on the environment. The buses even run on 20% biodiesel, and I think some are hybrids as well. Everybody wins all around, right?
(I'm sure I'll crack and buy a car in two weeks.)