If you look at it, each of us driving a HCHII is winning the lottery a little bit each day. As I tell my girlfriend (who then rolls her eyes...), my HCHII is made for $4.00 gas.

Also, our vehicles are likely gaining in value, while anything under 30mpg is dropping in value like a rock. Doesn't it feel good to make a smart buying decision in a vehicle?

 

It is much more easy to swollow! It is however hard to get used to the speed the increases are comming. Will it ever slow down! H

 

No kidding, I was paying $2.64 this time last year. We should be buying barrels of oil as an investment!!

 

That's the beauty of a hybrid -- it insulates us from the high gas prices that are eroding the quality of life of every other car owner in the U.S. We can talk about OPEC theoretically, e.g.; "gas prices shouldn't be this high," and "supply and demand can't explain these oil prices." But other folks have to deal with the reality that an extra $20-$40 per week is coming out of their pockets just to buy gas.

As I said in a post a few weeks ago, many of the people who criticized us for buying hybrids a few years ago are conspicuously quiet these days. Remember the derisive comments -- "Those things don't get the mpg they claim" and "The batteries go dead and leave you stranded" and "When gas prices come back down, hybrids will be worthless" and on and on.

I don't hear any of that lately.

And I'm sure that hybrids' resale value is sky high. I see used 2006 HCHs on AutoTrader.com selling for only a few thousand less than new MSRP. Try that with an SUV!

I read a news article last month about car dealers who refuse to take SUVs as trade-ins. They don't try to low-ball the customer on price, they just flat out refuse to take the SUV. They can't sell it, so they don't want it.

It would be interesting to take my HCH to a few dealers and see what kind of price they'd offer -- especially if I say I want to buy one of their SUVs!
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You know, if you die a million dollars in debt... It's like you won a million dollars!!!

 

I bought my used 2005 HCH the 30th of March of this year and paid 14K for it. The average asking price on Autotrader at that time, out of over 100 HCHs available for the same year & apprx mileage was about 15.5k pretty much matching the Kelley Blue book. Now just two months later the same search will show only 60 of them available in the U.S. an average asking price of 16.9k. Do I think I could flip my 2 month old purchase for that much, of course not but it does show a trend that while SUVs have lost up to 30% of their value in recent weeks my HCH is actually increasing in value.