I have a 2003 HCH CVT and I love it. I owe about $11,000 on it and it has 26K. I've never had a car payment and it's draining my a little bit making that payment each month and knowing it's going to be there for at least three more years. I also owe a lot in student loans. With gas being as high as it is right now, how much do you think I could get for my car? My plan is to sell my HCH and get an older Civic. With the techniques I now know with my HCH, I'm thinking I could get 40mpg out of a civic. Is that realistic? With the money I get for my HCH, I think I could get a nice mid-90's Civic and owe nothing and still get great gas mileage. What do you think?

 

in my opinion, i think it's quite possible. we still have my 1993 civic, which i bought new in 93. it has close to 200,000 miles on it and hubby drives it to work, about 35 miles each way. he gets close to 40MPG with it......and they seem to run forever.......

good luck with whatever decision you make.

 

I looked up the resale on my 03 and its about 11K-14K. You have lower miles so it might be more for you.

 

I would probably want at least $15,000. I know I'm not going to get that from a dealer, it would have to be a private sale. The next step would be getting a reliable used Civic. That would be great if it could go 200k. My 91 accord was about to turn over to 200k before I sold it on craigslist.

 

You had better be ready to pay top dollar for a used Civic. Dealers i have talked to cant believe how fast and high they go. One had a 96-97 or so and they got so many calls that it became a joke. One would get a call and the others would say, Was it about the Civic. He would say yes. Got top dolllar for it as I recall. Only way to get any deal at all is to know someone trading one in and buy it for what the dealer offers, which is usually above Edmunds trade in value and somewhere near the private party price. Good luck!

 

Jeff;

I have a Gas Civic and I get in the city with A/C on 26 to 29 MPG. , on the hwy. it gets 36 to 38 with A/C and 49.1 with (NO-A/C) at 65 MPH and using Cruise.

HTH

Terry

BTW; the Civic is a sedan with auto trans.

 

A car payment is not necessarily a bad thing financially. What sort of interest rate did you get on it? Assuming 4%, you can make 10% on average in the stock market per year.

At an interest rate of 5% or below you are better off with the car payment. Invest the remainder of your money and hang in there until it is paid off.

Gas prices are unlikely to decline much in the future given global demand for oil.

I can tell you from experience that the gas only Civic will not get 40mpg in mixed driving. Ours gets 30mpg in mixed driving (EX). Only consider it if you do a lot of highway driving. Then the difference in mileage is less dramatic.

 

You must have known what you were getting into when you bought the car in the first place. At that time you decided that the car was worth the price. Now that gas is much higher the car is even more worth it.

If you trade for an older car you will no longer have a warranty and you will get worse mileage. I'd rather have a newer car with a warranty and a payment but I'm not you.

 

I have a couple comments:

1. After having an HCH, it will take some getting used to the non-hybrid Civic. I bought my daughter a 2000 Civic (non-hybrid of course) this summer, and after driving a bunch of regular Civics to compare, I could not believe how rough and loud and noisy all of the new and used non-hybrid Civics seemed, compared to my HCH. I still have a hard time really enjoying myself in her car. The HCH has truly spoiled me.

2. A comment about mileage: I recently took a trip of about 400 miles with the two Civics, hybrid and non-hybrid, following each other, as my daughter went back to college. This was mostly freeway and interstate driving at approximately 65-70 MPH, one car following right behind the other. The result was about 48 MPG for the hybrid, and 36 MPG for the non-hybrid. That's approximately what others have measured, including road trips by a major magazine, comparing the hybrid to the non-hybrid. So my hunch is that your mileage will be about 25% less in the older, non-hybrid Civic.

HTH. Good luck with your decision. One other thing: I applaud you for trying to get out of auto-loan debt! It's a great thing to do.

 

Thanks for all the posts, here's a little more info. My loan rate is 4.44, which is good for a used car. My warranty is up this month. With Hondas, I don't feel that warranties are a big issue. If these cars had more problems, that would be a concern. I believe that Honda's last forever if you take care of them. Also, I don't do much highway driving and my commute to work is 8 miles total. If my car gets 50 mpg or 35 mpg, it's not that big of a saving difference. If I was going to sell my car, I don' t think there would be a better time in history to do it. Interesting comment about the noisy gas only Civic, I drove a 91 accord for years so I have been spoiled by the smooth CVT of the HCH. I found a 2000 Civic with 60K on it for $6000. Do you guys know of a regular Civic message board as good as this one where I could get some more info on the regular Civic? I don't even know if that's a good deal.