ha ha! it does! but its like, dad emo apparently.

 

i guess you are mentioning your kids because you are trying to prove some sort of 'older, therefore wiser' kind of point? i'm not going to even delve into the explanation of my movie watching experiences with you. (cause i'm sure you concluded that i still live with mom and pops. whatev.)

i'm not going to debate the politics of oil anymore either.

if your brain hurts, i'm sorry, not my fault you have trouble keeping up. and picking apart posts being a welcomed thing is ridiculous, no matter how much sense anyone is making.

and i'm glad you are through with this thread, that way you can go an explore more than just the 4 threads you have posted in.


p.s.: the REAL reason all this started was because, deep down, (yes i AM in fact a mind reader, i've studied at the jedi temple for QUITE some time), you simply didn't like the fact that i called half of america out for doing things because they could, even if they shouldn't.

puzzling why this would bother you, as you gave a legitamate reason for the vehicle that you own, (not that I was calling you out on it, you volunteered the info.), so i dunno why it should frustrate you to the extent that it has.

but again, whatev.

hasta luego....(well, hopefully not....)

 

So I'd say up until the last week or so I didn't get too annoyed about gas prices. I drive a lot because my fiancee and I like to go out of town to do things, and my fillups have just started getting over $50 (08 Mazda 3). I'm frustrated with a car that I bought for better gas mileage over an Element and am only seeing about 3-4 mpg more tops. Which is why I'm here, since I'm looking into a Fit.

The gas issue in general though, I'm shocked at how some people will complain, but don't seem bothered enough to do anything about it. My sister owns a Jeep Liberty, has a five or so mile one-way commute, and never drives anywhere out of town (I really mean never, for those familiar with Santa Cruz, she's 25 and hasn't ever driven to San Jose or anywhere else over highway 17). Saying she drives alone 95% of the time is probably an understatement. Every time I've seen her SUV the back seats are folded down and there's just some junk in the back, but nothing that wouldn't fit in a trunk or a hatch. Then she tells me last week that she hit the pump cutoff of $75 when filling up earlier that day.

I think too many people are ending up "stuck" with their poor mpg vehicles. Her Liberty is paid off, but nobody wants to buy one, and she gets crap trade-in offers for it. I think she should sell it, and for someone like her, there's no excuse not to have a compact or subcompact hatch type vehicle.

I know a lot of people who are from European countries and they've always talked about how much more gas is there than there, and how their car culture is different. Something like a Fit is perfectly acceptable to family with two kids there, but here in the US having two kids seems to require purchasing a large SUV. I don't get it, I wish people would try and do something to change their situation for the better. So much money is being wasted away on gas that it has got a point where I'm really disturbed by it. Some people get it though, my fiancee just stretched a tank in her 99 Protege to a new record number of miles for her, then again, she filled up and it pumped more gas than the listed tank size by a hair...but at least she's paying attention and trying to conserve. That's why I'll be trying to get a Fit and definitely finally getting my ScanGauge.

 

I wish I was "stuck" like your sister. I pay $60 in gas plus $200 in car payments a month for my FIT. I'd much prefer to pay $120 a month for gas with no car payment.

Your sister would have to sell her Jeep and buy a used economy car to improve her monthly costs. And really she'd only be saving what $50-$75 a month? And she'd be selling her Jeep at a depressed value and probably paying a greatly inflated price along with fees and tax on a used economy car.

Buying anything new would actually greatly increase her monthly costs.

Until her Jeep needs to be replaced the smartest thing is to keep it.

 

I could see the gas prices starting to soar and decided it was time to protect myself, so I sold my '96 Subaru SW (24 mpg at best) and got a new manual transmission Fit about a month ago. So far I'm averaging over 40 mpg. I look at the Fit as an interim vehicle, one that I can drive economically until some new technology comes along, such as high-efficiency diesel. If I decide to sell my Fit at some point, I figure it will have held its value because it is a Honda and because it will be among the more fuel-efficient automobiles.

Prospective vanity license plate for all of the Hummer/SUV drivers to read as they come barreling up behind me: 40MPGHA

 

Hey, who told you I'm emo!! lol

Nah, i just made it like that so i could get more people to see the thread (which almost have 2,000 views. YES!!WOO!!) and so i could get my message across. By the way, just because i am mad at gas prices doesnt mean that i am an enviromentalist (which i think is what people see me as). I just want to it so that when i get my real license (I only have my restricted) in a few months, i dont have to pay like $10 a gallon for gas.

Oh, by the way, I'm 15 years old, just letting you know.

 

And there's the problem...keeping the Jeep until it dies means she's sticking with the poor mpg despite rising gas prices. I think this is why a lot of people are still driving everywhere in their SUV's.

Buying something new would increase her monthly cost, but it would reduce the money wasted on gas. At 1,000 miles a month, 17mpg vs 36mpg would be a savings of $128 a month on gas ($4.13 out here now). I'd rather be putting that money into a car payment that resulted in owning something than burning it up in the tailpipe.

And for anyone who currently has a car payment on an SUV or truck that wants to downsize, the savings are pretty obvious once you make a spreadsheet with monthly gas/insurance/payment costs. Sure it isn't right for everyone, but seeing the savings in front of them like that, especially when you plug in $5.00/gal and up for fuel makes a pretty convincing argument.

 

Some of those people in the gas guzzlers are like me...have a home with projects and hobbies. We drive our Fit as much as possible, but there's two of us with a budget for two cars. Why not two Fit's?

In the past month I used my v8 4x4 Explorer to tow my open trailer with over 7,000 lbs of retaining wall blocks, a 5,000 lb compactor to repair my driveway, 4,000 lbs of flagstone for a pond project, etc.

Yes, those things could have been delivered. But, at what cost? Most places are now charging an absolute fortune for deliveries because the cost of fuel is hurting them as much as us. So, by using my own time and vehicle, I saved a lot of money in delivery costs.

Basically, we use the Fit for everything it can do and the Explorer gets used when it's either the only option or both of us are going two different ways.

I really miss the F250 Superduty diesel that I traded in on the Explorer (14.0 in the quarter), but I'm glad I'm not buying diesel right now.

 

If you are making car payments on your current car then that's another matter. But your sister's car is paid off.

A car is rarely an investment. Wasting money on a car isn't any better than wasting it on gas. To get the full benefit of the gas savings you have to drive the car for many thousands of miles. So once you have earned back the initial expenses the car is likely to have limited value.

There is also more to the cost analysis. You have factor in lost earnings if you spend any savings on that new car. You also have to factor in risk. If the car is stolen/wrecked well before you see a large portion of the gas savings you will end up losing a lot of money.

Trading in a car you own outright isn't going to save you money unless the sale value of the current car is close to or greater than the new car. So trading in a 14K Jeep and buying a 16K FIT might make sense. Trading in a 8K jeep and buying a 16K FIT does not.

 

I'd like to disagree with the statement about trading in an 8k Jeep for a 16k Fit not making sense. The automatic 2005 Liberty is listed at 17 mpg combined, while the 08 Fit sport MT is 31. So take the next five years of driving, total of 60k miles, and assume gas prices stayed the same as they are now in my area ($4.13), the Jeep would consume $14,576.47 worth of gas and the Fit would consume $7,993.55, for a difference of $6,582.92.

That's assuming $4.13 gas for the next five years. Let's say the average cost over five years in $5.00, which I feel is pretty conservative. Now the savings in gas becomes $7,969.64, right up on that $8k difference. Half the cost of a Fit, saved in gas, by buying a more fuel efficient vehicle.

My experience so far has shown that the Fit is very cheap to insure compared to other vehicles as well, so there's an amount of savings to be factored in there too (obviously different for everyone). And you also have to factor in that come 2013, a five year old Fit with 60k on it is going to be worth a lot more than a 2005 Jeep with almost 100k that already is only worth $8k today. And I'm not even getting into the out of warranty maintenance that Jeep would need over the next five years. I don't follow the comment about if the vehicle gets wrecked/stolen, as there's no more or less chance of that happening to either vehicle, and in either case the insurance will pay out for it, then you go find another used one like the one you lost and buy it.

Every time I consider a new vehicle purchase I make spreadsheets with payments, fuel, and insurance all calculated monthly, annually, and over five years, just to make sure I'm aware of what I'm getting into. You have to agree that the numbers seem to contradict the original statement that trading in an $8k Jeep to buy a $16k Fit doesn't make sense.

 

I would assume insurance on an 8k car is going to be cheaper than a car valued at 16k.

To assume gas will average $5 is very speculative. Personally I expect gas prices to return to around $3 a gallon as the price increases are driven solely by speculation in the oil market and not based on any factual reasons.

Splitting the difference and going with the $4 average you save $6,582.92 over five years which is good. However you are not trying to catch up to $8,000. You are trying to catch up to what $8,000 would be worth after five years of investing. With just a modest return of 5% per year that 8k is worth $10,210 after five years. So even with your gas savings you are still well behind after five years. Assuming you save the same $1316.58 in gas costs every year it takes you 10 years before the gas savings surpass keeping the Jeep and investing the 8k at 5% per year. Ten years is simply too long of a time frame and most people don't keep their cars that long. Nor will the car have much value after 10 years and 100K+ miles.

Or more likely the Jeep craps out after five years and she is forced to buy a new car then. You are still well behind having bought the FIT and if gas prices go up as you predict gas mileage from 2013 cars will be vastly better than the 08 FIT. So by owning the FIT you will actually start losing money by getting poorer gas mileage than the 2013 car.

 

First, I have to clarify that in this particular situation, there's no investing of money taking place. Any additional money she has will end up spent on something, and the rest will go into early payments on her mortgage.

As for the insurance, you'd be surprised. I've gotten quotes on 3-4 year old vehicles that were more than a new Fit.

I'll give you the $6500ish number for $4 gas, though I'll be shocked to see gas get back down anywhere near $3.00/gal. I'll even go with the fact that you could (if you wanted to), invest $8k if you had it in your hand right now and turn it in to about $10k with little effort over five years. So now we're $3,500 away from break even.

There's two things that will close even that gap easily. First, maintenance...there's no way that a Jeep SUV won't rack up a lot of out of warranty repair costs between 36k and 96k miles over the next five years. Just the 60k and 100k services would probably be almost half of the $3,500.

Second, the value in five years. You can't say that a five year old Fit with 60k miles wouldn't be worth at least $2k more than a 2005 Liberty with 100k miles. Just for comparison sake, a 2003 Civic DX 5-speed with 60k books for $9k private party while a 2001 Jeep Grand Cherokee with 100k books for $5600 private party. There wasn't a Liberty in 01, and a Grand Cherokee most certainly cost a lot more initially.

I'm sure we could go back and forth on it, but per the original topic, the point is that most people who would seem to think they're "stuck" driving their current vehicle really aren't, and in fact over the course of five years could see less total money paid out towards their vehicle as a whole (payments, insurance, gas, repairs, and future value) if something like a Honda Fit suited their needs.

I know you have valid points, and I enjoy having a reasonable discussion with someone who understands both sides of the situation. In this particular case however I still think replacing a vehicle like an '05 Liberty with an '08 Fit, with the intention of keeping it at least five years, is a financially sound decision. There's too many negatives against the poor Jeep to make it work out. Maybe if the mpg was better, or we were talking about something with better resale, or more reliable, then you'd probably win out as the long-term cost savings offered wouldn't be so extreme.

As to the argument of losing money starting in 2013 by owning a Fit if gas continues to rise, and forces new vehicles to be developed that offer even better mpg, to accept that argument you'd have to also accept the higher average cost of gas over five years and the impact it would have on cost savings. And if there's a cheap 60mpg car in 2013 that is worth buying, the resale still favors a Fit at that point.

 

The repair costs is a good point.

The value of the car is irrelevent until you sell it. So unless you intend to sell the FIT after five years (while you are still behind) its value at 60K isn't relevent. I recommend driving the Jeep into the ground for the next five years (or so) and then replacing it with an even more gas efficient 2013 model. Buying now only works out long term while the FIT is being compared to the Jeep. The moment the Jeep is replaced the FIT is then compared to the new car and the FIT becomes the less fuel-efficient car.

 

You think Hydrogen is made on the spot? You need to check the amount of electricitry needed to hydrolyze h2 from H20. And then there's that 19200 meters per second explosion wave. Having spent a year or tweo dealing with H2 vapor I'm nowhere near as certain as you. I'd take solar powered diesel electric hybrid any day and a lot easier to do.

 

No, i know that hydrogen cannot be made on the spot. If we could find a way to make it like that is what i mean. Yet, neither diesel, nor hybrids (which may use either gas or diesel), nor electric vehicles (which need to be charged over large periods of times.

Solar could work however. IF we could make so that solar power would charge the batteries just as efficiently as plugging it in, as well as making solar power into a lot smaller package.

Together, it might work too. It just needs to be lighter and very efficient.

 

Actually they can also sell high now then buy low later, it's called taking a 'short' position. If I sell (go short) a contract to deliver a barrel of oil next month at $125, then I make money if the price of oil goes down. Let's say the price of oil in the spot market next month turns out to be $100 per barrel. In this case my profit is $25 since I collect $125 for the barrel (per the contract), and I only have to pay $100 for it...pretty cool for me. If the price had gone up, I would have lost money instead.

 

Trust me, anybody who isn't a billionaire cares. I have never heard so many grumbling people since gas shot up. Go to any truck, SUV or muscle car forum, pretty easy to find the "Gas Prices!!" thread.

Agreed, Hydrogen has a lot of potential but the extraction process has to be made more efficient in order to make it a reasonable alternative.

One of these is needed;

1) Nano technology; no not little robots More like a filter constructed at a nano size level that has basically sharp points that could serve to break water molecules apart more efficiently, sort of like a synthetic catalyst.

2) Biotechnology; engineering an organism that could break hydrogen off of other molecules.

3) Some kind of super catalyst which the world has yet to discover

Without one of these key technologies being developed there can be no sustainable hydrogen cars on a mass scale.

I am convinced that carbon capture/atmospheric extraction technology (I am thinking a genetically engineered algae) mixed with development of ultra clean carbon based synthetic fuels from the captured materials will pave the way to a sustainable future. But that is just me

 

I find it interesting that with the weaken dollar (that helpes price go up), supposed shortage in oil refineries being able to keep up with demand from rising world consumptions (damn near doubled in 20years) people are upset but not really THAT upset. No one says anything about every oil company (not gase station, accual oil company) reporting record sales for 4 years straight. Or that it took 20 years for gas to rise from 1$ to 2$, but only 18months for it to rise from 2$ to 4$. Oil companies are running this country. Be happy that you voted a former head of one into office....twice....dumbasses...

On another note hydrogen is not the future. Its another bandage on a broken leg type deal. It cost to much to make, an brings the average SuV to a now whopping 20 mpg? Electric is the future people. It came 10 years ago in the form of the EM1 that was killed off due to preasure from oil companies on the government making car companies recall all of them to be crushed. That was a all electric car that went close to 100 miles on one charge (average american drove 41 miles per day at the time) released in the mid 90s. You mean to tell me 10 years later you are struggling with getting cars over the 30 mpg mark with gas? BS....If we spent a fraction of what we spent in Iraq in making more energy to offset the energy comsuption of say 30million electric cars, we would be far better off than waiting for this time bomb to blow...

 

That's kind of vague, could you be more specific?

 

Air Force, integrated avionics for C class planes (the big boys)