IMHO the year is more important.
If you were buying a used (yes, I know dealers call them "pre-owned") car today, would you rather buy an '02 with 60K miles or an '03 with 60K miles? With modern search capabilities, most will filter for the year, say 5 years or less, first and then pay attention to the miles.
With any purchase, however, your budget is more important than potential resale value.
However, when considering a hybrid, you really shouldn't be overly concerned with resale value, since, beyond a few years, no one knows what a used hybrid will be worth in the market, if anything?
A regular Camry is easy to gauge, there is enough data out there where one can easily project what a five year old car will be worth, even a ten year old car.
With the hybrid, there is a great unknown, how long will the batteries last? What if these batteries start going bad at twelve years? How expensive will replacement batteries be?
The car comes with a ten year warranty on the battery (and if your lucky, your battery will fail at nine years and you'll get a new one).
Will anyone buy an twelve year old hybrid?
Would you?
I wouldn't!
Here's my, back of the envelope, calculation...
- Let's go forward a few years, it is now 2019.
- If a 2008 (gas) Camry at 11 years of age is worth (just guessing) $4,000.
- Let's assume that it is well known that the batteries don't last forever and a replacement battery for the TCH costs (just guessing) $5000, the 11 year old 2008 TCH is theoretically worthless, since the risk to the buyer is too great to pay anything for it.
- This calculation (flawed as it is) will start eating into the value of a seven year old TCH as you use the same logic.
- How much would you pay for a car (gas) that will be worth $4000 in four years? Maybe $8000.
- How much would you pay for a 7 year old hybrid that you were pretty much assured would be worthless in four years. I'd say no more than $3000.
- Let's back it up and use the same logic for a four year old car.
- How much would a purchaser of a four year old (gas) car would pay for a four year old car if he assumed it will be worth $8,000 in three years? Maybe $12,000.
- How much would the TCH buyer pay for a four year old car that he thought was going to be worth $3000? Maybe $7,000.
- So, the gas Camry, starting at around $24,000 will be worth $12,000 in four years. The TCH, starting at $26,000 will be worth $7000 at the same time.
- You'll save about $500 year on gas (this number can vary greatly) and maybe a few bucks on maintenance, but not nearly enough to cover the loss of resale value.
I know my logic is probably flawed, but not too much, I think it's safe to say that the TCH will have a very poor resale value.
In addition, in the next five years I imagine battery technology will have improved greatly such that the 2012 TCHs will be far superior to the first generation TCHs, further reducing any potential resale value.
If your at all concerned with resale value,
don't buy a hybrid. Buy the gas powered Camry and put the savings in the bank to pay for the extra cost of the gas, when you sell the car, you'll be ahead.
IMHO, the decision to purchase a TCH is not a financial one.
BTW, I love mine, but I don't delude myself for one second that this was a wise economic decision.
If anyone thinks my logic is flawed, I'd like to offer them my six month old Toshiba
HD DVD player for sale.
(I am putting on my helmet and adjusting my chinstrap expecting to get bashed for this)
Current year model or "next" year model?
