Diesel or Hybrid?

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Sun 24 Feb 2019 17:36
Diesel or Hybrid? - R111RWD
Hello all

I currently own a 2015 Golf Diesel with around 35,000 miles. It’s a really nice car and haven’t had any issues whatsoever in the 12 months I’ve owned it (had 15,000 miles when I got it).

Recently I have been toying with the idea of hybrid cars but I am totally lost as to whether they would suit my needs.

I live in rural wales and do around 20,000 miles per year on mainly A and B roads. Averaging around 50mpg in total in the Golf.

I am keen to save some money (Golf is on finance at around £300 per month) and wondered about the Hybrid Yaris. I use my car mainly for work and have another car I use weekends. I am saving up for a house so every penny helps.

Any Yaris would be around £180 a month on finance.

I am aware a Yaris wouldn’t be as well kitted out as the Golf or as refined, but my car is used for work and I get 45p for every mile I do, so may pay off?

Any thoughts would be most appreciated, especially from any Hybrid owners!

Thanks
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Sun 24 Feb 2019 18:07
Diesel or Hybrid? - SLO76
A hybrid won’t really save any money over say a conventional 1.3 or 1.5 Yaris over your usage. They’re effective around town but over longer distance they’re not really any better than a conventional petrol, sometimes worse.

That said though the Yaris Hybrid is robust and quite nippy but if you drive hard it can be a bit tiresome and certainly won’t be as stable or refined as your Golf.

If you want to save money I’d buy a good used Yaris 1.33/1.5 petrol and run it for years. It’ll be reliable, is capable of 60mpg driven gently on a run. Drive one before going any further though as it might not suit you after being used to a Golf.
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Sun 24 Feb 2019 20:44
Diesel or Hybrid? - daveyjp
On rural roads our 1.5 Yaris petrol does well into 50s mpg and having 110 bhp it is no slouch when you need to press on. No CVT either, which is great for urban, but not so good on the open roads.

IIRC the hybrid is also only in a high specification, so costs quite a lot more than the petrol base model. Despite being base the petrol is still very well equipped. No satnav or auto climate (manual aircon) and manual rear windows. It does have cruise control and numerous safety devices such as speed sign reading camera, lane change warning etc.
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Mon 25 Feb 2019 00:45
Diesel or Hybrid? - SteveLee

How much is it going to cost to hand the car back and put a deposit on another one? Will the car's current value cover the outstanding finance? Will you really see a saving? It nearly always costs more to swap cars than people think.

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Tue 26 Feb 2019 16:48
Diesel or Hybrid? - barney100

Agree with SteveLee. Also swapping cars mainly benefits the dealers, they offer as little as possible for your car and ask as much as possible for theirs. They have to make a living after all. I now hang on to the cars I have 'til something major goes wrong, I've just paid my finance off and it feels good!

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Tue 26 Feb 2019 19:17
Diesel or Hybrid? - Bromptonaut

As others say it's difficult to see how you're going to make any real savings by changing. Suppose if Golf's worth enough to clear finance then you might reduce your monthly outgoings but likely you'd be paying more in long term

If the Golf is getting you where you want to be without incurring clean air zone charges then I'd hang on to it.

Ran my last three cars to 150k miles. Sold two to scrappies and traded third with known fault but as it was going to auction made little difference to deal.

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