[kaisen]

Are you using this car to commute from Portland to San Pedro? If so, the hybrid wouldn't be a great idea. Their strength is city driving. Conversly, a diesel's strength is freeway cruising.

The trouble, imho, with both hybrids and turbo diesels is their complexity. Yes, they can be had for $6000, but their repair costs can be double or triple what a relatively simple gas car can be. Coupled with VW's spotty reliability, they can be huge money pits compared to, say, a $6000 Honda Civic.

Let's break it down assuming the "average driver" doing 15,000 miles per year, spilt 50/50 between city and freeway.

Let's look at two $6000 cars:
A 2002 VW Beetle TDI 5 speed is rated 35 city / 44 hwy / 39 combined
A 2002 Honda Civic LX 5 speed is rated 28 city / 36 hwy / 31 combined

At $3.44 gasoline and $3.68 diesel (national average as of 6/25 per eia.gov) then:
VW TDI would use $1400 in diesel annually
Honda Civic would use $1650 in gasoline annually

The VW would save $250 a year, or about $20 each month

That's *IF* diesel stays within 20 cents per gallon.....in the winter months it's typically 50 cents

Over the course of a three year ownership, you'd save a whopping $750. I would bet any amount of money that the average ten year old VW TDI would have $750 greater repair costs over that three years than a ten year old Honda Civic.

So where is the savings?

I'm not advocating a Civic, it was just an easy example