New Prius Excel - good deal?

[Catlover]

I was on Carwow last night and it led me to an offer from a dealer of a unregistered Prius gen4 Excel in Gunmetal grey (usually over £545 extra) for just over £26k. Is that a good deal ?  

 

[Harters]

Why would a right hand drive car be sat in Germany and would the spec be the same?. I wouldn’t go near it

I got £5,500 off my Excel March last year through drive the deal which was an amazing deal. 

 

 

[Catlover]

Germany? How did that get into your reply?  Have you misread the Gunmetal grey for Germany?

My mistake anyway - it is Galactic Blue, still a +£500 option included.

[Ancient Nerd]

I bought mine from a local(ish) dealer, who got very close to the Drive the Deal price. It saved the likely hassle of travelling to a distant dealer, or risks of having it delivered. Again savings of over £5000.

I think DTD are still doing similar prices.

I used another broker for my previous Gen 3. No problems at all, but I had to drive a 300 mile round trip, with someone else to drive mine back as I wasn't part exchanging. So 450 miles, but if you want a day out...

[PeteB]

I paid the price for impatience!  When I ordered, none of the online firms quoted for the Gen 4.

I ordered mine in February 2016, had a test drive in March and took delivery 10th June.  Paid (almost) full list price, but did get £250 loyalty discount, free mats and a full tank.  Also, painless to just drive to the dealer in the old car and drive away in the new one.

Apparently, I could have got one sooner if I hadn't insisted on 15" wheels, a spare wheel and white paint.

But they did honour the price quoted of my old car in Feb.  WBAC initially offered more, bet kept reducing the offer each month, and when I did the trade-in were offering less than my dealer paid me.  (I also wondered if they'd try to drop the price further if I turned up with it by finding microscopic faults with the paintwork or something).

Still, so pleased with the car, the four month wait was agony!

[kithmo]

I just took online quotes with me to the dealers and got a similar deal. Not looking to change already are you Joe ?

[Harters]

4 hours ago, Catlover said:

Germany? How did that get into your reply?  Have you misread the Gunmetal grey for Germany?

My mistake anyway - it is Galactic Blue, still a +£500 option included.

 I was still half asleep obviously, oh my goodness I feel such a fool 

[Willss]

5 hours ago, Catlover said:

I was on Carwow last night and it led me to an offer from a dealer of a unregistered Prius gen4 Excel in Gunmetal grey (usually over £545 extra) for just over £26k. Is that a good deal ?  

 

I'd say better than if you walked in and asked your dealer for their best price but..........  Drive the Deal just quoted me £24,195 for that spec/colour (UK registered dealer and 1st owner etc - dealer paid on delivery so no broker as such). 

My local dealer matched DTD for me, claimed no profit for them but they wanted a sale through their books.  Saved me £2000 on my Avensis over the best Carwow price I was sent.  Subsequently seen pre reg ones available for less than I paid but I'm happy and I know my local dealer will look after me well if there is a problem (always serviced thr' them and the 4th Toyota we've had).

[Catlover]

Dont worry Harters, we are all fools at times, so you not alone.

Hi Keith, I am loving the Prius I had 1 month now (plus the 7 months in the Auris Hybrid, now the wifes).  Would love a new one, but I have said I will never buy a new car again, loose too much in the first year......... but I can dream.  I am 70 (nearly 71) and not working now, so it would be very hard for me to justify £25k for a new car anyway, so its dream on!

 

[YarisHybrid2016]

Strangely, I read it as "Germany", too, then I realized there were too many of the wrong letters. 

[Catlover]

Well, today I took the plunge, not a new one, but a Gen4 Excel, just under 2 year old. Bought from Toyota dealer in Solihull, under 21,000 miles, Pearlescent Red, and with 15” wheels plus a spare. Collection to be confirmed but possibly next Friday 20th July. Looking forward to getting it.

[PeteB]

Good move.  No doubt you'll have significantly beaten the £28k mine cost, but I hated waiting 4 months, never mind 2 years.

Mine was 2 years old last month, and is just 1k away from its 30k service.

There's 4 or 5 things I really hate (especially auto lights, less storage inside and under boot floor, lower chassis doing my knees and hips in), but literally hundreds I love and overall the best car I've ever had.

I was really happy with my Gen 3, but nothing would persuade me to swap back now.

I take your point about buying new, but I plan to keep this car as long as possible.  My 2nd Prius (a Gen 1) was with me 9 years, 8½k on the clock when I got it, 163k when I sold it, and worked out to be the cheapest car ownership I ever had when allowing for inflation (that's taking all into account, depreciation, fuel, servicing, repairs etc.) - even compared to a Mk 1 Mini and a 600cc Fiat 125!.  Even at over 50 mpg, I put more money in the fuel tank than the depreciation cost me those 9 years!

[Catlover]

Yes I noticed the reduction of storage space. Why the between front seats arm rest has not been used as a storage box I don’t know. I will miss the hard drive storage of my Gen3, together with no where to store cd’s in the Gen4 will make it a real pain. JBL sound system sounds real good, I got the JBL demo going.

[PeteB]

There IS storage under the arm rest, but only one glove box and it's not that big.

[Catlover]

Hi Pete.......How do I get under the arm rest?

yes, I noticed only one smaller glove box.

Apparantly my iPhone 6s is not modern enough to use the flat charging point, is this correct,anyone know.

[ian rooke]

Hi the iPhone 6 will work on the wireless charger if fitted with a wireless charging case about £12 from e-bay 

[Starmans]

10 hours ago, Catlover said:

Hi Pete.......How do I get under the arm rest?

As I'm also a Pete I can answer that 😉

On the centre storage box between the front seats there is button which is hidden in the lip at the front that you press inwards - the lid will then pull up and fold open towards the passenger seat.

[PeteB]

11 hours ago, Catlover said:

...I will miss the hard drive storage of my Gen3...

...JBL sound system sounds real good...

My Gen 3 was a 2012 post-face-lift version, and personally I liked the USB option.  Transferred all my music onto a USB stick on my PC, plus I can keep a backup on my PC so that if anything happens to the USB I just copy onto another one.

An additional bonus is being able to back up SatNav locations and phone numbers onto the USB; again, same benefit, AND when I got my Gen 4 I was able to restore all my contacts and SatNav destinations in seconds.  Also comes in handy if I am loaned a compatible Toyota, as I can load them up and 'delete all personal data' when I hand the car back.

The system does sound great, although most of the time I just listen to the peace and quiet of the Prius!  Still don't know where all 10 of the claimed Speakers live (not that I've looked very hard).

[Harters]

When you do get to open the armrest locker, make sure it still has the small sliding tray that sits on the top as I can imagine that would be quite easy to go walkies as I find it very useful 🙂

 

[Catlover]

Well, today did the 100 mile trip to Solihull to collect my Prius Excel with 15" wheels.  On the way there, M6/M42 mostly, my mpg in the Gen 3 rose to 66.2 which I was mighty pleased with.

I said to the sales guy, on the way home in the Excel I want to get 76.2 mpg.  Astounded myself, I set the trip to zero, travelled the 98.7 miles back home, heavy traffic on the M6, crawling at times, restricted to 50, then 60, at times 40, very varied but was astounded that the trip was reading 91.90 mpg. Am sure that will settle somewhat lower but pleased as punch so far. A very nice drive, quieter then the Gen3, with 15" wheels it seemed a more comfy ride. I wanted 15" wheels so feel fortunate to find a Excel with them on. Dealer also had a Business Edition Plus, same col0ur (the metallic red), few months newer, similar miles, similar price, but with 17" wheels.  Had that got 15" wheels I may have gone for that, but well pleased with the Excel, and it comes with Zero VED (for the moment anyway.

Big learning curve now, with all the gadgets.  It looks like previous owner had the car set so key fob has to be used to open/close car by default. It does not respond to touch on the door handle.  I wish I had known that I would have got the dealer to sort, but 100 miles each way is a long way to go just to get sorted.

If anyone can tell me how to get a photo off my iPhone onto my PC which is Win 10, I could put up a photo of my dash showing the miles/mpg done today.

Forgot to ask... if I put MP3 or WMA music onto a usb stick, do they have to be in folders or anything to play?    And do they play one track after another?  Anything special need to do?

 

 

[Tom stuart]

Can you see the HUD display yet?

Mine was set to the wrong height and it took a lot of adjusting settings going all the way down then all way up before it appeared.

[PeteB]

14 hours ago, Catlover said:

... if I put MP3 or WMA music onto a usb stick, do they have to be in folders or anything to play?    And do they play one track after another?  Anything special need to do?

Nope, it seems to find them.  Mine are in a mix of folders though.  You can go into a menu in the Media screen of the car and select by Artist, Title, Genre etc, and while playing there is a "find more like this" option.  There is also a Random option.

I've created some playlists on my PC so I can have tunes play in a specific order, but depending on which PC software you use there can be a little fiddling to get it working (mainly editing the playlist file and deleting the full path in front of the titles - Windows 10 version of Media Player seems to need this editing, where V7 didn't).  Beware, when first inserting a USB stick, it can take a few minutes before recognising playlists - I didn't work this out for a while originally and kept going back to the PC and redoing it unnecessarily!).

[kithmo]

Hi Joe, congratulations on the new car, the mpg reading you got is almost exactly the government figures for the Gen 4 Excel, well done. 

The key less/smart entry on/off is one one of the nav menus. On the nav, press "SETUP", scroll right (page 2), select "VEHICLE CUSTOMISATION" and "LOCK SETTINGS". You should see an unchecked box if it's off, a tick if it's on.

Get yourself a Faraday pouch for the your smart key and another for the spare

[Catlover]

Photo above shows the mpg at 88.7, which was this Saturday lunchtime after I done about 11 miles. This was taken on my "proper" camera, the photo I took last night is on my iPhone and I don't know how to get it on this forum from my iPhone (that's where photo showing 91.9mpg is.

Tom - Originally I could see the HUD display, but as I adjusted the seat to suit me, I like it higher, display sort of disappeared. Last night I took the manual out and figured it out, so ok now, but thanks.

Thanks Keith, with your help....now sorted.

and thanks Pete B for advice on USB music.

All shows the forum is working. Thanks

[Ten Ninety]

1 hour ago, Catlover said:

Photo above shows the mpg at 88.7, which was this Saturday lunchtime after I done about 11 miles. This was taken on my "proper" camera, the photo I took last night is on my iPhone and I don't know how to get it on this forum from my iPhone (that's where photo showing 91.9mpg is.

If you plug your iPhone into your PC using a lightning cable, you should get a message on the phone screen asking permission. Accept this, then the PC should detect the phone and you can access it in File Explorer similar to a USB drive. Photos should be in the DCIM folder and you can drag and drop in the usual way.

Those are very good mpg figures - clearly the Gen4 is some way on from the Gen3 in that respect. Congrats on your purchase!