Daily Score Blog

Playing around with the Kelly Blue Book--the gospel for the used car market--I found a surprising fact:  the first 7,000 miles or so you drive every year has little effect on the resale value of your car. 
Sure, your car loses a little bit of its value every year, whether you drive it or not.  But driving just a few thousand miles per year doesn't do much to your car's value: according to Kelly a five year old car with 10,000 miles on it is worth the exact same amount as a 5 year old car with 34,999 miles on it. 

Once a five year old car has logged at least 35,000 miles, though, depreciation starts to bite into your car's resale price.

Of course, drivng an extra mile can help move a car from  "excellent" condition to merely "good," which does reduce your car's value.  So miles do matter, even for low-mileage cars.  But not a lot.  Time, rather than miles, is the bigger factor.

Drive more than 7,000 miles per year, however, and Kelly says that depreciation accelerates.  By the time a 5-year old Ford Explorer, for example, has reached 65,000 miles or so, each additional mile reduces the car's value by about 8.5 cents.  Or -- if you factor in the likelihood that extra miles reduce a car's condition from "excellent" to "good" or "good" to "fair" -- each additional mile probably decreases the SUV's value by 9 cents.

Note: This is part of a series, highlighting Initiative 933 in Washington. I-933 requires taxpayers to compensate property owners for "losses" resulting from planning.

Simply complying with I-933 would be extremely expensive. That's because I-933 demands massive paperwork burdens and bureaucratic shuffling for even the smallest zoning change. The best estimates show that administration alone would likely cost somwhere in the $1 to $2 billion range each year. (And this figure does not include the cost of paying out any claims.)

That's not exactly the kind of money you scrounge up out of the couch in coins. So who would pay for it?

According to the Vancouver Sun, hybrids are now cheaper than conventional cars.

Perhaps surprisingly, this seems like a big deal to me.  Even though hybrids are (obviously) more fuel efficient than comparable conventional cars, they're not necessarily cheaper:  the fuel savings may not offset the higher purchase price.

But higher gas prices are changing the equation. 

A year ago, the British Columbia Automobile Association assumed that gas prices would remain at about 95 cents per liter for 5 years -- and found that hybrids weren't cost competitive.  This year, the BCAA assumed that gas prices will remain at about Can$1.15 per liter (a little under $4/gallon US) for 5 years.  So every gallon of gas saved by swtiching to a hybrid is now worth about 20 percent more than it was a year ago.  Plus, the BCAA found that hybrids now have lower financing costs than conventional cars, and that the price gap between conventional and hybrid models has narrowed.

So, for six out of the seven hybrid models that the BCAA looked at, the five-year savings on gas and financing overcame the higher cost of a hybrid.

This is, of course, part a larger trend:  rising energy prices are making conservation and efficiency more and more cost effective -- not just for cars, but across the board.

Knute Berger, aka Mossback, has some fun at my expense in the Seattle Weekly. He calls me a moocher for bumming rides from others on occasion rather than owning a family car.

Knute is entitled to be snarky; in fact, as a Weekly columnist, he's pretty much obligated.

Still, his column merits a thoughtful response. What should it be? Submit your own draft in comments, and I'll make sure Knute sees the best ones.

UPDATE: The Stranger and Seattlest have rallied to my defense with a lot of bile, but also some thoughtful points. Also, City Comforts.

UPDATE 2:  Even more Stranger commentary here.