The next car up for consideration is a used 2014 Nissan Leaf. 2014's have a chance of still being under the 36K bumper to bumper warranty, have low miles, and can be found under $8K with the quick charge package. The things I give up are the massive cargo space, and space in my garage. Also I'd have to rent a car for long trips. On the other hand, not having to go to a gas station any more is pretty alluring, as well as the more chill repair schedule. Another downer is the potential battery replacement down the road. So, does a modern car with low miles, that can easily travel 60-90 miles a day work as a Fit replacement? For it probably would. I rarely travel more than 90 miles a day--usually only on my trips from Seattle to Oakland, and again, that's what a rent a car is for. We generally drive our car 3 or 4 times a week, about 125 miles at most. For this, even a Leaf with a marginal battery would be fine.
Another big minus to the Leaf is the looks. They are not attractive. On the plus side, there are so many of them around, that they don't stick out quite a badly as they used to. I do feel bad for the people who paid full retail for these things back in the day. Even my friends who got favorable lease deals ultimately overpaid for them by putting down $$$ to fall into that low low monthly payment. The good news there is that when the lease was up, Nissan had to take back the car or eat a large piece of the residual value to encourage sales. Something clearly they're not good at as there are so dang many low $ low mile Leafs available.
Bottom line--the Leaf seems like a fancy electrified previous generation Versa to me, but they've held up a lot better than those old Versa. I'll add it to the spreadsheet.
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