We are going to be in the car market late this fall and early winter....suggestions?

It appears I am going to live a little longer. My wife was fine with our three vehicles, a 2001 chevy dump truck, a 2005 Chevy equinox, and a 2010 Prius when I was going to depart in September. We have NEVER gone this long without getting a new car, as the truck is the only vehicle below 100,000 miles. The other two are over 200,000.

I would like to get another Prius which fits our retired life very well. However, we are thinking about a mini van where I could put a lazy boy and travel a bit this winter as we always loved camping, but it is hard now to lay on an air mattress. The Problem is that I think we will have to get a demo, or go used with the tariffs impacting new cars this fall. Is there a trustworthy car dealer in the Pensacola area? What is the sales tax? I think we will look in Illinois but with each day traveling almost three hours to Chicago we are completely dependent on a reliable vehicle.

Chicago Prius taxis go 400k miles.

The Prius is the best vehicle my wife and I have owned. We are nearing 228,000 miles which we fully expect to go the 400k miles, but with each year without getting a replacement car, your probabilities of having a car fail increases. There was a simpler time when I could fix a lot of problems. I remember going to work with my 1967 Austin Healey which would break down about every fifth trip. I remember a fuel pump which quit pumping and having to pull over to the curb as cars zoomed by and crawling under the car and finding the broken wire and because I worked at Walker muffler's warehouse, my job involved putting logos on mufflers and I had a couple logos and taped up the wire and got to work on time. I do not understand a thing about what is under the Prius hood, and in my health I sure as hell cannot crawl under cars anymore and fix them, but I would rather have our primary car not with these many miles. It weighs heavy as we leave at four am to get to chicago to get the next radiation treatment, and transportation problems have huge consequences.

If you're looking for durable, go Toyota.

A friend of mine works two jobs -- postal delivery and pizza delivery. Both are horrible on a car, because there's constant stopping and starting, and you're driving all the time. He's putting I-don't-even-know-how-many hundred thousand miles on his Toyota Echo and it's never needed anything but routine maintenance. And this has been going on for around 20 years. Nobody's ever going to mistake it for a muscle car or anything, but you can't kill it with a stick...

I would highly recommend Honda. The CRV is a great vehicle, however, the recliner throws a Monkey Wrench into the choice. The Odessey Mini Van would work. For a bigger vehicle I like the GMC Denali. Both my girls have a Denali XL. It is awesome... and very comfortable for travel. Vince Whibbs has a great reputation for sales and service.

74 Ford Maverick is what you need.

Never been a real Ford fan. My first car was a 1961 Ford Falcon with a manual choke.

I agree with either the Toyota or the Honda recommendations. We have a 2013 Avalon Hybrid and I've never loved a car before we got this one. We bought it used, got a great price, and the only problem with the car is that we go to the gas pumps so rarely that sometimes we almost forget to look at the gauge before we are almost empty. It averages around 40mpg, it rides like you're floating on air and it is just beautiful, inside and out.
Ok. I won't talk about my beloved car anymore- but my daughter has a toyota Highlander SUV  that she loves, and the seats go down in it. She loves it too. It gets about 20 mpg, but if gas isn't a problem that might be something to think about.It has a super smooth ride too.  I'd definitely go used though. Too much money is lost when you drive a new car off the lot.

Anyone who's thinking used of any kind should definitely consider Frontier Motors on Beverly in P'Cola.  The best.

I agree with you. Frontier is an honest used car business. Lots of them aren't. We've bought a couple of vehicles for our kids from them.