The Prius has yet to fail me. I have owned many cars, and now that I have a Prius, I will never get a different type of car again. It is just the perfect size. I was worried about space, however it is very roomy inside. There is plenty of storage with a decent-sized trunk that has a privacy screen. The only con there is when using the screen, your storage in the trunk is cut in half and makes it limited. I love the built-in rear view camera for extra safety among many other safety features. I love the smart key technology, so when my hands are full and I am bringing my son to car, it senses the keys so I don't have to dig them out in order to unlock the door. Of course, the best part is it's hybrid, so the gas mileage is killer, and I don't have to charge it because it is half electric!

Fuel economy and how reliable it's been with minimal maintenance. As for fuel economy, it's a gas/electric hybrid, averaging around 50 mpg. It doesn't require a special charging station, you fill up the gas at any typical station, the electric system is powered by a combination of the gas engine and energy that is recaptured from the friction of the brakes. In terms of maintenance, the battery system was replaced once while it was still under warranty (just because) and since then this car has required nothing other than the most basic maintenance. The occasional basic tune-up and tire change are pretty much it. Maybe I've been a bit lucky, I'm sure there are owners with different experiences, but I have it up to about 180K miles now so I've certainly put it through a lot. I'm alone in the car most of the time and usually not exactly hauling heavy cargo, and when that's the case it's surprisingly fast. I zip along the fast lane on the highway all the time. That said, whenever I have multiple passengers and/or heavy cargo filling up the car, you definitely feel the difference and become aware that it isn't exactly going to win a tug-of-war against a muscle car or truck any time soon. However I've loaded it up with furniture and heavy boxes and whatnot many times and it always gets the job done. You can fit more than you might think once you put the back seats down. So, yes, it's quiet, reliable, efficient as heck, and as a hybrid, it's much better over time for the environment and the wallet than the average car. When I see people at the gas station paying sometimes 2x as much as me to fill their tank, knowing they will still probably have to fill it again before me, I can't help but thing if there were more vehicles like this on the road and fewer oversized ones we'd be a lot better off. Other features like in-dash navigation and a decent stereo make it that much more of a comfortable ride.