My husband and I just got a Toyota Yaris (the 4 door version). Its nice. It drives well, and feels big on the inside. It about a $14,000 car ($16,000 for the 4 door). I don’t know much about the safety rating, and can’t exactly remember the mileage (its good though). I’m starting to wonder if there is a weird Yaris following, because we’ve have people talk to us in parking lots about how much they love theirs.
Oh yeah, the speedometer and stuff is in the middle of the dash. It seems weird, but we got used to it pretty fast, and switching from the regular placement (behind the wheel) to the middle and back isn’t a bother at all (our other car has it in the regular spot). I am glad both our cars’ speedometer are in increments of 20. That would be tough to switch back and forth from increments of 10 to 20.
The seats in the back do fold down and reveal the back of the trunk, so you can stick long stuff in the trunk and have it come out in the backseat.
A couple silly things my husband and I love: 1) there are pop-out cupholders in the dash. Nothing in the console or in front of it, but next to the windows in the dash. Perfect! There are also some in the doors, and one behind the middle section, and you can pull out the middle part of the back seat to reveal two more. 2) You can set the cruise to 25 mph. I don’t know if thats a norm now, but all my other cars have had to be going at least 30 for the cruise to be set.
If you’re looking into hybrids, I’ve read that the mileage isn’t a very good uhhh… way to measure it. Kind of like comparing apples to oranges. Definetly look into how it all works so you can really tell if a 40 mpg rating on a hybrid is better than a 36 mpg on a regular vehicle.