Toyota hybrid sales hit tax credit ceiling:BUYERS AFTER SEPT. 30 GET HALF

[lindisfarne]

OF BREAK
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/14759490.htm

Posted on Wed, Jun. 07, 2006



Toyota hybrid sales hit tax credit ceiling
BUYERS AFTER SEPT. 30 GET HALF OF BREAK
By Matt Nauman
Mercury News

Toyota has sold more than 60,000 hybrid cars and sport-utility vehicles so far this year, enough to reach a government threshold that reduces the federal tax credit on those vehicles.

The good news for motorists weary of high gas prices is that the tax code is written so the 100 percent tax credit isn't reduced to 50 percent until the quarter after the one in which the 60,000-unit sales mark is reached.

That gives buyers from now until Sept. 30 to purchase one of the five gasoline-electric hybrid models sold by Toyota and its upscale Lexus division and still qualify for the 100 percent credit. On Oct. 1, the credit will be reduced by half.

``The credit amount is based on the purchase date of the vehicle,'' said Jesse Weller, a spokesman with the Internal Revenue Service in Oakland.

The credit will stay at 50 percent for two quarters, fall to 25 percent in the subsequent two quarters, then expire. For Toyota hybrid buyers, the tax credit expiration date is Oct. 1, 2007.

[Hissyspit]

1. Wonder if the new Saturn Vue Hybrid is going to be any good.

Literature says it:
- gets an estimated 32 highway miles per gallon
- engine pauses when you brake
- hybrid battery boosts power when accelerate and chargew when you decelerate or cruise

[rucky]

2. Is the Vue an SUV?

32 is what the Escape hybrid gets, I think.

[Hissyspit]

4. Yeah, I guess it is Saturn's version of an SUV

with the very BROAD definition of that term used nowadays...

[skids]

5. Don't trust the literature on that one...

...until it's on the lot.

They keep changing the proposed design. Some are going to come out as milds, some full hybrids but the last time I looked it appeared that their cooler hybird system, the BAS, isn't going to make it to the road in this model.

So caveat emptor.

[snappyturtle]

3. I'm hanging onto my old.....

1998 Civic EX-----getting 40mpg highway!