Looking to get a 2015 Sienna

[oleguy]

So after a few months of lazy research, a realization that my current car may leave me stranded on the side of the road has pushed me to finally get out and test drive new cars. It also helps that I am coming up quickly on the day in which our lives change with the arrival of twin boys.

As such, I went in thinking the Odyssey would be what I wanted, followed by the Sedona. The Sienna was in third, based on the negative reviews on how it felt to drive and that its fuel economy wasn't great.

After test driving the Sienna and Odyssey (ran out of energy for the Sedona), the Sienna was the hands down winner. I liked the ride, even though that was the frequent criticism in reviews and round-ups. And the cabin was miles ahead of the Odyssey, even at the lowest base trim. About the only place the Odyssey blew us away was the Lane Watch feature, but that didn't make up for the clunky center stack and dated feeling cabin. Or the ride that felt stiff and jarring.

Of course, my problem now is that 2015 is the only year this cabin is available. I don't really want to buy new, but the only used 2015s I can find are all fleet cars that already have 2-3 years of miles on the odometer. And the few that only have a couple thousand are all priced nearly the same as new, with much worse financing offers.

So I'm leaning new because this will be a car we buy to keep for a decade or more, and coupled with 0% financing for up to 60 months, it's not exactly free money, but it at least won't cost me any more to stretch the payments out.

Anyone out there think I'm barking up the wrong tree or if it's really worth spending time to test drive a Sedona or other vehicle at this point? I'm less inclined on the Sedona, if only because the places that praised the Odyssey's handling and ride did much the same for the Sedona, leading me to believe I'll have the same negative opinion about it.

 

[bigi]

I don't like current Odys as their 'bolt' design is hideous. The interior is still full of plastics so in comparison to even current Corolla, the Toyota kills it.

Odys have been very popular. I had last gen one (2007) and it drove very well.

The only hope I see for Honda is that they will drop this stupid 'bolt' design, straighten its body and improve the interior.

If you prefer Sienna's ride quality there is nothing you can do. Get 2015 in December and drive happy.

 

[NutBucket]

Being that it's a Toyota the resale value is high so you might as well buy new.

How is 0% APR not free money BTW? I don't quite understand that logic.

 

[oleguy]

Get 2015 in December and drive happy.

Well, December might be a bit long. Besides no guarantee of the 0% for up to 60 months going past 10/6 (when the deal ends), the twins will arrive sometime before mid December.

Plus, my '99 Intrepid is starting to really show its 195K miles. Two cracked coil springs, leaking struts, some disconcerting clunking noises when turning right, and various rattles, clicks, and thunks that get worse when it gets cold means that I might find myself stranded on the freeway when going to or from work one day.

 

[oleguy]

Being that it's a Toyota the resale value is high so you might as well buy new.

How is 0% APR not free money BTW? I don't quite understand that logic.

To me, free money is when I set up an account with a bank and they hand me $150 for doing so. This is just lending money for free... which still saves my wallet quite a bit over time, don't get me wrong.

Nevertheless, Toyota (and Honda, to be fair) are both pretty much begging you to buy a new car over a used one, since the used cars, even the "certified" ones, carry 1.9% or 2.9% APR in my area.

 

[jaha2000]

To me, free money is when I set up an account with a bank and they hand me $150 for doing so. This is just lending money for free... which still saves my wallet quite a bit over time, don't get me wrong.

Nevertheless, Toyota (and Honda, to be fair) are both pretty much begging you to buy a new car over a used one, since the used cars, even the "certified" ones, carry 1.9% or 2.9% APR in my area.

The money that you would have spent is earning interest in your bank account instead of earning interest for Toyota.
To me, that's free money.

 

[NoCreativity]

If you are going to have the van for the next 10+ years, why not take an hour or two to test out the Sedona?

 

[oleguy]

If you are going to have the van for the next 10+ years, why not take an hour or two to test out the Sedona?

Fair question. We might still do that (it's across the street from the Toyota dealer). My concern is that the Sedona and Odyssey tend to get similar ride and handling scores in various places, meaning that what I don't like about the Odyssey will be present in the Sedona.

Plus the Sedona is pretty feature light in the non-leather trims, unlike the Sienna or Odyssey.

 

[SearchMaster]

I don't like current Odys as their 'bolt' design is hideous. The interior is still full of plastics so in comparison to even current Corolla, the Toyota kills it.

I don't like it either - it looks like they welded the front end from one vehicle to the back end of another and called it a day.

Having said that, we own a 2015 Odyssey. My wife put about a quarter million miles on our '07 Ody and when it came time to replace it, she didn't even want to consider anything but the Odyssey (she literally cried when we left the '07). So that's what we got and I have nothing to compare it to.

I will say that I've been very impressed with the fuel economy. My wife tends to drive like a bat out of hell and got around 17-18MPG on the '07, but is closer to 24 on this one. I drove it on a 500 mile road trip and at ~75MPH, I got about 26MPG. Not bad for such a big hunk of steel. I'm not sure what your complaint about the ride is - hell it's a minivan but drives like a sedan IMO.

FWIW we probably would have gotten the Sienna in '07 but the dealer wouldn't budge on price and the Ody ended up about $7K cheaper. Leather seating was my wife's main requirement and that required the much more expensive package on the Sienna.

 

[oleguy]

I will say that I've been very impressed with the fuel economy. My wife tends to drive like a bat out of hell and got around 17-18MPG on the '07, but is closer to 24 on this one. I drove it on a 500 mile road trip and at ~75MPH, I got about 26MPG. Not bad for such a big hunk of steel. I'm not sure what your complaint about the ride is - hell it's a minivan but drives like a sedan IMO.

I will admit that the fuel economy (real-world testing, not the sticker) still seems to be about 10% better on the Odyssey. I'm actually a rather conservative driver when it comes to the throttle and brake, and do way more bumper-to-bumper than I'd prefer. However, I'm currently in a '99 Intrepid that's down to 22 mpg combined, so even a slight decrease won't change my gas bill too much.

As far as the ride, I like the road isolation and softer ride in the Sienna. The Odyssey felt too hard and I felt every nook and cranny on the road. To some, this might be seen as responsive. But to me, driving mostly on freeways and unkempt city roads, it's just rough and makes my back hurt. To your point, it was a similar feel to my wife's '12 Focus. Way better than the misery of my current car, but I still felt like too much of the road came through to my butt. Driving the Sienna on the same roads was more comfortable. I get that it might be less responsive, but the reality is that for my daily driver (which this would be), my back and hips would prefer the softer ride.

Also, the Odyssey had cabin comforts that paled in comparison to the '15 Sienna. That may not have been true in 2014, but that refresh did wonders for the Sienna.

Finally.... how do you put on 250K miles in 9 years? I realize I had a stretch where I didn't drive my Intrepid much, but even if you got the '07 in 2006, that's 25,000 miles a year!

 

[Blanky]

Forget the sedona. Poor man's minivan, same as the dodge lineup. If you buy a minivan you buy a honda or a toyota. No point in looking elsewhere.

If you find the right rate you can get the sienna significantly cheaper than the odyssey, at least I can in my area (Honda never seems to have crazy deals). Otherwise, get which one floats your boat, you can't really go wrong with either one.

I will tell you that the bluetooth connection on the 2013 sienna LE is f**king atrocious. I don't know if Toyota has fixed it, but it is absolutely terrible. Pairing phones is a g**damned travesty of difficulty, and even though multiple phones can be paired at once, as soon as you pair a new one it won't actually let you connect the old one again (or at least I never figured out how to do it). I have to assume Honda's implementation isn't so bad, because the other cars I've used were all fine. Something just really terrible about the Sienna's bluetooth (also streaming audio from the phone doesn't work properly). This was with an iphone i had all these issues (multiple iphones, actually). In fact, now that I think about it it is not just the bluetooth. If I plug an iphone 5s into the sienna and play music it works for one song on youtube and then errors out and forces me to pull the plug and put it back in. It's unbelievable. F-it, the more I write about it the more I want to dump the van because of this. lol, anyway, otherwise the sienna is surprisingly fast.