welcome back guys or if you're new to my channel this is odd mode of anonymous and that's my Rav 4 hybrid I bought it brand new less than four months ago I've put over 5,000 miles on it and in that time it has been a very good vehicle but today I'm going to talk with you guys about potentially selling it about what its replacement is going to be and what my experience has been with this and this Toyota platform in general for why it will be getting replaced at some point soon the reason for making
this video today is because usually when I get the itch to change out Vehicles it's not more than a few days later before that actually happens so I want to give you guys the opportunity to comment below and let me know if there's other video ideas you want to see with this platform if you do and I've already done it I will send you the link on your comment to let you guys watch that and learn more about the platform and if there's other video ideas you guys have please comment below because I'd love to
do them while I do still have this vehicle for a little bit longer but today there's going to be a lot of information I share with you guys so if you get anything out of this please consider liking it comment your thoughts and opinions below as mentioned And subscribe if you haven't already and you want to watch more videos usually I do a lot of car reviews but I also keep you updated on my own personal vehicles and with that said let's get right into it just a little bit of quick backstory if you are
new to my Channel or you've only been following since I've had this dve for the last few months is there a place to subar Outback Wilderness which I own for over three years prior to that I owned another Subaru and then before that it was Toyotas the last three Toyotas I owned were two Tacomas I bought those both brand new and I also had a supercharged lifted FJ Cruiser so I used to drive a lot of body onframe Vehicles a lot of body on frame Toyotas before switching to Subaru and then deciding it's time to
try the RAF 4 the reason I tried this vehicle out is because it's actually the number one sold vehicle globally right now the Rav 4 is sold all over the world and even in the United States they sell over 400,000 units so I want to see if this is just a plain Jane regular but good SUV or why is it so popular why do so many people like it I've also never had a unibody Toyota before and I've never had a hybrid so I figured I want to try a new experience so even though the
Subaru was perfect even though it didn't have any flaws I decided let's just try the number one Global platform let's see how it does and we'll try it out for a while but also the Subaru I kept that for over 3 years prior to that I've never kept a vehicle longer than two years and I think it's safe to say that I'm not keeping this vehicle nearly as long as I have with those and I'll be honest with you guys if I was a normal person if I wasn't obsessed with different cars and different experiences
and the fact that I part-time get to make car videos is perfect for me because I like to experience a lot of things but I don't necessarily like to own them for that long I'm a little bit minimalistic in that way that I like to have less and to me less is more at least in terms of material stuff but this vehicle I do think that the raav 4 this current generation is completely underrated I understand why so many people buy them but unfortunately these don't have a huge Enthusiast following not like the Toyota 4Runner
not like the Land Cruiser not like the Tacoma not even like Subarus or Volkswagen or so many other platforms for some reason the Rav 4 just doesn't have a lot of following it doesn't have a huge aftermarket support for it sure you can swap out wheels tires there might be a couple lift kits on the market but there's not a lot of Custom Fabrication there's not a lot of just crazy people doing crazy stuff which I think is so unique about the platform because this is just kind of a daily commuter it's kind of a
good vehicle but it is is very underrated so some of the vehicles that I have been considering what would I sell this for what would I trade into well I used to own a lot of body on frame vehicles and being perfectly honest with you guys after driving a few hundred Vehicles a lot of the body on frame stuff a lot of the Toyota stuff is kind of disappointing there's a lot of reasons for that most of those Vehicles like I just mentioned they cost 50% to over twice as much as something like the unibody
R 4 they handle worse they drive worse the all Drive four-wheel drive system and some of those honestly isn't even that fantastic because they weigh 1,000 lbs more they have a higher center of gravity and they're just a little bit more numb feeling you can't feel as much through the vehicle so some of them I'm not impressed with in the snow for instance when I got out of my Toyotas and I got into Subarus I was blown away at how much better my first Subaru handled in the snow accelerating stopping handling turning all that than
any of my vehicles even on snowflake raay tires those Vehicles just were not that good so some of the other disappointments with those in Toyota which I do think they're getting better sure the reliability is questionable with their turbo engines compared to something like this that has one of the best most reliable engines and electronic cvts in the market today this power plant might be about as reliable as anything currently sold in 2025 but those other vehicles not only are they having problems not only do they cost twice as much and in most cases they
don't handle as well but they're just not as practical if you look at this vehicle it has 37 cubic feet of rear cargo capacity that's about as much as a 4Runner that's about as much as a Land Cruiser but I'm pretty sure this actually has just as much rear passenger space as those vehicles and don't even get me started on the Tacomas even the full-size Tacomas really just don't have a lot of room in the back seats you can hardly fit fullsize adults without their knees being cramped into the back even in the back of
the raav 4 on the passenger side where this seat is further back than my driver's side I still have room in front of me I can still recline the seats a few degrees which is cool and more importantly than anything else the seats are actually comfortable and you have ventilation the Tacoma doesn't have ventilation for instance how ridiculous is the TRD Pro those cost over $65,000 they don't have Vents and because of the fancy back seats you can't even fit probably children in the back so it just feels like you're paying a lot more and
you're getting less vehicle let alone the fact that usually they're slower because they're heavier the engines are maybe overworked a little bit unless you get something like the tundra but we know how reliable the tundra has been and to not even get backseat vents for your kids for your pets for Grandma in the back it's just kind of sad the things that you are missing out for the purpose of buying a name for the purpose of buying an Enthusiast vehicle something with some Heritage something with the huge Enthusiast following there's there's there's benefits to all
that but the actual value that you're getting for day-to-day life it's just not as good in my opinion and guys I'm a car Enthusiast I love vehicles I love different experiences I like unique and different but reliable and safe and practical and trying to balance out what I think is cool I love the Tacomas I owned I love the supercharg jej cruiser I used to have those are such cool vehicles but body on frame vehicles at least up until this current Generation by Toyota which thankfully they are finally getting on board with this is they
are not nearly as safe as you think you think because you're driving a 5 to 6,000 lb piece of metal down the road that it's actually going to be structurally sound and support you and protect you in accidents and honestly that's just not true they don't have nearly as sting crash test results they don't need to have the same safety features that car and passenger and ody vehicles have that's just the government regulations they are not as safe you guys can check out full-size Tahoe Suburban truck crash tests for yourself they don't hold up very
well a lot of the time they do have some poor ratings and being a body onf frame it doesn't have the same crumple zones that a unibody does where this vehicle is kind of like a vessel to protect you and the Rav 4 even though I don't think it's necessarily as safe as a Subaru in a crash I don't think it's necessarily the safest vehicle on the road this is one of the best it still is a top safety pick even though it's not a top safety pick plus and it does a good job overall
at balancing life and doing a lot of things that you need so why would I want to be getting rid of it you might ask and honestly the answer might surprise you guys I really like this vehicle I love that it's naturally as sprayed I love that it's Toyota's modern hybrid system which is completely proven I love this transmission it does such a good job gives me a lot of peace of mind that I don't have to worry about the vehicle and because I have snowlake mountain peak raid all train tires on it this thing
does well enough in the winter for my area if we're not going to get a lot of snow with global warming and all that stuff if this or whatever if it's just an off year this year this did completely fine it still gets over 30 m per gallon in most driving conditions and I like the things that it does but there's supposed to be a new one coming for 2026 a new one that is likely going to be very similar very much the same but slightly revised because Toyota doesn't want to risk losing their audience
they don't want to do a major change because that might turn a lot of people off and if they sell a million of these a year and they and they lose 10% of the market share just because they tweaked it too much that's a lot some other compact crossovers don't even sell 100,000 units a year so I don't think Toyota's going to drastically change this I think they're going to keep the formula proven and with a good set of tires there's really not a lot of reason to not like it or not consider it so
my current thought is I will probably or maybe 80% sure that I will buy the new generation when it comes out the 2026 assuming it's still made in Japan assuming it still offers silver paint and assuming you know it's not a complete disaster which I don't think it's going to be or that it's a turbo small engine or something off like that in that case I wouldn't consider it but if it's like this but newer but better that has the Camry system that makes a tiny bit more horsepower and it's just revised in a better
platform a little bit safer and it just keeps working its way uphill doing all the right things that I'm 80% sure that that's what I want to buy next but there are some other cool vehicles coming out the new Outback which may or may not be a hit there's also the hybrid Foresters there is a small part of me that would consider a bodyon frame vehicle if it could tow a lot because I do want to start getting another project car at some point in the past I had a full Bolton LS1 transan that I
built that before having a YouTube channel since having the YouTube channel I bought and sold a 2023 Miata Club that was a fantastic vehicle basically you know it was bought brand new didn't have any issues so I'm kind of conflicted on what do I want to do next do I want just a good daily drive or something that if it is the new generation I probably will keep it for more than a year maybe two years or even longer I guess we'll just kind of see how life goes what the vehicle's like if it has
any problems being one of the first but because there aren't a lot of enthusiasts who care about the Rav 4 I see the value in it and I want to test out the new one for you guys if I have the opportunity to do that when the time comes and they start rolling out hopefully in a few months but we'll see what happens or maybe I'll try a different platform but for me it is a whole lot of fun to be able to get a vehicle to think about every part of driving it to think
about the things I like about it the things I don't like about it and just to be honest with you guys before you spend or waste your money on a vehicle that costs so much if this is one of the biggest purchases we will ever have in our lifetime you don't want to you don't want to make the wrong one and I don't think that this vehicle gets enough credit gets enough value and enough uh basically following online so I like it a lot but it's not perfect you guys know that from my other videos
I've knocked it I've tried to be completely honest with the issues it has but the only reason I probably wouldn't get another unibody crossover in my next vehicle as a daily driver is if I were to get really far into a project car and I don't think I'm going to do that next I think the next project car or truck I'm going to have is probably going to have a V8 it's probably going to be pretty reliable and drivable right off the bat and then they'll get modified from there it's not going to be a
complete rebuild or anything crazy just yet so I don't think I need a truck anytime soon but we'll see what happens I just want to give you guys a heads up because I know a lot of you guys have been following my ra 4 videos and things change quickly in a couple months a lot of these other new vehicles like the subru and other automaker new models are going to start to roll out and in case something happens quickly I want to try to get all the videos that you guys are interested in so again
comment below what else you want to see with this platform while I still have it probably going to be at least a few months but honestly who knows and I wish you guys the best thank you so much for watching till the end like this video if you got anything out of it that lets me know you want to watch more stuff like this and subscribe if you haven't already otherwise I wish you guys the best take care guys
