Toyota Prius Named Least Likely Car To Be Stolen

If you happen to own a Toyota Prius, you should be pretty excited to know that it's the car that's least likely to be stolen out of any other vehicle in its year range, according to a report from the National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB), despite the fact that the Prius is the top-selling hybrid electric vehicle in the US.

According to the report, as of April 2012, 1.2 million Toyota Prius cars were sold in the US, which accounted for half of the hybrids on the road at the time. However, despite its popularity, the Prius has low theft rates and a high recovery rate. The 2008-2010 Prius models reported only one in 606 vehicles stolen, while all other 2008-2010 cars averaged one in 78 vehicles reported stolen.

So why aren't thieves particularly interested in stealing a Prius? It mostly has to do with the uniqueness of the vehicle, which has a one-of-a-kind hybrid engine that won't power any other car. A stolen Prius's engine can only be fitted in another Prius, otherwise it's of no use to the thief. Also, those who own a Prius tend to keep it for many years, which means the market for stolen Prius parts is smaller than others.

This makes sense, especially when one of the main reasons of stealing vehicles is parting them out and selling the individual parts. Then again, this doesn't mean that you're completely theft-proof if you buy a Prius. The report says that the top five states for Prius thefts are California (with over 1,000 thefts reported), Florida, New York, Washington, and Texas with just under 90 thefts reported.