<human>: Can you provide a brief overview of the text?

My wife and I have one car between us, an old 2000 VW Beetle whose transmission we recently learned is failing. We live in the city and drive very little, so it's happening in slow motion, but it's becoming clear the time is now to get a new car. Quick summary of our financial situation: between us, we are currently saving about $2600/month towards a house (or will be once she finishes paying off her student loans), and paying $1000/month in rent in our current apartment. We estimate that we can make our goal for a down payment (~$70k on a ~$350k house budget) in ~2.5 to 3 years in this way.

But the car complicates things slightly; I was really hoping our current car would last us until the house. We're both in agreement that we really want a slightly-used Toyota Prius; it has an excellent reputation, great mileage, ample space compared to our current car, and should last us a while. However, buying one will probably set us back on the house by about 6-8 months, and make us spend that much more on rent instead of a mortgage. So we're kicking around the idea of getting a cheaper but still decent used car for less than $8k, and then reselling it once we're in our house and can get the Prius. This would cost us due to depreciation, but it would help us get into a house sooner and thus save us some rent.

So I just wanted to ask the collective wisdom of this subreddit: is this a decision I should put a lot of effort into making and weighing? Or is one of these options obviously better than the other in my case? Or does it matter less than I am thinking? (I have never bought a car before; the Beetle was my wife's)
<bot>: Saving for a house, need to replace our car, wondering if buying our more expensive dream car or a cheaper temporary vehicle to resell in a few years is the better choice.