No experience with hybrids either, but depending on the condition of the car if the $5,000 garners another 100,000 miles of use then maybe its worth the investment?

Its fairly easy to invest more in repairs / maint on an older mercedes than the resell value but plenty of folks on this forum do it.

Maybe the equation should be cost of repairs minus future selling price divided by expected future life (miles) you expect to drive the used car instead of current resale value of car vs repair costs?

__________________
You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometime you just might find you get what you need.