My relative has an 06 with over 200k miles and it's still running fine, although it did need some electrical component replaced recently that was a few hundred dollars, and the battery is a little degraded so it gets slightly worse mileage.

From what I've read, they're generally cheaper to maintain than the average car. You'll spend a lot less on gasoline of course, but also less on brakes since the electric motor takes care of some braking.

You can buy various products that bolt on to protect the catalytic converter, or you could hire someone to weld some rebar around it, or if you want to do it yourself, you can wrap it with chain or barbed wire.

Any local resources that keep track of catalytic convert thefts? Maybe its not a big enough of a deal that it needs to be worried about in your area.

Alternatively, Low Rider Prius.

I'll also say that if you want a hybrid with a catalytic convert that's harder to steal, the cat in a Chevy Volt is tucked up in the engine bay between the engine and the radiator. But the Prius gets better mileage, unless you can plug in the Volt to charge it.

Either way, you should paint a cool airbrush mural on it

I'm starting to think it's not worth it even if the car is objectively good because I'm not going to spend thousands of dollars to replace stolen parts.