Those are good cars. Why is it asking to be retired, whats wrong with it?
If can't be that bad, Altima's are built well. I think you should keep the Altima as a winter beater and keep the iQ for summer!
It's a good car, but it's old and it has around 200,000 miles.
In Los Angeles, winters are very mild and it never snows.
It's not as reliable as a new car and getting broke down on the on ramp somewhere here in LA can be deadly.
It also burns twice as fuel as the Iq would. It doesn't have the modern safety equipment.
Owning two cars is expensive... registration in California has gone wild (260$ for my fit).
The altima needs couple of thousand dollars worth of repair... ball joints, control arms, cv boots, struts all around, steering rack boot, some electrical gremlins, oxygen and TPS sensors, rear suspension bushings, new steering wheel (old one has been cut by thieves).. lots of engine gaskets not to mention tearing down the engine to repair the timing chain pensioner.
All in all, this car has never given any problems, just routine wear and tear.