I think I read in an EAA Sport Aviation magazine about choosing which plane to build that it is estimated that a pilot will spend >80% of his time flying solo. In my case it's more like >95% of the time. When I'm by myself I like to fly both fast enough to get somewhere although I don't typically go very far and I like to go slow enough to check out the terrain at a lower level and land in the desert if I want to. I couldn't do all of this in very many airplanes. Of those, I find the Kitfox to be the most affordable and of the best performance for my kind of flying. I would never routinely try to put an RV12 down in the desert or very often on an unimproved runway for that matter. You mentioned it taking you an extra 30mins to get to your destination. How often would that even be a factor? It is true there are no wrong answers but when there are five right answers you have to figure out which is the best right answer and that ain't always easy as you obviously know. Sometimes you have to consider the intangible economics. Who's going to do the work? Who's going to fly it and how much? Who's going to change the oil, do the annuals and pamper it. I'm not saying ignore your wife, heaven forbid, but when it comes to a debate, don't forget the non-monetary investment you are going to make and who should harvest the greatest reward as part of your discussions. Once my wife saw how much work went into building a plane, how many different kinds of things I had to do, how long it took, she has never complained about it and has more often told me, "Go fly. You've earned it."