Hi Nan,
The Prius's are hybrid. That means they don't need charging. They get charged by the engine and braking and will run as an electric car when conditions are met (eg. cruising around at 30mph). If you put your foot down or run out of battery charge the engine will kick in 
.
I feel you're asking for too much. Something has to give. For instance, high AWD cars tend to not be fuel efficient. You could have a hybrid AWD but that's over your price range. You could have a cheaper hybrid but it's not AWD.
What are your orders of priority?
1) Affordable. If we can't afford it, none of the following matters. Prefer a valid warranty, because repair costs over the next five years are something I consider in determining "affordable."
2) Reliable/safe. Must start and run reliably. No tin-cans-on-roller-skate cars.
2) Tied at #2 with Environmental system
absolutely must work, particularly the AC system.
(If we don't have working A/C, the car is worthless to us in the hot months. One of the reason in getting a car is to not be exposed to excessive heat/cold when traveling. It's a medical issue, not a "comfort" issue. We need to also not be worried it's going to strand us on the road in hot weather for that same reason. It's got to run when we need it to run. So I need to choose wisely to minimize that risk. And also the cost of repairs on those systems - if they take special parts only that model uses, etc.)
3) Preferably not older than 5 years old and not high-miles. I am uncomfortable with a car with more than 50K miles on it. Had plenty of those in my life and they start nickle-and-diming you to death on repair costs and it's not nice living with a car that you have to say a small prayer to just before turning the ignition key in hopes it's going to turn over.
(Cars older than that tend to have much higher miles and no chance of warranty. Also, there is a point at which even a very low-miles car will need repairs because parts, such as hoses and electricals, will simply start to fail due to age. Like tires. Per my very reliable mechanic of 25 years, previously. I inherited a car a few years back that had under 15K miles on it and had literally been driven by a little old lady only to the store and church. It was a top of the line car from it's year, but it was older and cost me a small fortune to keep running due to needing to replace the original wiring, etc., that was starting to crumble away. Every couple of months it'd leave me sitting by the side of the road with something else gone wrong. NOT doing that again.)
4) Automatic tranny.
(Not a make or break, although the Daughter doesn't know how to drive a stick. Yet. She can learn if she wants to drive it. There are days when it would be more comfortable for me to not have to be moving my leg to run a clutch pedal, too. Also, I slightly prefer a mechanical transmission over a CVT due to the difference in the cost of repairing the CVT down the line, if it's ever needed. A warranty would take care of that, though.)
5) Hatchback, but it's not a deal-breaker.
6) Fuel efficient. We aren't going to be driving that much and fuel is cheap. It'd be nice if it was very fuel efficient as I'd like to be as non-damaging to the environment as possible, but at this point we need transportation, so if it'll get over 20mpg I'd take it if it ticks all the other boxes.
NOT required - I like AWD, but I've been long resigned to not getting that because, as you say, it adds to the cost. A used Outlander is over $17,000 and the insurance is much higher than the smaller cars I've been hunting. It also has too many bells and whistles on it anyway. Nice to drive, though.
NOT wanted - a lot of tech. Blue-tooth, touch-screens, lane warning alerts, automatic stopping tech are all actually negatives in my book. (I do like backup cameras, but I've been backing cars up for decades just fine without them. Just one more thing to have to repair if it breaks.) Seriously, if I could find a vehicle comparable to a 1960s Datsun (terrorist) pickup truck, with A/C....
DON'T REALLY CARE - sound system, colors, interior other than the seats really do need to have some support in them. Would be nice if they were heated, but, again, all the cars I've owned did not have heated seats, so I can manage just fine without that perk. It just feels really good when one has a sore back to have that heat on it.
I did not know that about the Prius! That's cool. They are also out of our price range, until you start talking quite old models. I would assume they are probably more expensive to repair than a "normal" car would be, given their unusual components and the need to source parts from only that manufacturer and have the work done at a dealer? The Daughter is also saying that there are a lot of jokes about Priuses not being able to accelerate well enough for you to survive on a LA freeway. Not sure if that's true or not (and I no longer live in LA, but it's not out of the question that we might again soon).
I did another search last night, and things are looking a little better for the Kia Soul. (The market does fluctuate wildly, been watching for a while. They are starting to do massive sales on brand new cars, so perhaps people will trade in their older cars and there will be more to choose from in a few weeks.) Anyway, last night I found the following:
2019 - $13,997 34K miles, (will be renting a car to go see this, it's about 90 miles from here) warranty would be good for another 4 years, I believe. A little more tech in it than I'd like, but I could deal with it.
2018 - $14,999, 10,511 miles, comes with a warranty that would be good for almost 7 years on the powertrain and one year on everything else as a "certified used" car. One owner, NY garaged its whole life. I could bend the budget a bit for that warranty.
2017 - $12, 860 about 34.5K miles, not too far from us (the place that kept wanting to bring it to us) Powertrain warranty good for another 15K miles or 2 years, whichever came first.
2016 - $12,500 and about 30K miles (also about 90 miles away, will see it on the same trip) Powertrain warranty good for one more year or 29K miles....All of the above would be acceptable, although 2018 and older are slightly better because they have less touch-screen stuff and tech in them. (And thus no future repairs on it.) The insurance on them would be around $80 a month for full coverage, $250 deductible. One thing that is annoying with the Soul is that you do not get a spare tire. Not even a donut tire with it. They are available aftermarket as a kit that comes with a jack and a lug wrench, but it's still pretty annoying. The little "patch it" kits don't handle shredded tires and AAA will only change a spare, not do the temporary patch thing on the road.
The one we drove (with the malfunctioning AC) was just under $14K, so it appears I may have some leeway for bargaining, given the above. Assuming they'd bargain at all. And assuming they fixed the AC. (Which, apparently from my research is a cheap resistor that has failed.)
Sill looking at Nissan Versa Notes, though, as the Daughter really wants one of those. I am getting older, and I imagine this will be the last car I buy "for me". I don't think I'll still be driving in five years, and so she'll probably end up with it. So I'm still checking those out. They get really amazing gas mileage, too.
