Regardless, Mazda’s are nice cars. In the long run $1000 more won’t matter anyway.
Toyotas are really expensive right now because of their reputation. You can drive a toyota most likely for 200k+ without any issues.
Mazda quality is getting way better. The quality isn’t the issue, is the availability of parts that will be of more concern because they are a smaller car company so a lot of parts are not cross-shared. It’s not nearly as bad as BMW’s but it’s not as good as sa y a Toyota because just by the number of cars under both their Toyota and Lexus brands