Why Most Electric Cars Are Leased, Not Owned (bloomberg.com) 206
Bloomberg's research shows that drivers in the U.S. lease almost 80 percent of battery-powered vehicles and 55 percent of plug-in hybrids. "The lease rate for the country's entire fleet hovers around 30 percent," reports Bloomberg, noting that Tesla does not divulge how many of its vehicles are leased since it sells its cars directly rather than through dealerships. From the report: The lopsided consumer preference for leases is fueled by the meager demand for battery-powered vehicles on the used market. Partly this is a consequence of public policy meant to spur electric vehicle adoptions: buyers of pre-owned cars can't grab thousands of dollars in federal and state incentives. The high lease rate is also fueled by the bet [many] are making that upcoming models will far exceed today's in value and capabilities. Perhaps electric vehicles will truly arrive when they are no longer compared to smartphones, which become obsolete after three years.
Yeh no shit (Score:5, Informative)
No shit. I lease my eGolf. Why - I leased it 2 years ago, and could get an 80 mile range car. Today for the same price I could get a 240 mile range car from Chevrolet, or a slightly nicer 120 mile range car from VW. I'm sure in a further 3-4 years I'll be able to get a 400 mile range car for the same price again.
It'd be completely crazy to bind yourself into a technology that's advancing so quickly at the moment.
Re:Yeh no shit (Score:5, Informative)
I agree. The improvements in battery tech from one generation to another is significant, in that it can be lifestyle-changing. Range anxiety can be a real and frustrating issue to deal with.
I helped a friend go a different approach for an EV-as-a-commuter/second car option: Buy used, and the price drop from a lot of off-lease vehicles can be significant (e.g. Fiat 500e, Nissan Leaf, Chevrolet Volt, Mitsubishi i-Miev, BMW i3, etc).
Some back-of-the-napkin math using a Nissan Leaf as an example:
Some areas even give additional incentives, even to pre-owned buyers (e.g. $500 PG&E Clean Fuel Rebate [pge.com]), and older EVs may still have the Clean Air Vehicle (CAV) sticker that may eventually phase out in January 2019 in California.
If you're patient and do your research, you might find a very good deal that may work to your advantage. My friend ended up getting a 2013 Fiat 500e with 27,000 miles for $6400 after taxes and rebates. Decent commuter vehicle, and the owner gets to enjoy company-provided charge stations (so effectively "free miles" while employed).
Re:Yeh no shit (Score:4, Insightful)
A conventional automobile, properly maintained, can last for a very long time and repairs can be performed incrementally. Any component that fails can be replaced with a used part from a junk yard if you want to save money, so used vehicles are still quite valuable,
Electric vehicles have a very expensive component -- the battery pack -- that cannot be repaired. Once it reaches end of life it must be replaced, you have no choice. This makes used electric vehicles much less attractive because they have a very expensive, unavoidable cost lurking in the future. Ultimately it affects the sale of new vehicles as well -- most people don't want to buy a car that nobody will want when they need to trade it in for a new one.
Maybe someday this problem with be solved, but it's still a very long way off.
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I paid $11,000 for it new+ ~$5000 maintenance = 300kmiles/$17,000= $0.0566/mile. 30mpg = ~10,000 gallons of gas =~$20,000. So in total I've paid about $36,000 for 300,000miles or about 12cents/mile averaged over 30years ballpark for everything except insurance.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSwUEVx5G3U
If there is sufficient market, there will be a secondary market solution. Simple really.
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>>This makes used electric vehicles much less attractive because they have a very expensive, unavoidable cost lurking in the future
Nah, that's not the case any more.
On today's vehicles with big range, the battery outlasts the car on a factor 3x.
The question is not any more, "what will I do with the car once the Batttery is dead?", but rather "what will I do with the battery once the car around it is worn out ?"
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The upgrades in newer electric cars are often more then just battery improvements. Changes to the engine, computer operation, gearing... Will add up toward extended life as well.
However while you can probably get a good battery replacement that will not cause any issues, I expect that would void any service agreements on it. Just because an improper battery type could damage the car, or just be overall dangerous.
While toner and liquid ink printers can usually take 3rd party cheaper products. I am reminded
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I will do well over 1000 miles a day when on the road.
You average well over 41 MPH every hour for 24 hours per day? What, do you only drive the interstates in empty places like Nebraska, or the Autobahn in Germany?
Another factor that would drive leasing over buying is the cost of replacing the batteries when they lose capacity. Nobody wants to be stuck for the cost of new batteries in a few years. This, too, is why the resale value would be low.
It's interesting that there is a question about Tesla's lease rate when they sell their cars directly. I'd guess "0
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I'd bet there are ways to convert a Tesla sale into a lease on paper for those people or businesses that need to lease it for tax purposes. Tesla might even offer this themselves, with the lease held by some third party leasing company.
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Exactly; my second Leaf lease is about to end. I made the mistake of buying my first Leaf after the lease ran out because it looked like the tech wasn't advancing as fast as I'd expected, then the battery wore out enough to make regional driving problematic, but not enough to trigger a replacement. So I replaced the battery with a bigger one (24kWh -> 30kWh), which happened to come with a new Leaf ;-) Unfortunately, Nissan doesn't believe in active cooling, making the 30kWh battery actually *worse* fo
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Not apples to apples. These moro^h^h^h^hpeople buy new brand cars about every 3 years, with payments. Getting higher pay, to them, means they can afford higher payments. Unless they fix that mental defect, everything else is rounding. Leases sometimes make sense, if you assume 'new car moron'.
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Or, just perhaps, they get significant value from buying new, rather than used? Not value that you care about, but value they care about.
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Ego gratification via financial ruin. That value? The point is they are MORONS.
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Sure - sounds great. But it's not me losing out here. It's the dealer. The dealers are offering end of lease residuals in the region of $12-15k for 30k miles. If they want to take a $4-7k loss on every vehicle they have to hand on, that's fine by me.
For me, my eGolf lease cost ~$15000 total across 3 years... Minus $7500 of federal tax credits... Minus $2500 of california rebate. So grand total, $5000 for 3 years of owning a vehicle from brand new, with 0 fuel costs (since charging is paid for by my emp
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It is you losing at the tax office. Why leasing, well, corporations do it a lot, whole lot and auto manufacturer lobby like crazy and so do auto dealers, just look at the attacks on Tesla. Why lease, because the tax advantages are wildly over the top and hence it is a major tax dodge especially employee vehicles, counts as a tax free wage with major tax deductions for the employer.
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Um. He said it would have depreciated *by* 19k, not *to* 19k. It would be worth 11k after three years...
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Not sure about the used market being dead though. Maybe depreciation is bad, but those cars are attractive to people who want a commuter car and to businesses like taxi firms.
My old Leaf is a taxi now.
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Cool man... keep it up. A steady supply of cheap used cars is good for other people, like me, who bought a used Nissan Leaf a couple years ago at a massive discount. My Leaf runs great and meets my needs, needs that aren't changing just because a new EV with longer range comes out.
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What about overall cost though? You're perpetually making a monthly payment with no end.
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Do they toss in a free coward card with that comment? Motorcycles are awesome.
Yes, people on the organ donation waiting list especially think they are awesome.
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Not if you don't sign the donor card...
It's just selfish to not sign the donor card when you buy your autoeuthanasia machine.
Re:Yeh no shit (Score:4, Insightful)
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Bah (Score:3)
Dumb? For some maybe. Certainly not for all.
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Re:Yeh no shit (Score:5, Informative)
70mpg is far from better milage - my eGolf gets 129mpge. And that's before you consider the fact that my employer pays for all the electricity to charge it.
I ended up paying a total of slightly less than $5000 over 3 years to own the car, including all fuel for it. To drive 30,000 miles in a petrol car would have cost me $3000 in fuel alone, further, the value of the car would have depreciated by far more than $5000 across 3 years. Long story short - sure I "paid money for nothing"... if you ignore the utility of having a car for 3 years. I in fact got a far better deal than if I'd paid money for something.
And that's all ignoring your idiotic "ride a motorbike, turn yourself into a road crayon" idea. I'll pass on having a 35 times higher likelihood of being seriously injured thanks.
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I had a small motorcycle, and I don't want to ever again. It's dangerous out there, and it's not your own driving you need to be careful of, you have to beware of everyone else who drives crazy. I would regularly have cars pass me in my own lane, tailgatiing was very common, and I always felt like I was low visibility to everyone else. And that was without getting on any freeway.
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I would regularly have cars pass me in my own lane
It's a lot different on a full sized motorcycle. Once you are able to keep up with the other traffic it's a lot safer and more fun.
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Pay cash for things, donâ(TM)t finance them (and leasing is financing, do not assume it is advantageous to you). You will quickly find that your relationship with money and your overall financial status with both get better.
Financing isn't always bad. In particular, it's fine when either the thing that you're financing is an appreciating asset that will appreciate at a higher rate than the interest, when the cost of owning including interest is significantly lower than the cost of not owning, or when you can afford to pay cash and the interest is lower than you can get on savings / investments minus tax. Some concrete examples:
When I bought my first new laptop, the manufacturer was offering 10 months interest free financing
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No
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Probably not. Consider replacing a ni-cad with a lithium battery. The charging circuit is different, the discharge rate is different, current is higher, battery monitoring is more critical (if you discharge a lithium-ion battery beyond about 3V you can damage it). So the entire power system will need to be modified (if not outright replaced). And unfortunately, batteries are chemical and don't obey Moore's Law, so you can't depend on them simply becoming half the size for the same power every 18 months.
Obvious flaw (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't know if that still holds, but it would set both a trend and expectations, so attempts to analyse customer preference based on owned/leased would be unfairly bent towards lease. It would be far more accurate to actually ask people with those vehicles if they'd rather own or lease the it if they had the choice.
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Yes Teslas can be, and are, bought outright. We own our Model S.
Battery life? (Score:2, Insightful)
Isn't there something about lithium-ion batteries having a 3-year shelf/life, whether they're used or not? I'm not sure if this is true, but if it is, it would make sense to turn the car back in if you'd have to replace the battery, which is the most expensive part (?) of an electric car.
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When the batteries are poorly managed (as on Leaf) then 2-4 years use
can reduce the battery capacity 50%. That large a drop in capacity does
not happen to everyone. But it happens. Depends on the use
of the vehicle and the temperatures it is used and recharged in.
Or so I gather from comments by owners.
But if well managed (as in Tesla) the batteries last a long time.
Our 2014 S had 100% battery capacity after 3 years (we traded
it in for a 2017 to get an even bigger battery and more
sensors).
In other words, ba
Re:Battery life? (Score:5, Informative)
My 2015 Tesla S still has 96% of the original battery capacity after 60,000 miles. I'm happy I bought it since leasing is expensive and I don't see getting rid of this car for a long time.
OTOH, I have heard that Leaf batteries don't last long since they don't have a good battery management system.
Leasing is sensible with EVs since the technology is changing fast. Tesla's are good since I get monthly software updates and the battery is good.
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The Tesla also has a battery composed of so many groups of cells that the battery management system can just stop using a group if it starts performing badly or failing.
So basically, if a small percentage of cells fails, you'll lose a little capacity but not like with a phone where you have ONE cell that, if it fails, that's it, you're done.
Re: Battery life? (Score:2, Informative)
EV batteries have different chemistries. They have turned out to be surprisingly long lasting, especially if properly cooled. Most new EVs have 8-10 year battery warranties.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
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Most electric cars ship with a 10 year warranty on their battery pack.
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This was true in the first generation Leaf, after that battery tech has advanced enough where the batteries are lasting the life of the vehicle. There is a Volt owner with over 400k miles with no shown battery loss still.
https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1112485_2012-chevy-volt-has-now-crossed-400000-miles-range-remains-steady
greenwashing at its best (Score:3, Interesting)
if one truly cared about the environment, and was still wanting to drive themselves (for whatever reason)
Does it make more sense to:
a. new car, and all the energy intensive production needed to make it.
b. used car
Financially, the calculus is even worse (and gets worse the more you spend, like a fucking Tesla for example)
Tesla -> ~60k (there's other EV's of course, around what, 30k or so?)
Used economy car -> 5-10k ?
That price differential would more than likely be more than you'd spend on gas for the life of the car (realistically several of your life times).
I'll admit Teslas are pretty fricking cool, but i don't think they should be subsidized by tax breaks.
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If you believe (as I do) that it is crucial to be reducing carbon emissions you immediately grasp why the subsidies exist. When sufficient sales volumes are achieved the subsidies may not be needed to encourage sales, but can still matter (even if smaller) to push down carbon emissions. (yes, we generate enough electricity to charge our Tesla and more: solar).
If you don't think Carbon matters...never mind.
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If you believe (as I do) that it is crucial to be reducing carbon emissions you immediately grasp why the subsidies exist.
Subsidies do not exist because either you or I think it is crucial to be reducing carbon emissions. They exist because the government wants to social engineer the tax-ees into doing what the government thinks is best for us. Sometimes it is because the legislators get lots of campaign contributions from the companies that they are subsidizing, or they are scratching someone else's back so they'll get theirs scratched for things they want. They don't actually care what we think about it.
When sufficient sales volumes are achieved the subsidies may not be needed to encourage sales,
If nobody wants to bu
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You do realize, I hope, that the science behind AGW is not what all of our tax system is based on, and that I said nothing at all about the validity of AGW? Maybe not. The legislators can care not one whit about what you or I think about AGW and legislate for any n
Re:greenwashing at its best (Score:4, Insightful)
The new vs used argument is only valid if you assume that no one else would buy the used car.
Re: greenwashing at its best (Score:2, Interesting)
I think old EVs will be great because they're mechanically simple. The motor has one moving part. The entire power train typically has 8 gears including differntial. There's no fuel system, air system, ignition system, exhaust system, no oil and a very simple cooling system. No component gets hotter than boiling water, greatly reducing material aging. There will be third party battery replacements.
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How do you feel about subsidies that are artificially keeping the price you pay for gasoline low? Should those subsidies also end, or is it only subsidies that bring down the cost of electric vehicles be eliminated?
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How do you feel about subsidies that are artificially keeping the price you pay for gasoline low?
Upon which line of the 10-40 do I enter the tax rebate I will be getting for purchasing a specific product -- i.e. gasoline?
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Look at the price of gasoline anywhere else in the world compared to the US and you'll know exactly how much gas actually is.
No, I'll know how much those companies sell gasoline for, which includes their profits, costs of production and taxes. All of that will be different than in the US. It's different even in different places in the US. It is a false argument to claim that the real cost of gasoline is what people in other countries or places pay.
Re:greenwashing at its best (Score:4, Insightful)
The US having lower taxes and thus lower gas prices is a defacto tax credit to both the producers and consumers of the gas
What an absurd statement. I assume you think that a product that has no artificially added taxes is a "tax credit" to the producers somehow. This is the same kind of logic that results in "massive budget cuts!!!!" in a US budget where there is an actual increase in funding, just not as much as some people wanted. It is an example of the idea that the government owns all the income and is benevolent and kind when it lets the workers who earned it have some back. It's how "tax cuts" are claimed to "cost the government", but tax increases don't ever cost the workers anything.
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If gasoline burning cars are going to continue to be subsidized so heavily, why shouldn't electric cars? That doesn't make any sense.
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Financially, the calculus is even worse
Only if you want to drive a used car. If you're going to buy a new car either way, and your driving patterns fit the profile that current EVs work well for (which is becoming less of an issue; 200+ miles range works for most people), then the total cost of ownership calculation for EVs gets to be pretty good even without tax credits, and quite compelling with them.
And if you don't mind driving a used car, you can buy a used EV. It's pretty disingenuous of you to compare new EVs to used ICEVs.
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There's other EV's of course, around what, 30k or so?)
Used economy car -> 5-10k ?
There about 14million new cars sold every year. 8/10 of the EVs currently on the market in the USA are cheaper than the median new car cost. Your financial advice while sound in general does not apply to the market.
Also it's quite dishonest to compare a new EV to a used ICE vehicle when talking about an industrial change. I hope that in 20 years we get to a point where your used economy cars ARE EVs.
I'll admit Teslas are pretty fricking cool, but i don't think they should be subsidized by tax breaks.
Tesla aren't subsidized by tax breaks. EVs are subsidized by tax breaks. There's nothing stopping any other c
It's the batteries (Score:3)
Nobody wants to be stuck with the cost of replacing the batteries when they stop effectively holding a charge, or they hold much less of a charge than when you first bought the vehicle.
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Complain until Tesla offers $29 replacement batteries.
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That's good, because 99.99% of the EV owners are not stuck with a dead battery.
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Not at all. Batteries can be replaced. The real issue is no one wants to be stuck with outdated tech. EVs second hand value doesn't hold because the industry moves so quickly. A 5 year old EV is just plain garbage (in terms of range, charging capabilities, features etc) compared to a modern one, whereas a 5 year old ICE car is very similar to a modern one.
Three impacts (econ) (Score:2)
Three things drive this:
1. Battery tech continues to improve, both in charge time, discharge, and cost factors. Literally I've seen 20 basic patents for this in just the last two years here at UW Seattle. Thus, it's not worth buying, as the battery depreciates in value more rapidly than the car. Early EVs had 3-7 year lifespans and new battery tech usually means a retrofit to some of the internal systems or the chargers. So by leasing, you avoid buying into one form of tech, and can buy the winning tech (h
Method of Federal Incentive Matters a Bunch (Score:2)
If you're looking to capitalize on the $7,500 Federal tax credit, it's less simple. Since it's a non-refundable tax credit, you have to make sure you have a $7,500 tax bill at the end of the year. If you qualify for a $2,000 tax refund, then your $7,500 tax credit just poofed. You get nothing.
If you have a $2,000 tax bill, then $5,500 of your tax credit went up in smoke.
Thus, those who like t
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If you have a $2,000 tax bill, then $5,500 of your tax credit went up in smoke.
If you're paying only $2000 in income tax, then you probably cannot afford to buy a new EV anyway. From the 2017 draft tax tables, to pay only $2000 you'd have an AGI max of $19,600. Add the $12,700 standard deduction and you have $32,300/yr. Are you buying a $60,000 car on that income? (Numbers are married filing jointly. Lower for single.)
Another reason: cost (Score:2)
These cars are expensive. Leases are cheaper on a monthly base than a 3-5 year payment plan.
On the other hand the entire market is filled with wealthier individuals, people in those brackets lease for tax purposes as well as the need to have a reliable vehicle. If you can afford (time-wise) to fix your car every other month, then it makes sense to keep your car 10-15 years, myself I am having more and more time-sensitive meetings so I canâ(TM)t afford not to get somewhere because my car broke down agai
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Who is making such horribly unreliable cars that at 10-15 years old they break down so often? Even when I was driving a PoS 20+ year old Porsche it didn't break down 6 times or even 3 times in a year. I've owned a similarly aged Nissan Z car, a Chrysler sedan, and a large Pontiac I could have put historic plates on. None of them were so unreliable as you seem to think a 10-15 year old car would be. And as my wife would happily tell you I'm horrible about maintaining my cars, the rain provides free wash serv
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Pretty much any American-made or Japanese cheap-car. Jeep, Pontiac, GM, Buick, Chevrolet, Hyundai - I've driven them all, given they were the cheapest of the cheap, most of them cost $1200 or less when I purchased them.
You're comparing a very expensive high end vehicle to a cheap daily commute car. These cars cost $12-15k when you buy them brand new, not $60-80k, after about 10-15 years of driving in high heat, rain, several inches of snow and salt, up and down hills, this month it's the shocks, then it's t
So used electric cars are a good deal? (Score:3)
That seems to be the take away for this.
Worst case scenario, replace the battery. Leaf cars can even replace individual cells rather than the whole battery.
Buying wasn't always an option. (Score:3)
I seem to recall a lease was the only way you could get an EV-1 or the electric ford ranger unless you were doing fleet sales. Were the electric Rav4's sold or leased?
Leasing EVs is generally cheaper than buying (Score:5, Interesting)
EV sales are taking off because of CARB (California Air Resources Board). They have a ZEV mandate [ca.gov] (zero emissions vehicles - mostly EVs though Toyota has a hydrogen vehicle on the market). Beginning in 2013 or 2014, CARB required a certain percentage of each manufacturer's vehicle sales to be ZEVs [ucsusa.org] or PZEVs (partial ZEVs - basically plug-in hybrids). The percentage goes up every year. The formula is a bit complex but it's about 2% ZEVs for 2018, and supposed to reach over 15% by 2025.
If a manufacturer fails to reach this percentage, the manufacturer must buy ZEV credits from another manufacturer which exceeded its required quota. This is what keeps Tesla afloat. Since they only sell ZEVs, they always have excess credits which they sell to other manufacturers who didn't sell enough ZEVs. That's right - if you buy an ICE vehicle, you are likely subsidizing someone buying a $70,000 Tesla. This is also why Tesla is in no hurry to ramp up Tesla 3 production. They don't want to flood the ZEV credit market - that would devalue their own credits. So they're going to ramp up production just barely fast enough to keep up with how many credits other manufacturers need to buy to comply with CARB's requirement.
If the manufacturer fails to sell enough EVs or buy enough ZEV credits, they are banned from selling cars in California. Since about a dozen states automatically adopt CARB's rules, that ban would extend to about 1/3 of the U.S. by population. No manufacturer wants to be banned from that huge chunk of the market, so they do whatever they can to sell enough EVs to comply with CARB's ZEV mandate. This means sales, discounts, incentives, whatever it takes to get however many EVs they need into buyers' hands to satisfy CARB's requirements. This is why the EV deals are better in California than in other states - CARB only counts EVs which are sold in California. So California is where automakers offer the biggest EV incentives. I almost pulled the trigger on a 3-year e-Golf lease in 2016 for $500 down, $79/mo in Los Angeles (the Bay Area had zero down, $79/mo available).
Since EVs are not actually popular with buyers (at least not at the percentage the ZEV mandate requires), this means the manufacturers have to sell the vehicles at below true market value to generate sufficient sales (sometimes even below manufacturing cost). If they're going to do this, leasing it is preferable to selling it. With a sale, they've lost the entire manufacturing cost of the vehicle. With a lease, they at least get the materials for the vehicle back at the end, which they can then reuse or recycle. And if the blue book value of the EV is less at the end of the lease than was projected, they can write off the difference and get a tax deduction for the loss. Leasing also allows anyone to take advantage of the full $7500 federal tax credit. Being a tax credit, you have to owe at least $7500 in income taxes to take full advantage of it. Based on IRS tax stats, this means the buyer needs to make more than about $70,000/yr to take advantage of the full tax credit. But if you lease it, the tax credit goes to the car manufacturer, who pays a lot more than $7500 in taxes each year. So they can take advantage of the full credit and pass it on to the buyer. That means the real price for a leased EV for anyone making less than $70,000/yr is often less than for a purchased EV.
All this is why the blue book value of a used EV is so low. The ZEV mandate only applies to new vehicle sales, not used EVs. The incentives lower the price, effectively causing more new EVs to be sold or leased than would've at the correct market p
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A quick look on truecar.com shows 2015 SEL egolfs selling for $15-$18K. Not at all bad for a car that was effectively selling for $21K new three years ago. Personally I am leasing an eGolf, and expect to net a few K by buying off the lease and selling it at the end of the lease. So for me I am very pleased with the used market.
OK it's true, really it's a $31K car that had a $10K subsidy. But the subsidy is still going on...it makes sense that it would depress the market for used electrics.
I fully expect
At one point I looked at used Leaf prices (Score:2)
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Sure, I lease mine as well (Score:3)
There two major incentives to lease: price, and obsolescence.
When I leased, I got a very steep discount on the vehicle total price, and federal tax credit ($7500) was already factored in without going thru any hassles. Also sales tax (which is very high here in CA) is only paid for the portion that you lease every month, and not the full vehicle price. And, when I finally return the vehicle, there won't be another tax for resale, like one would when you do on the used market. Given the lease financing was about 0%, there were many economical reasons to lease than to buy.
And of course I was expecting the technology to progress fast, like many others, and it would not be wise to be stuck with a short range vehicle (even though I enjoy it in my commute) for the long run.
The manufacturer and the market just pushes you to lease than to buy with all these incentives.
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I leased my Nissan Leaf as well, until I bought it. In 2016 my lease was expiring and I extended for a year. In 2017 it expired and I bought the car.
This all worked out to be *extremely* economical, mostly because Nissan badly mis-estimated the resale value. I leased a $35K vehicle for ~$210 per month for 36 months (no cash down, though there were some documentation fees and sales tax that had to be paid up front on the $7500 federal tax credit). When the lease ended, I paid $6000 to buy the car. 36 * 2
Bloomberg is staffed by who exactly? (Score:2)
This was probably written up by someone that is too young to know the re
Purchase price (Score:2)
battery (Score:2)
when you lease the vehicle, the battery is covered in the lease. if you buy it and your battery is underperforming because of age, #charges, etc. you have to buy a new one yourself, which is expensive.
rightly or not, people don't trust EV batteries (Score:2)
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I have a five year old Nexus 5 which works just fine. I did replace the battery (and the screen after I dropped it) but the new phones aren't any faster and don't have any more features. I'll get a new phone when there is some new whiz-bang tech that I have to own but I'm happy now.
Re:Obsolete after three years? (Score:4, Interesting)
Apart for missing those security updates, which your phone hasn't received since October 2016.
Re: Obsolete after three years? (Score:2)
I should install CyanogenMod to keep updated.
Fortunately, Android is open source so it is maintained beyond the official support.
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Seems to be a problem with Apple hardware. My five year old Nexus 5 runs great. OTOH, my 5 year old MacBook Air is a dog... software "updates" have killed it.
Re: Obsolete after three years? (Score:2)
My ten year old MBP runs fine, once I replaced the hard drive with an SSD. Canâ(TM)t be upgraded past El Capitan without hacking, but thatâ(TM)s still getting security patches anyway.
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Re: Obsolete after three years? (Score:2)
Thanks, I'll give it a try
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Yup, had the same problem with my iPhone 3G. By the time the 4S came out (with its accompanying iOS update) it was basically useless. Took 10-15 seconds to launch an app, didn't even display incoming calls until the third or fourth ring.
In contrast, I had my galaxy S5 for four years, only replaced it with a new S8+ because I dropped a book on it while it was charging and messed up the power jack. It felt just as fast on the last day as it had on the first.
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Dealerships are stealing the tax credits and bulking up their purchase cost.
Universities are stealing the student loan money by bulking up their tuition. Subsidized anything suffers from that problem. Artificial stimulation of demand increases prices.
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Rural and suburban utilities are stealing the rural electrification administration budget (just under 1 billion$/year).
It's called rent seeking, it's understood, but a bitch of a problem. Constitution banned 'transfer payments', but long gone.
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Rural and suburban utilities are stealing the rural electrification administration budget (just under 1 billion$/year).
Rural and suburban utilities are not increasing their rates because the government is giving their customers money to pay for the services like Universities can do because the students have access to loan money. If there is money being provided to the utilities directly by the government, that's keeping the prices down because it covers some of the costs, and the public utility commissions are managing price increases based on those costs.
That's not stealing. It's nothing like direct-to-consumer subsidies
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Here in the UK the whole market is different, but we lease our hybrid Outlander - it turns out it's about the same cost either way, and arguably less hassle with the lease.
We went to a dealer and chose the car. We asked the dealer about leases, he gave us a quote for monthly and other costs. We then went home and found another lease company with lower monthly costs. After lots of form filling and whatnot, a couple of weeks later went back to the dealer to pick up the car. Even though we're leasing, it's con
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Somebody once told me, as soon as you drive off the lot with a new car, your vehicle depreciates by 30-50%. Just by buying it you lose that much if you were to trade it in.
It is also why I was always told to never buy a new car, no matter what. Always get a 1-3 year old car instead.
Not sure how true the above advice was. But that's what I was always told by a lot of people.
As long as you don't buy a new car and then immediately sell it, it doesn't really matter, it's not a cash loss. Yes, over the life of the car you will pay more than buying a two year old one, but you are starting with a zero mileage clean vehicle with probably a 100k/ lifetime warranty.
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