OT: Electric vehicles
- Thread starter BellyFullOfWhiteDogCrap
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Analysis: Ukraine invasion sets back Musk's dream for cheaper EVs, for now
Surging raw materials costs, made worse by Russia's invasion of Ukraine, could set back the dream of Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk and other auto executives to roll out more affordable electric vehicles.
Dumb article. The current supply of cheaper EVs and the price point is cost prohibitive for middle and lower class people. Plus for those that do not own and live in a single family home, there is most likely no way to charge at home (e.g., an apartment of townhouse complex). So, except for the people rife with cash and able to shell out more than $30,00 for an EV (not counting incentives) and who can have a home charging station installed, this article is useless.
NJ gas prices soaring, but will that give a jolt to electric vehicle sales?
Electric vehicles have offered the promise of cleaner — and maybe cheaper — transportation. Drivers have been reluctant. But gas prices are rising.
www.app.com
There are still range issues for those not just using EVs for around town or daily commute type driving. Road trips over 300 miles still require some charging stop considerations (real world 75mph highway testing doesn't support EPA MPG numbers for all but a few cars, and those do not get much over 300 miles).Dumb article. The current supply of cheaper EVs and the price point is cost prohibitive for middle and lower class people. Plus for those that do not own and live in a single family home, there is most likely no way to charge at home (e.g., an apartment of townhouse complex). So, except for the people rife with cash and able to shell out more than $30,00 for an EV (not counting incentives) and who can have a home charging station installed, this article is useless.
NJ gas prices soaring, but will that give a jolt to electric vehicle sales?
Electric vehicles have offered the promise of cleaner — and maybe cheaper — transportation. Drivers have been reluctant. But gas prices are rising.www.app.com
So for folks not looking to spend $30K, they may also not want multiple cars.
All this will eventually be solved (supply chain issues, cost issues, range issues). But it ain't gonna happen tomorrow.
Still, for someone using a car to commute every day, or head to the food store, an EV makes excellent sense for all that afford them.
Wawa and QuickChek are at most of their new locations.
You can remove highways from the map and still trace the major ones using the Supercharger network.
Good to know…I think people grossly underestimate how long the transition will take. Think about all of the family owned gas stations that are sitting on huge tanks in the ground. Environmental lawyers may make a comeback.
For someone who has the money and can afford the expense of a new EV car, and many people are not in that boat. People least able to absorb the cost of inflation and spiraling cost of gas are getting hurt bad right now. That was the point of my comment on the article.
Don't know, but I'd guess charging infrastructure is happening at a pretty fast pace - perhaps slowed a bit by supply-chain issues.
My interest in EVs is for an SUV EV, and a big reason for that is for road trips. So I'm holding off until I see SUV's that get at least 400+ miles of real world (i.e. 80mph) range. I'd be happier with 600+.
True, inflation and cost of living has shot up. Probably go up even more given the Russia-Ukraine situation and there's just not much anybody can do about it, at the moment.
Absent the Ukraine thing, inflation and a stock market "correction", if that's what's happening, were always gonna be happening at some point. But the confluence of world events has seemingly made them worse than they might otherwise have been.
Really sucks for a lot of people.
According to Elon it's a matter of how big the battery would be, causing the car to be less efficient overall versus the amount of times someone would actually need the capacity to go 400-600.
Elon Musk: Tesla could have made a 600-mile-range electric car a year ago
Elon Musk said that Tesla could have made a Model S with 600 miles of range a year ago, but...
electrek.co
A problem is that the current group in power lurched too far, too fast. I fully support more sustainable, environmentally friendly energy and transportation, but it has to be done in a way that allows regular people making $25-50,000/year to not take an economic beating. Saw a segment with the VP and and Sec. of Transportation in which they said everyone should just buy electric vehicles. It came across as being completely tone-deaf on the plight of most Americans who are scraping by right now.
Surprised no one's mentioned the VW ID Buzz yet. It's getting some flak for not being the T1 with an e-drive, and they did add some headscratching changes up front, but still pretty cool, imo.
Make a US AWD seven-seater with a couple inches of lift and ATs and I'll be looking close. 300+ miles of range and $50K or less would be nice, too. Also, bring the camper back!
Sorry linking not working on my phone, but thing's everywhere. CNET must have run 45 different articles on it.
Make a US AWD seven-seater with a couple inches of lift and ATs and I'll be looking close. 300+ miles of range and $50K or less would be nice, too. Also, bring the camper back!
Sorry linking not working on my phone, but thing's everywhere. CNET must have run 45 different articles on it.
He's talking about today. But eventually, it won't take a huge battery to get the desired mileage. Mercedes appears to be working pretty hard on range improvements without increasing weight. And I'm pretty sure they're not alone.According to Elon it's a matter of how big the battery would be, causing the car to be less efficient overall versus the amount of times someone would actually need the capacity to go 400-600.
Elon Musk: Tesla could have made a 600-mile-range electric car a year ago
Elon Musk said that Tesla could have made a Model S with 600 miles of range a year ago, but...
I'm overdue for a new SUV so will probably go w/ICE or hybrid. But Porsche claims the EV Macan will have "great range", so we'll see. Unfortunately, pretty much everyone everywhere is dealing with increased supply chain issues for various geopolitical reasons, in addition to still not having caught up after pandemic-related problems. Prices are terrible right now, mostly MSRP or MSRP+ (or MSRP++). So I'm gonna have to be patient. By the time prices settle back to normal, we might already be seeing next-gen battery tech in EVs.
The supply-chain issues, economic issues, and infrastructure issues we're experiencing today originated w/massive federal spending, among other things, going all the way back to the Bush admin, with it just getting worse and worse with every admin since. Probably also all the artificially low interest rates the fed was using to try to delay the inevitable. We've also enjoyed a very long period of stock market goodness that was always going to be reversing itself eventually (I kind of got burned a bit there because I expected it a few years earlier and opted to pay cash for my last car because I couldn't get an interest rate lower than 3.5 at the time and figured w/a market correction, I'd be losing money at 3.5. Big, huge mistake, as things turned out, as I would've made at least 20% leaving the cash invested, netting very roughly 17% on the decent chunk of money for the car).
Among the aforementioned other things are failures to recognize the allowing such heavy reliance on tech components coming from elsewhere in the world, particularly China. That's been a failure of foresight taking place for decades. As if electronics weren't every bit as crucial as energy.
I'm not into finger pointing. But the current and past three admins are all complicit in some of the issues we're seeing today (and congress, for the past several decades, too). It's been a long-running bipartisan failure.
Tone deaf is spot on. Just buy an EV that you can't afford. That doesn't work? Why not work from home so you don't waste so much gas? Their suggestions are laughable.
How do construction workers, laborers, restaurant workers, delivery people, people who work in stores and hospitality work from home? Freaking geniuses.
Prices are a joke…I’m at the point I’d rather buy my car after the lease expires and figure it out from there because I can’t stomach the thought of paying MSRP or +.
It was all compounded by the current group lurching off of evil oil so quickly. I agree there were long-standing issues. But this group deserves special blame for driving the bus off the cliff without any plan to turn back.
Yep. Agreed.
I can understand it for high end limited production cars. If I could get a build allocation for a 911 GT3 or GT3RS today, I'd happily pay MSRP or even MSRP + $10K. But that ain't happening - it'd be more like + 50K and, at the moment, such allocations are unobtanium at any price given recent events.
But I'm not paying over MSRP for ordinary cars w/unlimited production. I can wait.
You seem to be ahead of me by a few years with these things. We need a car sooner rather than later for our youngest kid, a first year in college. We did well in 2019 buying a loaner Mazda3 with a few thousand miles, getting a great deal and a better warranty than if we had bought it new.
Funny thing, that same car would sell 3 years later with more miles for about $4-5K more than what we paid for it. But that one will stay with one of our kids.
We plan to buy a new car, something along the lines of a Mazda3 or maybe Hyundai base model. We were ready to go with Mazda, because we really like the finish, features and drive of the Mazda3, but Hyundai has a much better warranty.
We are not in a position to wait much more than 2 months, as our youngest kid will need a car for the summer job.
Any thoughts? Sorry, not trying to derail the thread.
At this point, you kind of have to see what's available on lots, in my opinion. Some new cars have months long waiting lists. Used car inventories are so up and down...my buddy is leasing a Nissan Altima and dealers have been coming at him with ridiculous offers to buy him out of his lease just so that they can have inventory to sell. When he asks them about what they can do for him in terms of getting him into another vehicle, they have been dodgy about what they can actually do.
I’ve had dealers offer to buy me out of my lease but the issue is that while I may be able to take that equity and roll it into a new vehicle, those new vehicle monthly lease payments are like 30% higher than what I’m currently paying. I get that supply is an issue, but there is plenty of price gouging going on too.
Thoughts about what car to get? Or how to find a reasonable price?
First, seems like avoiding leasing is currently wise. Due to pricing and other current pressures. Second, the used car market is awful too, as awful as the new car market it seems to me. So if you can figure out 2-3 different make/model combos you could live with, maybe dig into which brands have dealers that are not adding dealer markups to their MSRPs at the moment. Not sure how easy getting a car for under MSRP will be, right now - maybe impossible for popular models.
Regarding the car choice, do your homework and spend a little time in some car forums where owners are discussing the car. You can quickly get a sense of the sorts of issues people are having (all cars have problems, but it's the nature of the problems and any difficulties people have getting them resolved that you see in the forum). So if it's Hyundai vs. Mazda, a perusal of the forums will help you see how folks feel about their cars, maybe help you make a choice.
A ten year warranty is fine. But if the ownership experience is such that the car spends all it's time in the shop, it ain't worth the longer warranty. Not to me, at least. I have the Kia (basically a Hyundai) Telluride on my list of possible SUVs to consider. Before I ever finalize that as a choice, though, I'll spend a bunch of time in the Kia forums doing research (already have, looking into what people are doing w/putting aftermarket wheels/tires on them since the stock wheels are fugly to me style-wise, and more importantly way too narrow).
If you're getting a Mazda, once you know the exact make/mode/color/option-list you want, I'd recommend giving a guy named Wayne Callabretta a call at Irwin Mazda (Freehold). Over the years, I bought two Mazda's from him (one for me that I still have, and years later, one for my dad). Wayne is probably my favorite car sales guy of all time, although I have a Porsche guy who was pretty great too. I had researched the average price for my exact car/options and called Wayne w/the price and he met it instantly. No BS. Also had some unusual conditions for the sale and he met them perfectly without any problems or complaint.
Years later, when my dad was trying to buy a Mazda at Sansone in Woodbridge (one of the worst experiences I've had), they first tried ripping him off (an older guy with older guy confusion) for about $5000 for a model he didn't actually want. So I went in with him and took over the purchasing. We spent around 6 hours there while they tried every single sleazy underhanded trick to sells us less car for more money. You wouldn't believe the dishonest BS they tried to pull.
We finally walked out in disgust, my poor dad exhausted by this point. I called up Wayne and he instantly met my price over the phone (again) and my dad had the exact car he wanted the next day for a very fair price.
OTOH, could be that Wayne can't meet any great prices anymore do to the supply-chain issues plaguing everyone. It's a seller's market.
So... price-wise, do your research once you know what you want, research what price you're willing to pay, then use the phone to call a bunch of dealers and find out who will meet your price. Starting out well-informed makes all the difference in the world.
Leasing is particularly tough at the moment. Probably would do better to finance, if you can get a low rate. Or if you think the stock market will suck for a couple years, pay cash.
The problem is dealers have no motivation to make leasing deals at the moment and they'll get enough suckers to make bad deals on leases (way too much room to play with the various leasing numbers and increase the dealer's profit at the customer's expense). Financing has less wiggle room for dealers to make unobvious bad deals.
It's just way too much of a seller's market. And yes, basically dealerships are price-gouging. Really sucks.
I think some manufacturers are kind of stepping in to prevent dealerships from gouging. But not in anything I've been looking at, unfortunately.
Thanks. We want to buy, not lease. Mazda has 0.9% finance, which we may do so the kid can build credit (but we are buying/paying for the car). I agree with you on the warranty vs. reliability consideration. We will likely stick with Mazda and get another Mazda3. Every time I have driven the 2018 Mazda3, I can't believe what a fantastic vehicle it is for the price, and it is a lot of fun to drive. Zoom zoom, as their commercials say. The kids have been happy with it too.
You raise a good point. If the need for the car is imminent, it has to be a car on the lot already. That's just gonna bump up the price even more.
Maybe do an online search for lowest selling car models, and see if a particular model that sold poorly has 2020 inventory still on a lot somewhere. Thing is, everybody else is in the same boat so cars like that have probably already been snapped up.
I'm kind of annoyed with myself about not jumping on a 10% off MRSP deal on new Macan GTS's back in 2020 (I think it was) out in Chicago. I could've almost certainly gotten that back then and almost leapt, but then decided not to make any big expenditures until seeing what happened w/the pandemic and economy.
Missed opportunity as now, I doubt many are able to secure an allocation for MSRP for the same car without doing a pre-trade trade-in or agreeing to have dealership options added one doesn't particularly want. Not to mention Porsche is shutting down manufacturing of various models for supply-chain issues exacerbated by the Ukraine situation. So even getting ANY allocation at any price is probably very difficult.
Missed opportunity as now, I doubt many are able to secure an allocation for MSRP for the same car without doing a pre-trade trade-in or agreeing to have dealership options added one doesn't particularly want. Not to mention Porsche is shutting down manufacturing of various models for supply-chain issues exacerbated by the Ukraine situation. So even getting ANY allocation at any price is probably very difficult.
Call that dude in Freehold. Or if you want, get Spanky to put us together in a PM conversation, and get me your contact info, and I can reach out and see if Wayne remembers me (it's been awhile) and give you an intro.
I'll lie and tell him you're an awesome dude and all. 😁
Again, he might have no wriggle room, but he was a no nonsense guy and that can be hard to find. It isn't right next door to you, but who cares if the price is right. You can take the car to your closest Mazda dealership for service so it's just the purchase and pickup where you'd have to get to Freehold.
I asked @DJ Spanky to connect us.
If things were further along with EVs and charging infrastructure, I would do my patriotic duty and buy my oldest kid an EV. The only reasonable option with decent range seems to be the Hyundai Kona Electric. with a 258 mile range.
Are the NJ rebates not available yet for 2022? I can't find anything on the chargeup nj clean energy website?
What would I get in federal and locale rebates in NJ.
The cheapest Kona I can find is right around $39,000. That is pushing it in cost for us, unless there was a total of $10K or more in rebates.
But even if we got that to work out, my oldest would have to be confident driving the EV from NJ to Wisconsin for a summer internship. And for a non-Tesla vehicle, not confident that the kid would make it through without getting stranded or having to drive far off the interstate to charge up.
Please Maverick genie, bring my Maverick hybrid tonight. Wawa and Quick Check over $4 a gallon! Booooo !
Light Trucks Now Outselling Cars 3-to-1
Pickups, SUVs, minivans—light trucks—outsell cars by 3-1. Cars were first overtaken by trucks in 2002. U.S. automakers sell only a handful of car models.
www.forbes.com
Dumb article. The current supply of cheaper EVs and the price point is cost prohibitive for middle and lower class people. Plus for those that do not own and live in a single family home, there is most likely no way to charge at home (e.g., an apartment of townhouse complex). So, except for the people rife with cash and able to shell out more than $30,00 for an EV (not counting incentives) and who can have a home charging station installed, this article is useless.
NJ gas prices soaring, but will that give a jolt to electric vehicle sales?
Electric vehicles have offered the promise of cleaner — and maybe cheaper — transportation. Drivers have been reluctant. But gas prices are rising.www.app.com
There is a vast market of people shopping for new cars. High gas prices will absolutely get more people to buy EVs, and more people will also buy more fuel efficient vehicles.
And right on cue ...
electrek.co
Tesla (TSLA) order rate is surging in the US as gas prices are turning people toward electric cars
Tesla is seeing its order rate surging in the US, according to sources familiar with the matter, as the record...
electrek.co
The douchey snark of your privilege is chilling and galling,
Do you know people in situations like this? Of course you don't:
Toms River HOPE Center gives residents a helping hand in difficult times
The staff of Toms River's HOPE Center is bracing for an increase in people seeking help as rising inflation increase prices for gas, food and shelter.
www.app.com
Back to my questions.
Are there currently NJ rebates in place for EVs? If not, when are they expected to go in place?
And the federal rebate is still $7500?
Thanks.
NJ rebate ran out of the allocated funds last fall. Maybe there will be a third round this summer if State budget includes it again. The $7500 is a federal tax CREDIT. It is not a rebate. You should check to make sure the EV you are buying is eligible.
@Knight Shift
chargeup.njcleanenergy.com
This is the website for NJ EV rebate. I ordered a VW ID4 last summer after NJ allocated 2nd round of funds to the program. Unfortunately, money was gone by September and my ID4 is still on the waitlist to be built. Maybe I’ll get lucky and can take delivery this summer after NJ funds round 3 for the program.
Home | Charge Up New Jersey
New Jersey residents that have purchased or leased a new electric vehicle are eligible to receive up to $5,000 through the Charge Up New Jersey program. Visit the website for program details and to apply for your electric vehicle incentive.
chargeup.njcleanenergy.com
This is the website for NJ EV rebate. I ordered a VW ID4 last summer after NJ allocated 2nd round of funds to the program. Unfortunately, money was gone by September and my ID4 is still on the waitlist to be built. Maybe I’ll get lucky and can take delivery this summer after NJ funds round 3 for the program.
