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Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

theguardian.com

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Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#31

Post by MilaM »

Right now, electric cars are still at a disadvantage because of lower production volumes. It's not only the material cost of the battery and the motor that makes them more expensive, but also the share of the development costs that each sale has to recoup. In the not so distant future I think petrol and diesel cars are going to be at a disadvantage because of this.

I still own a quite old (12 years, but low mileage) petrol car, because I don't drive a lot and really only need it for errands in my city. In this scenario it's very hard to justify buying an almost new electric car. The used ones available on the market right now are still not very attractive in my opinion.

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#32

Post by highwaylights »

br3d wrote: post #22
CraigJPerry wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> That's why you see so many expensive cars driven by people who can't afford them How is it possible to keep possession of the car if you’re not paying the contractual obligation? Is there some exception for cars? For example, failing to keep up with mortgage payments will eventually see you lose the property.

OP meant "can't afford them" in the sense of "couldn't afford the full price of". There are lots of people here in the UK on medium incomes driving around in £80,000 cars using this finance

Can confirm. Financial literacy is fairly thin on the ground here.

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#33

Post by helsinkiandrew »

edent wrote: post #14

In the UK, most people don't pay the "sticker" cost for a car. They take out a PCP or similar plan. Pay £X00 per month for Y months. At the end of the period, either buy the vehicle outright or hand it back. Or, as many people do, switch to a new vehicle. That's why you see so many expensive cars driven by people who can't afford them. No one is paying the up-front cost. They splurge their disposable income on a moto…

I didn't realise how pervasive this was, but yes 90% of new car purchases are using a PCP.

https://www.thecarexpert.co.uk/car-finance-pcp-explained/

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#34

Post by padjo »

highwaylights wrote: post #16
edent wrote: post #14

In the UK, most people don't pay the "sticker" cost for a car. They take out a PCP or similar plan. Pay £X00 per month for Y months. At the end of the period, either buy the vehicle outright or hand it back. Or, as many people do, switch to a new vehicle. That's why you see so many expensive cars driven by people who can't afford them. No one is paying the up-front cost. They splurge their disposable income on a moto…

I didn’t realise until recently just how engrained this practice is in people’s behaviour. I was discussing cars with someone not long ago and they were really matter-of-fact about switching to a new car just because the dealership offered it to them. It came across very much as that’s just how it works and everyone does that.

I wonder do any of them realise they’re paying the maximum depreciation every single time too. Losing 20k+ in depreciation every year feels like a great way to stay poor

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#35

Post by poisonborz »

napolux wrote: post #10

Where I live (Italy) is still a matter of infrastructure. Situation is improving, but I'm not ready to live with the constant fear of not finding a charging station, especially if I need to travel thru the country or in the countryside. I'm not ready yet. I'll be more for plug-in cars in a 5-years span.

I was traveling with an EC in countryside Italy 2y ago and had no problems finding public chargers.

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#36

Post by j4yav »

br3d wrote: post #22
CraigJPerry wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> That's why you see so many expensive cars driven by people who can't afford them How is it possible to keep possession of the car if you’re not paying the contractual obligation? Is there some exception for cars? For example, failing to keep up with mortgage payments will eventually see you lose the property.

OP meant "can't afford them" in the sense of "couldn't afford the full price of". There are lots of people here in the UK on medium incomes driving around in £80,000 cars using this finance

How do the economics work out for the seller? Depreciation is highest at the beginning, when these people are paying the per month price. If they can't afford a loan for the price of the car, how are they making a lease payment that covers the depreciation for the leasor? I'm sure there's a reason but I can't think of it.

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#37

Post by highwaylights »

Dalewyn wrote: post #24
CraigJPerry wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> That's why you see so many expensive cars driven by people who can't afford them How is it possible to keep possession of the car if you’re not paying the contractual obligation? Is there some exception for cars? For example, failing to keep up with mortgage payments will eventually see you lose the property.

I think what parent is saying is people lease or finance cars so they can drive cars they wouldn't be able to afford in full. That is, those people can afford the monthly payments but cannot afford paying the sticker price. An easier to understand example would be how most people finance iPhones with their carrier. Most people balk at paying one or two grand for a phone, but don't mind paying ~$50 per month. At the e…

Which also seems a bit wild to me.

I won’t buy a new phone let alone a new car.

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#39

Post by cpursley »

techterrier wrote: post #4

Just get rid of the damn cars.

It's not so much about getting rid of the cars (just yet). I agree that electric vehicles don't solve the underlying issue. But we first need (we in North America, at least) a build environment designed for humans first (basically, copy what the Dutch have accomplished).

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#40

Post by Dalewyn »

whatevaa wrote: post #21
mg wrote: post #8

This reminds me of the discussions some years ago whether one should invest in an SSD when buying a new laptop or stay with a spinning disk. Nowadays, barely any new laptops are released without an SSD. When it comes to electric versus petrol, I often think about the fact that the sun sends more energy to earth in an hour than all of mankind uses in a year. I guess that in theory, all that energy could be captured wi…

SSD only became mainstream after 3D TLC was invented, bringing costs down. Planar MLC was okay but was still somewhat expensive, tech enthusiast thingy. So for petrol, sure, if we just had as energy dense batterry as fossile fuels. No, current tech is not there yet. The big range vechiles are stupidly expensive, and the inexpensive ones are daily commuters only, mostly. They also charge slowly. Most people don't own…

Even with SSDs, it's only laptops specifically that made a wholesale shift to SSDs. Why? Because laptops get jostled around, and SSDs are impervious to rough handling.

Over in the land of desktops, servers, and other stationary computing installations, HDDs are still superior if you do not explicitly require (or want) the fast access speeds and latencies of SSDs which are oftentimes overkill for most use cases.

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