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I keep hearing this argument but as someone who has been shopping for a EV for months now I don't see it. EV proponents need to understand one important thing:

I keep hearing this argument but as someone who has been shopping for a EV for months now I don't see it. EV proponents need to understand one important thing: People like their gas cars because they are actually pretty good these days. The EV needs to overcome that. The car I am benchmarking against is the Mazda CX-5. The natural equivalent is the Model Y. The CX-5 is a fully mature platform and is an excellent example of a solid ICE vehicle. Mazda CX-5 Cost: $29,300 (possible out the door price ~35K) Model Y cost: Demo vehicle out the door price is ~41K My upper bound price is 35K and im seriously exploring used given Mazdas reliability so I can save myself ~10K for a recent model year. I cant do the same on the Model Y because of Tesla's poor quality reputation. Either I am stuck taking a massive risk on a used Model Y or I am priced out of the market. Repair costs on the Model Y are insane. This is not including the fact that the Insurance cost on a Model Y is almost double that of a CX-5 for me. (970$/yr vs 1700$/year) Now I have also considered other EVs but none provide an equivalent to what the CX-5 offers. Theres the used Mach-E market but I have concerns about reliability and given the whole issue with the contactors and how Ford handled it, I don't think this car will last long term. OK, lets ignore that issue, you still get a bad looking car that gives poor value for the price you have to pay (I can only buy used and it is still on the upper bound of what my budget is) There is the Chevy Bolt EUV. Good insurance, easily within my price range but I am giving up everything else. Terrible charging speeds (made worse because I dont have supercharger access), not really a crossover, terrible looks, not as comfortable as CX-5. This is just my anecdote but there has got to be many others who have made the same conclusion as me about EVs. You have to compromise in at least one of the following areas with every EV: Price, looks, comfort, value

fragmede 3y ago
What's the "massive risk" on a used model Y?
- nebula8804 3y ago
  Becoming underwater on repair costs.
  - ein0p 3y ago
    What “repair costs”? I’ve owned a Model Y for 3 years now. My repair or maintenance costs were $0.
    - nebula8804 3y ago
      Good for you. The number of complaints I see on the Teslamotors subreddit, TMC forums, youtube, and Truedelta make me unlikely to take you at your word. With something so important and expensive on the line why would I make the decision based on your anecdote?
      - fragmede 3y ago
        why would you your decision on anecodoes of disgruntled users instead though? people who aren't having problems aren't going to storm over to TMC forums and yell THINGS ARE FINE! how many model Y's have been sold, and how many people are posting? my thoughts here aren't about Tesla, but about the broader online complaints system. people who aren't even thinking about it (food from a restaurant, service from a auto shop, whatever) just aren't motivated to go online and say things are fine because they're busy having lives outside of yelling how fine their experience is, so we get this distorted view of the situation because of that.
        fragmede 3y ago
        https://youtu.be/sKcrsdvlBzE https://youtu.be/sKcrsdvlBzE is where I'm coming from.
        nebula8804 3y ago
        Well I find consumer reports was spot on with my last car in terms of what failed. Since the Model Y is only in my budget used, and they rank model years 20,22,23 as 2/5 in reliability with 21 getting a surprising 3/5 I am inclined to think all those numerous people complaining about quality issues isn't just selection bias.....plus there is the fact that the car insurance is almost double that of the Mazda...im sure part of that is repair costs. When you are risking so much money on the line, it becomes difficult to ignore all these signals.
chasd00 3y ago
Just to pile on, beating the value of a one year old cx5 with low mileage is basically impossible even with other ICE cars.
ein0p 3y ago
Drive an EV. You’ll understand why people buy them. Then also consider that you’ll almost always charge it at home, and the price of a “full tank” is $8 where I live. Not a typo. And you don’t have to go to a gas station, and potentially stand in line there. All of this saves time and money, and you get a much better driving car which requires zero maintenance other that changing tires every 40k miles or so.
- lttlrck 3y ago
  Plenty of people have driven electric cars in 2024, are well aware of the pros and cons. And they still decide, rationally, that it's not for them.
- nebula8804 3y ago
  I have driven an EV. Despite the smooth riding nature of them, I'm looking for a car that will last me 10+ years. My last car(Mazda 3) was perfection in my eyes. I really would like an EV. I don't have time or money for a headache. I am also planning on moving with my car a couple times in the next few years to different cities so there is that problem with charging infrastructure. I was just looking at the situation in LA (Silver Lake area) and for non tesla chargers it is surprisingly worse than I thought given that this is California.
- mdavid626 3y ago
  Well, not everywhere in the world is electricity cheap. In Germany (Munich) I pay around 70 cents for kWh. That's close to what a full tank of gas would cost.
xetplan 3y ago
To me, there is just a class of people who are simply out of touch with reality. While I could afford the monthly payment on a $41k car, I would never do that when I would be starting my comparison with a $16k Nissan Versa. Then on top of that, there are many who would be starting with a Nissan Versa because they simply can't afford an EV even if they wanted to. EV discussion always ends up being what the best espresso maker is when a huge % of the population is just going to buy the cheapest coffee maker they can because they are too broke to buy much else.
- nebula8804 3y ago
  This exactly! A large part of the market is actually shopping below the price of a new car because thats all they can do. Its getting worse since those buyers are being priced out more and more everyday. We have reached peak auto in America as well. [1]:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2wHh6sduVw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2wHh6sduVw The last car I owned (Mazda3) lasted me 10 years and cost me 6k (I bought it at 60K miles) The CX-5 is what I consider a stretch purchase. I can easily afford it but after working 15 years I feel like I wanted to get something I consider upscale. Really wish more EVs were in this price range but if you include the nonsense that Tesla does with repair costs, the fact that even in 2024 it is still up in the air whether or not they can consistently build a reliable car, and all the other OEMs just messing around with bad designs, the state of EVs is pretty poor. :/ Like I mentioned in my previous post: This isn't a situation where ICE cars are so horridly bad that most people's day to day lives are made worse. You could maybe say that for some EVs though. People are quite happy with their ICE cars, and EV makers need to not only overcome all the issues that they have, they also need to overcome this friction to switching.

fragmede 3y ago

What's the "massive risk" on a used model Y?

nebula8804 3y ago
Becoming underwater on repair costs.
- ein0p 3y ago
  What “repair costs”? I’ve owned a Model Y for 3 years now. My repair or maintenance costs were $0.
  - nebula8804 3y ago
    Good for you. The number of complaints I see on the Teslamotors subreddit, TMC forums, youtube, and Truedelta make me unlikely to take you at your word. With something so important and expensive on the line why would I make the decision based on your anecdote?
    - fragmede 3y ago
      why would you your decision on anecodoes of disgruntled users instead though? people who aren't having problems aren't going to storm over to TMC forums and yell THINGS ARE FINE! how many model Y's have been sold, and how many people are posting? my thoughts here aren't about Tesla, but about the broader online complaints system. people who aren't even thinking about it (food from a restaurant, service from a auto shop, whatever) just aren't motivated to go online and say things are fine because they're busy having lives outside of yelling how fine their experience is, so we get this distorted view of the situation because of that.
      - fragmede 3y ago
        https://youtu.be/sKcrsdvlBzE https://youtu.be/sKcrsdvlBzE is where I'm coming from.
      - nebula8804 3y ago
        Well I find consumer reports was spot on with my last car in terms of what failed. Since the Model Y is only in my budget used, and they rank model years 20,22,23 as 2/5 in reliability with 21 getting a surprising 3/5 I am inclined to think all those numerous people complaining about quality issues isn't just selection bias.....plus there is the fact that the car insurance is almost double that of the Mazda...im sure part of that is repair costs. When you are risking so much money on the line, it becomes difficult to ignore all these signals.

chasd00 3y ago

Just to pile on, beating the value of a one year old cx5 with low mileage is basically impossible even with other ICE cars.

ein0p 3y ago

Drive an EV. You’ll understand why people buy them. Then also consider that you’ll almost always charge it at home, and the price of a “full tank” is $8 where I live. Not a typo. And you don’t have to go to a gas station, and potentially stand in line there. All of this saves time and money, and you get a much better driving car which requires zero maintenance other that changing tires every 40k miles or so.

lttlrck 3y ago
Plenty of people have driven electric cars in 2024, are well aware of the pros and cons. And they still decide, rationally, that it's not for them.
nebula8804 3y ago
I have driven an EV. Despite the smooth riding nature of them, I'm looking for a car that will last me 10+ years. My last car(Mazda 3) was perfection in my eyes. I really would like an EV. I don't have time or money for a headache. I am also planning on moving with my car a couple times in the next few years to different cities so there is that problem with charging infrastructure. I was just looking at the situation in LA (Silver Lake area) and for non tesla chargers it is surprisingly worse than I thought given that this is California.
mdavid626 3y ago
Well, not everywhere in the world is electricity cheap. In Germany (Munich) I pay around 70 cents for kWh. That's close to what a full tank of gas would cost.

xetplan 3y ago

To me, there is just a class of people who are simply out of touch with reality. While I could afford the monthly payment on a $41k car, I would never do that when I would be starting my comparison with a $16k Nissan Versa. Then on top of that, there are many who would be starting with a Nissan Versa because they simply can't afford an EV even if they wanted to. EV discussion always ends up being what the best espresso maker is when a huge % of the population is just going to buy the cheapest coffee maker they can because they are too broke to buy much else.

nebula8804 3y ago
This exactly! A large part of the market is actually shopping below the price of a new car because thats all they can do. Its getting worse since those buyers are being priced out more and more everyday. We have reached peak auto in America as well. [1]:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2wHh6sduVw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2wHh6sduVw The last car I owned (Mazda3) lasted me 10 years and cost me 6k (I bought it at 60K miles) The CX-5 is what I consider a stretch purchase. I can easily afford it but after working 15 years I feel like I wanted to get something I consider upscale. Really wish more EVs were in this price range but if you include the nonsense that Tesla does with repair costs, the fact that even in 2024 it is still up in the air whether or not they can consistently build a reliable car, and all the other OEMs just messing around with bad designs, the state of EVs is pretty poor. :/ Like I mentioned in my previous post: This isn't a situation where ICE cars are so horridly bad that most people's day to day lives are made worse. You could maybe say that for some EVs though. People are quite happy with their ICE cars, and EV makers need to not only overcome all the issues that they have, they also need to overcome this friction to switching.