Budget EV-anyone done it?

[a311]

Our second car (a lease) will be getting returned soon.

I've decided to get off the leasing treadmill having done it for years and having some good deals.

Our main car is a plug in Hybrid. I'm starting to consider a range of options, we really need a second car as my wife drops the kids off on the way to work and I pick them up and we work in different locations.

We'd be lucky to do 5K miles per annum in the second car, although it's difficult to judge over the last two years with WFH.

My commute when it resumes is 10 miles each way, mostly A road my wife's is about 3 miles (public transport is no good due to needing to drop the kids). The other car will do the longer journeys.

I've like the hybrid most of our journeys are within the EV range, can charge at home and will be able to charge for free at both work locations (if available).

If I were to buy an ICE car I'd be looking at spending around 4K but I've got thinking maybe spending a bit more on an EV like a Leaf may be worth considering and keeping it until it dies.

My man maths suggests 5K mile per annum at 141 pence a litre assuming 35 MPG for short runs will cost in the region of a grand.

A leggy Leaf can be had for between 6-7K with minimal at home charging costs if we half on to it for 3 or more years it would pay back the extra cost about a petrol.

Anyone followed a similar logic and bought themselves a cheap EV?

[krisdelta]

I got a 2013 early Gen2 leaf for a touch under £6k 15 months ago. It’s completely doable and is brilliant for around town and even a 60 mile commute, it will do about 75 miles in the depths of winter and 85 in the summer. Buttons to run and almost nothing to go wrong. Mine still has 11 of 12 battery bars on 53k miles. Do it!

[TooLateForAName]

We've had two cheap leafs exactly for this reason. Done over 70k miles in 7 years just doing commutes and school runs.
Its been very cheap motoring and for all its faults the leaf is actually good to drive on these journeys.

[ZesPak]

Definetly check out these videos by Rory just about that, seems very interesting and I've got a couple of friends interested as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ii-iWkdTQ_8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QSqMbuPh8PY&ab...

[Daaaveee]

Cheap early Leafs make a lot of sense for super cheap commuting, but good luck finding a cheap one now

[a311]

ZesPak said:

Definetly check out these videos by Rory just about that, seems very interesting and I've got a couple of friends interested as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ii-iWkdTQ_8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QSqMbuPh8PY&ab...

Thanks for the replies-those were an interesting watch, also a bit depressing how much the cheaper end have gone up in a short time! He bought that exapmple sometime last year when there were issues with fuel supplies for £4300 can add 2K on to that today.

[ZesPak]

a311 said:

Thanks for the replies-those were an interesting watch, also a bit depressing how much the cheaper end have gone up in a short time! He bought that exapmple sometime last year when there were issues with fuel supplies for £4300 can add 2K on to that today.

Yeah, a big part of what I think they will age very well is that these cars are so simple.

"How good is the battery?" Is basically all you need to know beside some basic tire kicking and it will tell you the value of the car quite accurately.

With a lot of people having plug in hybrids or BEV's from work and the like, most people start to realize their second car doesn't need to be able to do 150 miles on a whim, so I don't think the value on these is going down anytime soon.

[krisdelta]

The values have firmed up a lot, which was a surprise to me. Mine is now £7k on WBAC, which probably translates to £8.5 retail. Not bad for a £5950 purchase!

[TheDeuce]

krisdelta said:

The values have firmed up a lot, which was a surprise to me. Mine is now £7k on WBAC, which probably translates to £8.5 retail. Not bad for a £5950 purchase!

Kind of suggests that even were it not for the current insane prices for used cars, the Leaf would probably have held it's value give or take a little.

Thing is, the running costs are so cheap that a used leaf is arguably worth several thousand pounds more to a potential buyer than a similar age/spec car that isn't electric - so I expect in part used EV prices are going to be sustained at the cost of lowering (in the long term) used ICE car prices. It's going to be cheaper for a lot of people to pay a premium to get a used EV vs ICE.

[SWoll]

krisdelta said:

The values have firmed up a lot, which was a surprise to me. Mine is now £7k on WBAC, which probably translates to £8.5 retail. Not bad for a £5950 purchase!

This is affecting almost all cars, not just EV. Be interesting to see what happens in the next 6 months once the squeeze starts.

[off_again]

SWoll said:

krisdelta said:

The values have firmed up a lot, which was a surprise to me. Mine is now £7k on WBAC, which probably translates to £8.5 retail. Not bad for a £5950 purchase!

This is affecting almost all cars, not just EV. Be interesting to see what happens in the next 6 months once the squeeze starts.

Yeah, be very cautious here. Our i3 is worth $1k less (trade-in, not retail!) than we paid for it 18 months and 12000 miles ago! But our Macan is worth $5k more (again, trade-in!!!!) than we paid for it a year ago!

My son is looking for a cheaper car here at the moment, between $3k - $5k, and 6 months ago it was a nightmare. Prices have softened massively and we are getting back to sensible prices again. Some specific cars are still stupidly priced, but normal cars are getting priced much better and there are more cars for sale. This could be a signal of a wider shift and a softening of the used market. Who knows!

[lost in espace]

I am reluctant to sell my 2017 Leaf with 50k on it, I think values for these cars will hold well. But my brakes are shocking at the moment, brake gently and they apply really hard, you then have to release and rebrake and they come on gently. Very unpredictable. I was going to give it to my daughter when she passes her test, but it is a recipe for an accident. Also hit a bump whilst braking, lose the regen and you need 4x the effort to achieve the same braking. Great cars but this is becoming a real issue.

[TheDeuce]

lost in espace said:

I am reluctant to sell my 2017 Leaf with 50k on it, I think values for these cars will hold well. But my brakes are shocking at the moment, brake gently and they apply really hard, you then have to release and rebrake and they come on gently. Very unpredictable. I was going to give it to my daughter when she passes her test, but it is a recipe for an accident. Also hit a bump whilst braking, lose the regen and you need 4x the effort to achieve the same braking. Great cars but this is becoming a real issue.

I'd be asking the local dealer for advice about that. Obviously it's out of warranty but the manufacturers and their dealer network tend to be fairly switched on to brake issues. Chances are it won't be an issue unique to your car and they'll at least have some advice.

There's nothing worse and nothing that slows a car down more than lack of confidence in the brakes.

[TooLateForAName]

lost in espace said:

I am reluctant to sell my 2017 Leaf with 50k on it, I think values for these cars will hold well. But my brakes are shocking at the moment, brake gently and they apply really hard, you then have to release and rebrake and they come on gently. Very unpredictable. I was going to give it to my daughter when she passes her test, but it is a recipe for an accident. Also hit a bump whilst braking, lose the regen and you need 4x the effort to achieve the same braking. Great cars but this is becoming a real issue.

When you look at the values of the bits - inverters/motors/etc and even depleted batteries it is pretty good.

[krisdelta]

lost in espace said:

I am reluctant to sell my 2017 Leaf with 50k on it, I think values for these cars will hold well. But my brakes are shocking at the moment, brake gently and they apply really hard, you then have to release and rebrake and they come on gently. Very unpredictable. I was going to give it to my daughter when she passes her test, but it is a recipe for an accident. Also hit a bump whilst braking, lose the regen and you need 4x the effort to achieve the same braking. Great cars but this is becoming a real issue.

I think to some extent this is a feature of how the e-brakes work with regen (that is massively exerbated when it's very cold and related to a cold battery). There seems to be some suggestion that the 12v battery may be a cause, so conditioning / replacing that may help.

[Rawhide]

I've just bought my wife a Leaf Tekna 30kwh which was relatively cheap as it's a cat S. I've never bought an accident repair car before but I decided to spend the budget on a higher spec car with larger battery was a better option. I cannot find any evidence of the damage at all. The car has 47k and 11 bars.

It's replacing a 2008 Mercedes E320 CDI. I've not done the maths yet but I think unless the car depreciates to nothing the savings on diesel will be huge. Right off the bat I've cancelled the direct debit for tax which saves £60 a month.

My wife loves it. I'm a bit nervous about battery degradation but I'm pretty sure we can't loose financially.

[danp]

lost in espace said:

I am reluctant to sell my 2017 Leaf with 50k on it, I think values for these cars will hold well. But my brakes are shocking at the moment, brake gently and they apply really hard, you then have to release and rebrake and they come on gently. Very unpredictable. I was going to give it to my daughter when she passes her test, but it is a recipe for an accident. Also hit a bump whilst braking, lose the regen and you need 4x the effort to achieve the same braking. Great cars but this is becoming a real issue.

Sounds odd, we had 3 x gen1/ gen2 Leafs over a few years and can’t say I found anything like this - as mentioned get it to a Nissan dealer or HEVRA specialist, and search/ post over at speakEV?