They’re so expensive, I’d never save enough with fuel costs to justify one
davus_maximus on
Stop pricing your cars over £32,000 and we’ll talk. I thought EVs were simpler to build with simple powertrains? If so why are they 10x what I can afford?
Correct_Basket_2020 on
Too expensive for most still, also difficult to navigate home charging if you’re in a flat
WerewolfNo890 on
I have no sympathy for the car industry. Sounds like their problem not mine.
pburgess22 on
So in 2021 I bought my electric car and after the government grant(which no longer exists) and my deposit etc ot cost 300 a month with PCP. I’m looking at getting another car next year and the prices are wayyy higher for the same car to the point it’s not affordable.
Dadavester on
People want EV’s. They do not want them at current full prices.
viotski on
I live in a flat so there’s no fucking way I can charge my car. In order to get to the charging station I’d have to cross two roads – one of being the main road, which is 10 minutes walk. Fuck that, for me having a car is convenience not need, and that’s the opposite
Electronic-Sky-3741 on
We paid £54k for a new Ionic 5. Good vehicle but that’s expensive. Currently have a single 7kw charger, pumping out 21 miles range per hour at 4p/kw overnight. If we had a 2nd EV, I’d need to upgrade to a 3-phase house supply for the 2nd or even 3rd charger; which means digging up the nice new driveway/block paving…
If this wasn’t a business purchase, I would not buy one.
Car manufacturers can take the £15k fine..
They need to drop the prices to reasonable prices (£20k)
tiny-robot on
I see the Dacia Spring is launching – which will be the cheapest EV by some distance. Cheapest model is about £15k.
On a PCP with deposit it’s about £160 per month. Pretty basic spec – but see it selling well.
GeneralDan29 on
Just as Clarkson said in the final Grand Tour episode.
“Electric cars are just shit”
kahnindustries on
Everyone is poor, what do they expect to happen?
Also the second hand EV market is barely getting rolling
PretendThisIsAName on
EVs are here to save the car industry not the biosphere.Â
Electric buses are probably the way forward but we desperately need to improve the dire state of public transport outside of London first.Â
On paper buses are brilliant, it’s a shame they’re ruined by traffic and corporate greed.
Healey_Dell on
Infrastructure and of course, price. The lack of the first is helping keep the second high as the economy can’t scale.
In dense UK terraced neighbourhoods charging will be an issue unless 1 fast charging becomes available or 2 we start installing plugs in every fifth kerbstone.
the_man_inTheShack on
old school car companies:
make crap electric cars
put them on sale at ludicrous prices
complain that they are not selling and you need government “help”
tempor12345 on
“While there was a record 56,362 battery electric models sold… [last year]”
How is that stalling as per the headline? That’s literally a record number, according to their own data. 😂
R-M-Pitt on
Prices are high and choice is low. European companies have not innovated or provided much variety, and now the eu wants to restrict chinese companies who have.
Happytallperson on
It’s embarrassing to be on 20% when China is on 40% new sales.Â
As a new EV owner my thoughts.
1. We’re really kicking the support out. No longer a tax advantage, no longer grants to support charger install, no longer purchase grants.Â
2. As well as lack of carrots we have a lack of sticks. Car companies are still advertising wildly inefficient SUVs with fossil only power – why? This isn’t an affordability thing, these SUVs are more than my EV.Â
3. Culturally we’ve let charlatans run the media narrative. If people see you have an EV there are two responses;
– fellow EV owners who will nerd out at you 🤓Â
– a man dressed like Jeremy Clarkson will tell you a horror story about their mums third cousin’s dog walker who ran out of power on the M62.Â
Fundamentally, I’ve been using EVs at work for years and can absolutely assure you they are nicer cars. They are just better to drive. Other countries manage nearly 100% EV sales so anyone telling you they are impractical is misinforming you. Yet we let the oil industry run our narratives.
TorchKing101 on
2nd hand prices are much more affordable now. We got a Leaf because 70% of the solar power we generated went to the grid. We will upgrade to a longer range vehicle soon, level 2 charger and then wait for the solid state batteries to come through.
softwarebuyer2015 on
Ford were on the radio this morning begging to government to help them sell EVs.
Low-Educator6026 on
I paid £18k for a long range leaf. 2 years old and thought this is a good price. Well 18 months later it’s worth £10k.
Is it a good car? Yeah it’s ok. Do I like it? Yeah it’s ok.
Would I buy another? Not a chance until the market stabilises. My rough negative equity on this car is about £4K from what I expected it to be worth.
I’ve also got a German saloon. My negative equity on that is £0 because they are predictable and don’t depreciate like used toilet paper.
beeblbrox on
A lot of talk about average car being £35k. Me and my partner both work full time and have a mortgage if I had to go out and buy a car tomorrow I’d be looking at £10k tops. Admittedly I had to renew my mortgage right in the midst of the Lizz Truss saga but I just have no money left over at the end of a month to justify financing a car. I imagine I’m not the only one in this boat.
New-Range-1087 on
A friend of mine bought a VW electric car. Something went wrong with it within 6 months, the repairs were covered under the warranty but it took 3 weeks for them to be done. In the second year, more faults, this time not covered and the costs were in the thousands. He’s tried to sell it but it’s lost 50% of its value already. He’s now bought a cheap petrol car and the EV sits in a garage.
barrio-libre on
The anti-EV propaganda is raging out there. The telegraph alone publishes a few hate pieces against EV’s *every day*. Most of it is utter nonsense, but it filters into the body politic. I’m not surprised people repeat these canards as if they were truth.
Lo_jak on
They have far too many restrictions that come with them….. if you don’t have a driveway or garage you’re a bit fucked when it comes to charging them.
They are really fucking expensive for anything half decent, I can see them becoming more and more expensive to insure due to them being next to impossible to put out if they catch fire, and they are mostly ugly with giant tablets in the middle.
Il stick to my ICE car for as long as I can thanks.
JosiesSon77 on
Too dear, too many people can’t charge them at home.
/thread
Ancient-Watch-1191 on
Last month, VW had enough profits to fork out 5 Billion Euro as dividends. It seems to me that EU companies are profitable enough to pay out significant dividends, but not to develop affordable BEV’s.
XenorVernix on
I’ll buy one when the economics make sense, as I am frugal. I’ve had conversations with people who own EVs before and they’ve told me their charging up stories away from home and it’s around the same I pay for a tank of diesel.
I do roughly 5000 miles per year and around 3000 of that is long distance like the 600 mile round trip to London at the weekend that averaged 68mpg. Did that on a tank of diesel. If I had a modern EV I would perhaps make it down there without charging up but then have to charge it there at extortionate kwh prices before returning. That said, most of my longer distances are in the 200-300 mile range and may be doable on a single charge. Maybe the real problem is the cost of an EV that can do 300+ miles on a charge. I’d want 350 minimum to allow for those 300 mile round trips to Manchester.
I’ve also heard EVs cost more to insure, and given my diesel car is £0 road tax buying an EV would significantly increase that too. My car is 8 years old and I could easily get another 10 out of it if I want to. It has everything I need as it was a top spec trim at the time. Bought it second hand at three years of age at 1/3 the cost of a new one.
lookatmeman on
Not many would be happy parting with 35k for a new car. You can ask people to go green or not take pay rises to help your inflation numbers but not both.
Jonomeus on
How does the government think people will charge all these? Have they ever walked around the estates built in the 50s 60s and 70s?
Deep_Delivery2465 on
It seems like an odd title. The article mentions that sales have “stalled below 18%”, and the comments here seem to treat this as EV sales going through the floor.
The SMMT data for Jan to July 2024 has EV sales at 16.8% of total sales, up from 16.1% in 2023, and HEV/PHEV combined at 22.0%, up from 19.2%.
It’s absolutely right to say that the natural demand isn’t there to meet the government targets this year (Or probably the next couple of years if the current fad of companies cutting jobs continues), and it’s definitely on the SMMT to voice conerns and offer possible solutions when the current mandate is “Sell 22% full EV’s this year, irrespective of demand, or we’ll fine you massively”
The question is what is the right mechanism to drive EV adoption? Part of that is incentivising infrastructure to reduce the range anxiety concerns, part of it may be finding ways of incentivising buying of used EV’s (Which would help push residual values up, and bring monthly payments on new EV’s down), or scrappage scheme type programs to take some of the most polluting vehicles off the road when replaced with a new EV.
…Or maybe we can resort to the normal discourse of people chatting shit on the internet about EV’s because they don’t like change.
phead on
Just the normal EV reddit thread:
“new EVS are too expensive”
how many times have you bought a new car
“never”
“EVs are too hard to change”
how many times have you charged an EV
“never”
31 Comments
They’re so expensive, I’d never save enough with fuel costs to justify one
Stop pricing your cars over £32,000 and we’ll talk. I thought EVs were simpler to build with simple powertrains? If so why are they 10x what I can afford?
Too expensive for most still, also difficult to navigate home charging if you’re in a flat
I have no sympathy for the car industry. Sounds like their problem not mine.
So in 2021 I bought my electric car and after the government grant(which no longer exists) and my deposit etc ot cost 300 a month with PCP. I’m looking at getting another car next year and the prices are wayyy higher for the same car to the point it’s not affordable.
People want EV’s. They do not want them at current full prices.
I live in a flat so there’s no fucking way I can charge my car. In order to get to the charging station I’d have to cross two roads – one of being the main road, which is 10 minutes walk. Fuck that, for me having a car is convenience not need, and that’s the opposite
We paid £54k for a new Ionic 5. Good vehicle but that’s expensive. Currently have a single 7kw charger, pumping out 21 miles range per hour at 4p/kw overnight. If we had a 2nd EV, I’d need to upgrade to a 3-phase house supply for the 2nd or even 3rd charger; which means digging up the nice new driveway/block paving…
If this wasn’t a business purchase, I would not buy one.
Car manufacturers can take the £15k fine..
They need to drop the prices to reasonable prices (£20k)
I see the Dacia Spring is launching – which will be the cheapest EV by some distance. Cheapest model is about £15k.
https://offers.dacia.co.uk/cars/spring/personal-contract-purchase?offerId=364
On a PCP with deposit it’s about £160 per month. Pretty basic spec – but see it selling well.
Just as Clarkson said in the final Grand Tour episode.
“Electric cars are just shit”
Everyone is poor, what do they expect to happen?
Also the second hand EV market is barely getting rolling
EVs are here to save the car industry not the biosphere.Â
Electric buses are probably the way forward but we desperately need to improve the dire state of public transport outside of London first.Â
On paper buses are brilliant, it’s a shame they’re ruined by traffic and corporate greed.
Infrastructure and of course, price. The lack of the first is helping keep the second high as the economy can’t scale.
In dense UK terraced neighbourhoods charging will be an issue unless 1 fast charging becomes available or 2 we start installing plugs in every fifth kerbstone.
old school car companies:
make crap electric cars
put them on sale at ludicrous prices
complain that they are not selling and you need government “help”
“While there was a record 56,362 battery electric models sold… [last year]”
How is that stalling as per the headline? That’s literally a record number, according to their own data. 😂
Prices are high and choice is low. European companies have not innovated or provided much variety, and now the eu wants to restrict chinese companies who have.
It’s embarrassing to be on 20% when China is on 40% new sales.Â
As a new EV owner my thoughts.
1. We’re really kicking the support out. No longer a tax advantage, no longer grants to support charger install, no longer purchase grants.Â
2. As well as lack of carrots we have a lack of sticks. Car companies are still advertising wildly inefficient SUVs with fossil only power – why? This isn’t an affordability thing, these SUVs are more than my EV.Â
3. Culturally we’ve let charlatans run the media narrative. If people see you have an EV there are two responses;
– fellow EV owners who will nerd out at you 🤓Â
– a man dressed like Jeremy Clarkson will tell you a horror story about their mums third cousin’s dog walker who ran out of power on the M62.Â
Fundamentally, I’ve been using EVs at work for years and can absolutely assure you they are nicer cars. They are just better to drive. Other countries manage nearly 100% EV sales so anyone telling you they are impractical is misinforming you. Yet we let the oil industry run our narratives.
2nd hand prices are much more affordable now. We got a Leaf because 70% of the solar power we generated went to the grid. We will upgrade to a longer range vehicle soon, level 2 charger and then wait for the solid state batteries to come through.
Ford were on the radio this morning begging to government to help them sell EVs.
I paid £18k for a long range leaf. 2 years old and thought this is a good price. Well 18 months later it’s worth £10k.
Is it a good car? Yeah it’s ok. Do I like it? Yeah it’s ok.
Would I buy another? Not a chance until the market stabilises. My rough negative equity on this car is about £4K from what I expected it to be worth.
I’ve also got a German saloon. My negative equity on that is £0 because they are predictable and don’t depreciate like used toilet paper.
A lot of talk about average car being £35k. Me and my partner both work full time and have a mortgage if I had to go out and buy a car tomorrow I’d be looking at £10k tops. Admittedly I had to renew my mortgage right in the midst of the Lizz Truss saga but I just have no money left over at the end of a month to justify financing a car. I imagine I’m not the only one in this boat.
A friend of mine bought a VW electric car. Something went wrong with it within 6 months, the repairs were covered under the warranty but it took 3 weeks for them to be done. In the second year, more faults, this time not covered and the costs were in the thousands. He’s tried to sell it but it’s lost 50% of its value already. He’s now bought a cheap petrol car and the EV sits in a garage.
The anti-EV propaganda is raging out there. The telegraph alone publishes a few hate pieces against EV’s *every day*. Most of it is utter nonsense, but it filters into the body politic. I’m not surprised people repeat these canards as if they were truth.
They have far too many restrictions that come with them….. if you don’t have a driveway or garage you’re a bit fucked when it comes to charging them.
They are really fucking expensive for anything half decent, I can see them becoming more and more expensive to insure due to them being next to impossible to put out if they catch fire, and they are mostly ugly with giant tablets in the middle.
Il stick to my ICE car for as long as I can thanks.
Too dear, too many people can’t charge them at home.
/thread
Last month, VW had enough profits to fork out 5 Billion Euro as dividends. It seems to me that EU companies are profitable enough to pay out significant dividends, but not to develop affordable BEV’s.
I’ll buy one when the economics make sense, as I am frugal. I’ve had conversations with people who own EVs before and they’ve told me their charging up stories away from home and it’s around the same I pay for a tank of diesel.
I do roughly 5000 miles per year and around 3000 of that is long distance like the 600 mile round trip to London at the weekend that averaged 68mpg. Did that on a tank of diesel. If I had a modern EV I would perhaps make it down there without charging up but then have to charge it there at extortionate kwh prices before returning. That said, most of my longer distances are in the 200-300 mile range and may be doable on a single charge. Maybe the real problem is the cost of an EV that can do 300+ miles on a charge. I’d want 350 minimum to allow for those 300 mile round trips to Manchester.
I’ve also heard EVs cost more to insure, and given my diesel car is £0 road tax buying an EV would significantly increase that too. My car is 8 years old and I could easily get another 10 out of it if I want to. It has everything I need as it was a top spec trim at the time. Bought it second hand at three years of age at 1/3 the cost of a new one.
Not many would be happy parting with 35k for a new car. You can ask people to go green or not take pay rises to help your inflation numbers but not both.
How does the government think people will charge all these? Have they ever walked around the estates built in the 50s 60s and 70s?
It seems like an odd title. The article mentions that sales have “stalled below 18%”, and the comments here seem to treat this as EV sales going through the floor.
The SMMT data for Jan to July 2024 has EV sales at 16.8% of total sales, up from 16.1% in 2023, and HEV/PHEV combined at 22.0%, up from 19.2%.
It’s absolutely right to say that the natural demand isn’t there to meet the government targets this year (Or probably the next couple of years if the current fad of companies cutting jobs continues), and it’s definitely on the SMMT to voice conerns and offer possible solutions when the current mandate is “Sell 22% full EV’s this year, irrespective of demand, or we’ll fine you massively”
The question is what is the right mechanism to drive EV adoption? Part of that is incentivising infrastructure to reduce the range anxiety concerns, part of it may be finding ways of incentivising buying of used EV’s (Which would help push residual values up, and bring monthly payments on new EV’s down), or scrappage scheme type programs to take some of the most polluting vehicles off the road when replaced with a new EV.
…Or maybe we can resort to the normal discourse of people chatting shit on the internet about EV’s because they don’t like change.
Just the normal EV reddit thread:
“new EVS are too expensive”
how many times have you bought a new car
“never”
“EVs are too hard to change”
how many times have you charged an EV
“never”
Its like the daily mail comments section.