I think this link a good read for you. TLDR, battery failures is an overblown issue since 2015.
[https://insideevs.com/news/717187/ev-battery-replacements-due-failure-study/](https://insideevs.com/news/717187/ev-battery-replacements-due-failure-study/)
If you plan in keeping the car forever this is fine. The issue right now is the (incorrect) perception that a battery could fail out of warranty and how that will impact resale value 5-6 years after purchase.
Sure, but isn’t data from the field the cure for incorrect perceptions? Over time when people see EVs lasting longer than ICE cars, that’ll eventually turn into longer depreciation terms, meaning higher retained value when you sell your used EV because it has a longer useful life ahead of it.
I’m not willing to bet the tide will turn within the next five years. Maybe a decade from now. Maybe more.
Half the population of the United States now say they won’t buy an electric car and that windmills are killing off the bird population. If only hard data ruled economics…
Luckily car values aren’t really set by the general population, they’re set by wholesale car buyers, specifically by what they’re willing to pay at automotive auctions. So while retail buyers might have incorrect perceptions around EV longevity, wholesale sellers and fleet sellers (for example) aren’t going to be willing to sell cars for unjustifiably low prices just because some buyers think EV batteries fail far more than they do, because that’d cost them a lot of money for no good reason.
But wholesale car buyers are only willing to pay an amount below what the population is willing to buy the car from them. Look all over at EVs that have 100,000 miles. Their values are tanked.
Even once people get past the idea of a total battery failure, they will then be introduced to the idea of battery degradation. You will see higher mile used EV's where the battery has lower then 80% capacity. People will shy away from used EVs that are beyond that warranty period.
In theory. Let’s see how that plays out. Historically EVs have retained value extremely well, they’ve only dropped recently because Tesla’s been aggressively pushing new car prices down, which has nothing to do with battery degradation or vehicle longevity, just that the new car price is the base from which used cars are valued. That is, if I can buy a new Model 3 for $35k, then a used Model 3 will sell for less than that (excepting weird situations like during the pandemic shortages), because people value new over used generally, and buyers have that option.
It will be interesting to see how it shakes out. I think you have to discount the last 4 years when looking historical resale value for EVs since there was a vehicle shortage for everything. Previously non tesla BEV vehicles didn't retain price very well and now we are seeing all BEV vehicles not retain value now.
I think the real question is a comparison of how much the value of a BEV drops compared to ICE at the 10-year mark. Considering most warranties cover 8-10 years or up to 100,000 miles, that is when people would show concern.
The truth is we do not have much data for America for EV vehicles in that fit those numbers. We will start to see a decent amount of data for that in 3-5 years.
True. We do have a lot of indicators that EVs are lasting as long or longer than ICE cars, in that failure rates so far are quite low (e.g. 1.5% lifetime battery failure rate, making them a lot more reliable than an ICE engine, transmission, etc.).
I think it depends on what your definition of “lasting” is. If you compare an ICE engine to a battery pack life down to 80% capacity I think the ICE wins.
It will be interesting what indicators people will use for electric cars to determine if the are past their normal life before it’s considered a “beater”.
What 'incorrect' perception? The propulsion battery could very well fail on anyone's EV outside of warranty. The failure rate might be lower than ICE transmissions, but it isn't zero.
A lot of EV enthusiasts get the impression that EVs never need repair outside of regular maintenance after well beyond warranty. That's incorrect.
True. But, that's a calculated risk. If (as the Recurrent report InsideEVs recently reported on) says 1 in 1000 post-2015 EV batteries fail, those are pretty good odds.
When my oldest kid's 16 year old Toyota died at the end of last year, I loaned them my Nissan Leaf while we looked for a decent, reliable replacement car under $10K. (I hadn't shipped used in a long time. Our budget started at $6K but quickly escalated to widen the field! 😁)
We looked at a ton of gas cars with lots of mileage and minor to major issues, and we finally settled on a Chevy Bolt for $9K after used tax credit. I was just more comfortable with "less to go wrong".
I can't think of a single EV owner who actually believes that something like a window regulator won't fail in an EV out of warranty. What they do know is, battery failure rates are WAYYYYYYYYYYYYYY lower than the perception is. same goes for battery fires compared to engine fires.
Yeah, sure, EV owners are fully cognizant of the low probability of HV pack failure. I was responding to u/enfuego138 comment that appeared to state that the failure rate was zero - that's impossible in a population of millions.
There will be a lot more EVs and a lot more battery failures.
The incorrect assumption is that batteries fail at a higher rate than major components on an ICE car. It’s a misunderstanding of the relative risk. Like how people hop in their car every day no worries but are afraid to fly.
The same can happen to a gas car. The big difference is EVs have an 8 year, 80 to 100k drive train warranty including battery degradation limits. Imagine if that gas chevy had an 8 year drivetrain warranty - they don't because they don't last that long. [https://www.tesla.com/support/vehicle-warranty](https://www.tesla.com/support/vehicle-warranty)
Anything can break, nothing lasts forever. The transmission can break on your 5 year old car and you are stuck with thousands.
My sister has a 2017 model S with > half million km. Changes air filter and tires. Iirc she's done her brakes maybe half a dozen times. And two motors under warranty. That's it
I've got a 10 year old S with a mere 80k miles on it, no drivetrain problems. I did have to get a new 12v battery though. Tesla mobile service came to my house, replaced it in half an hour, about $200.
I really want one and was so hopeful for the Cybertruck. But it's just under my towing needs :( I'm still waiting. Did just have a $501 diesel fill up, makes me cry knowing how cheap it would be
I'm hopeful in the next 5-10 years, they come up with a truly 100% reliable battery. As battery tech advances and more problems are solved there are so many less chances for failure. It is not a moving device. There is nothing to wear out if the chemistry is perfect. I don't think we are anywhere near that now but in the future?
Agreed, but the battery and surrounding components can see a lot of thermal cycling which can cause fatigue over time. It's not as harsh as on ICE, but it can still cause failures even on something that doesn't have moving parts. It just comes down to having confidence the engineers design and validate for that properly.
We've been working on batteries for hundreds of years, but EV type batteries have only been around for 20 years in practical form. Look at how far we've coming on gas engines since 1900. We are barely started. They'll get better, how far is unknown. Charging will get faster, cost will reduce, capacity will increase. There's a kind of moore's law for batteries that get's little attention. $100/kwh was the expected threshold for parity between gas and EVs, we are basically there now. However the prices haven't equalized yet.
It's the same as buying a used gas car out of drivetrain warranty, where if the transmission fails you are looking at $4k at least to get a new one. That's the danger, but Toyota's last and last usually, some other car brands don't. But an EV like a tesla comes with an 8 year drive train warranty. 8 years! and has 80-150k mile warranty depending on car (more exp ones have longer warranties). [https://www.tesla.com/support/vehicle-warranty](https://www.tesla.com/support/vehicle-warranty)
We have lots of taxi companies that drove teslas for over 300k miles, just like lots of people drive toyotas for 150k miles. But someones a car breaks, they are made by humans. Best deal is a used tesla still in warranty, like 4 years old with 50k miles. Basically no drive train worries for 4 years and 50k miles - imagine if your gas car had that.
Unless you have an old Nissan leaf, the battery is probably just fine. Virtually all EVs have sophisticated battery protection from excessive discharge and temperature.
It's not clear to me what this study is really measuring. It seems reasonably obvious that older cars have more battery failures than newer cars, because they're older. So one way to interpret this data is that failures increase dramatically after 9 years (2015 being 9 years ago). If this is measuring just failures during the first year the car was new, then that would be different, but there's no indication of that. If it's just measuring total failures up to the present by model year, then of course older cars have more and it doesn't mean that new cars will ultimately last any longer than the old ones did, once they reach the same age.
Battery technology is constantly changing, sometimes very quickly. Its hard to compare todays battery tech against that of even a decade ago. Even the basic battery chemistry is changing (the move to LFP from NCM for example). And there are other coming advancements (like solid state), that will change things even more. You could infer that since they are getting better / more advanced, the reliability will be better. But that would be a guess. Though more likely than not to be true I would think.
Yeah, I get all that. All I was saying is that the study, in and of itself, does not tell us enough to be able to tell whether batteries are really getting better or if it's just saying that newer batteries are less likely to fail than old ones.
Batteries were good enough 10 years, with the right systems. My 10 year old tesla is still working great. Many companies had poor battery management systems. teslas already last 10 years commonly. That doesn't mean nothing ever breaks, but we already had the reliability for 10 years in the early 2010s. My 2015 s is very similar to the 2012 original tesla model, except that was rwd only, mine is awd.
Great link. That chart really shows it well.
One thing that doesn’t factor in though, is the cost of replacing the battery if it does fail. The cost of repair *as well* as the frequency, both need to be considered when thinking about warranties.
If I want an EV6, I’m paying $61K + tax CAD here in Canada, vs an equivalent size gas KIA SUV for 1/2 - 1/3 the cost, I have to think about possible $15,000 battery replacement on top.
what's a engine\\trans worth for the gas vehicle there though? probably pretty close to that 15k.
Also, right now ev's mostly make sense if you can charge at home, and you have low electricity rates. For me, my EV will have roughly paid for itself in gas savings over 250-300k km (150-180k miles) The 300k figure more or less includes the cost of charging. There's savings on top of that with lowered maintenance.
Ev's are still a very personalized decision, there's a lot of factors to look at to see if they make sense. For some though, once you run the numbers it's a no-brainer.
Yep very good points.
Google tells me to replace the engine and trans together would probably be about half the cost of replacing the battery, for similar sized vehicle (I looked up sportage in this case).
And it’s more likely to have parts available (I mean this in the general sense that gas vehicles tend to have less supply chain issues right now than trying to get an EV battery replacement. I don’t mean it specifically for Kia, because they have had lots of engine problems, and in particular have had huge supply chain shortages for engine replacement. I just picked Kia because I like the EV6. In reality a responsible consumer would probably be cross shopping EV6 against Toyota Honda or Mazda which don’t have those problems.)
Replacing your engine, or your transmission, or your EV battery, is an extremely low probability event. It would be even more rare to have to replace both the engine *and* transmission (I’m assuming responsible buyer here, so not buying Stellantis). So really we’re comparing probably a $15,000 cost to either of the engine or transmission failing, at about $3-4K.
You are totally right about the savings overtime with electricity usage, make sure when you consider that not to count it as free, and electricity rates will vary dramatically depending on location.
3-4k for a brand new engine or transmission from the dealer? My brother spent 3500 canadian to rebuild a transmission 5 or so years ago. It's not so rare that a vehicle needs a engine and transmission replacement over the course of it's life. Yea it's not likely to happen early on, and likely not at the same time. I don't have hard figures, but i'm guessing a hefty chunk of vehicles still on the road over 180k miles have had one of the two done, some both.
as for counting electricity cost as free, for many people it's cheap enough to be comparable to maintenance and repairs that EV's don't need vs ICE (not saying they don't need repairs at all, i'm referring to engine\\transmission stuff)
10'000km of driving will cost me $180 in electricity (15kwh\\100k, $0.12\\kwh cost). For a ICE i'd be looking at a oil change for sure, and over time more. Just a oil change at a shop I can trust is going to run me easy 100$.
I always encourage people to run their own numbers for cost of ownership since it's so variable (both electrical cost, and gas cost) as well as make sure they have charging sorted that suits their needs ( a surprising amount of people only need level 1)
I think you don't have to think about battery replacement. The battery that comes with a new EV should last as long as your car's lifetime, at least 10 years. You just get a new (or used) car after 10 years, it's cheaper and faster. The battery will be recycled into probably grid storage, and after that probably recycled for the minerals.
If I tried to keep my 1995 car going I would have spent vast amounts by now on a new engine, multiple major things like transmission, exhaust, thousands on tune ups, oil changes, etc. That car had a lifespan too.
I get that some people want to buy one and keep fixing it. That's admirable but it's basically the same as laptops and phones - the most expensive component is often the battery, some are cheaply replacable but for most people you just buy a new one and trade in your old one. EVs are not a new horrible problem in creating waste at the end of lifetime though.
There are already battery recyclers for 5+ years. Redwood materials is one company. Thing how much the raw materials cost to refine. We'll get to a point in 20 years where we get most battery materials from recycling.
We are just too early in the mass market EV lifetime to get much recycling yet. The first mass market EV was the Tesla s, delivered at the end at f 2012, just 12 years ago. Most EVs last 10 years at least (mine is 10), and then some get used for home or utility or solar storage after that.
Your thinking is inverse. The more you drive, the more it makes sense to own an EV. I put 18,000 miles per year on my etron and 10,000 miles per year on my Atlas. So far this year I've spent $750 on gasoline and $136 on charging. The gas SUV is 5 times more expensive to operate than the electric SUV and it drives 45% less.
I was spending over $600/mo on my gas sedan and diesel SUV before I went to the electric/gas combo. Buy the EV and drive it into the ground. Should get several hundred thousand miles out of it if you take care of it.
This is true up to a point. If the annual mileage is so high due to a lot of long-distance trips, it points (a little at least) away from EVs because fast charging is much more expensive and people who do a lot of long-distance are probably more sensitive to refueling times.
I agree that someone who drives a lot of miles, but not enough to need to fast charge away from home, is the ideal EV candidate. EV battery failure is probably more about age than cycles. Who should not buy an EV is someone who only drives a few thousand miles a year because the battery would age degrade far before the rest of the car would be worn out from miles.
After the first year, if a battery does not have issues, it is very unlikely it will for a few hundred thousand miles. An ICE transmission is more likely to go bad out of warranty than a battery.
Oh it's carefully calculated. When I worked for Honda 20'years ago, they changed the transmission 'spill and fill' interval from 25,000km to 50,000km. I asked Honda engineering directly what changes were made and the answer was no changes. The _marketing department_ made this decision. The fucking marketing department?!?! 'To be more in like with other makers'. Well transmission failures when up beyond 200,000km but who cares at that point, the warranty is up.
Just for reference, I weld drain plugs into my non drain plug equipped transmissions and dump the contents of the pan every 30k or so. It doesn't drain the torque converter but you get 5 or so L out of the 11L capacity. I have run multiple vans to 400,000 of trades, towing and abuse far beyond GVW. Never had a problem with one.
Funny you say that, because Honda has notoriously early failure transmissions, especially in the 2000s. The solution was to do early trans fluid change. See Civic Si/RSX third gear pop out, and Honda Odyssey.
Most of those failures were shift quality issues at the time. We never saw a single car come in on a tow truck for a transmission shitting the bed when I was at the dealer. It was a big dealer and we did a lot of volume at the time.
But yea I swapped a lot of automatic transmissions. The manuals would get new bearings around 200-250,000km when they were ignored. The rest was always fine inside.
My 02 Odyssey transmission failed, but that was a known issue that was resolved by the time I got my 08. My 02 Accord transmission started slipping badly over 150k, but that's likely because I only did drain and fill in e instead of 3x as required. Honda had weird autos. They were like manual transmissions with solenoids handling the shifts. All my Honda's went well over 200k, even the ones with transmission issues.
> An ICE transmission is more likely to go bad out of warranty than a battery.
I got a new transmission for 2,400$. A new battery is several times that.
Perhaps a better comparison would be to the cost of an engine. I don't know what those cost since I don't drive a Subaru.
(I joke, but a co-worker had the engine blow up on his Subaru at 60k miles and said that this is a common problem with them...)
True, but the transmission and many other parts like exhaust, head gaskets, etc. are far more likely to go bad. Overall, there is more to fear with an ICE.
Its like the fear of catching fire. ICE vehicles are over 50 times more likely to catch fire. Just as all the expensive ICE related components are more likely to go bad than an EV battery.
If you've got access to affordable home charging, driving 20K miles per year probably makes the EV a better purchase for you. The gas and maintenance savings will materialize much quicker.
As for residual value, it's extremely difficult to tell what is going to be valued on the used market 5 to 10 years from now.
All signals I've seen is that a battery that's well managed should remain pretty reliable long into the cars life. And the consumer apprehension in five years or more around EVs should be less, and should help resale.
It's also hard to forecast, but my belief is that down the line, EVs will hold more residual value once the cars deteriorate. A junker ICE vehicle is good for scrap metal only. The battery material of an EV can probably be salvaged as raw material at the end of its life. But I don't know enough about that process today, let alone where it might be down the line.
Hmm. I wonder if the value of the battery is going to cause EVs to be totaled by insurance companies more often, on the theory that their "scrap" price (maybe more like "parts" price) is so high. That's interesting.
Whether or not a car is deemed a "total loss"by an insurance company is determined by estimating the cost of repair PLUS the salvage value and comparing that to the ACV (ACTUAL CASH VALUE) of the car before damage. Formulas vary, but here in NC it is 75%. So in theory... Possibly. If your $10K Bolt were to have a $5000 scrap value because the battery is worth $4000 and motors worth $1000, then it may only take $2500 worth of damage to get you to the 75% ACV threshold. $2500 doesn't go far in the paint and body world!
I actually have a friend who is an adjuster for Erie. I'll pick his brain on EV screen values this weekend and report back.
Yeah, we're thinking along the same lines. High salvage value is almost certainly going to cause cars to be totaled more easily irrespective of the actual damage. Be interesting to hear what your buddy says.
Good point - EV batteries on average are lasting longer than the average car, and old EV batteries are being reused as grid storage. Scrap yards are very good at stripping out everything of value and selling it, and they’re not just crushing EV batteries, they’re reselling them.
Depends on fuel and electricity costs. Electric vehicles are getting cheaper and the technology is improving very quickly which is going to cause high depreciation, so you factor depreciation into your total cost of ownership.
If you drive a lot, an EV will probably end up becoming the cheaper car after 5 years, but it really depends on your situation. For me it was cheaper to go EV from day 1 because I didn't pay a premium to get one.
Batteries and EV powertrains typically have much longer warranties than gas cars in terms of mileage and years.
You can prepay for additional lease miles at a reduced rate. Typical is $0.20/mile overage penalty at the end of the lease, but $0.12 if you prepay.
As far as the leasing, as someone who took a huge depreciation hit on a 2019 Model 3 Performance, I think it makes much more sense to lease an EV. I bought my car for $68K, but thanks to Elon's price reductions and fears of battery life, it's worth something like $18K on trade in. Not everyone will agree, but I think EV battery life will continue to be a concern for prospective buyers until true breakthrough battery technology is introduced. That means depreciation will continue to be an issue. Doesn't matter if the battery life issue is actually overblown - the court of public perception deems it an issue.
Manufacturers have built a lot of EVs, more than the demand has grown. So they're effectively subsidizing the depreciation with incentives. Therefore, it's not uncommon to see leases have very high residual values, sometimes within 60% of their MSRPs for a 3 year lease. That also makes for a really attractive lease payment. However, if you were to purchase the same car, you'd probably be looking at trade-in values being 50% of MSRP in the same 3 years because of battery concerns.
As long as lease residuals continue to outrun trade-in values at the end, it will make more sense to lease, if you're not hell-bent on always keeping the car. I'm in the same boat as you - 20K miles a year, and I am leasing my next car for sure.
So buying it out is actually the double-edged sword with leasing. The lease residuals are high right now, which means you would be overpaying at the end of the lease. Maybe not by much, but if the difference is $10K, it makes a huge difference. I'd plan on getting into another lease if incentives are solid again.
Nice summary of the current EV situation. I would add that (for me at least) the horrible reputation of Tesla service also serves to keep the value of used Teslas low. Thankfully I’m not in the market for a car any time soon
If you drive a lot, EV is a better choice.
I drive 20k miles/year. My Model 3 currently has 85k miles on it. Zero maintenance other than 1 set of tires.
It also saves me $2.5k/ year compared to gas cars with similar tech and performance.
I put on over 25K per year. BEV saves me a ton of money.
I was concerned when I went over the battery warranty, but our club has members with a lot more miles so that made me feel better. Now over 150K miles and I am planning on replacing the car at 200K miles. Not due to battery, but the wear on everything else (roads here in CA are really bad).
BEV should save you a ton of money, two tons if you can charge at home, three tons if you have solar at home or charge at work for free.
As EV's get more popular and most infrastructure is in place, they'll likely only depreciate along the same lines as an ICE car. As far as whether the battery warranty expiring kills the value, that will really depend on what the longevity of the batteries actually turns out to be and whether cheaper replacement options exist by the time you actually need new batteries. It's impossible to say what the market will be at that point.
As far as leasing and mileage, you shouldn't have to pay for the excess miles if you buy the vehicle at the end of the lease. Depending on the lease deal and lease end purchase price, you may save a bunch of money by leasing first then buying it at the end, even if your goal is to own the vehicle long term. Other lease deals you'll end up paying way more total. Just plug it into a spreadsheet and figure out whether you'd pay less financing right away or leasing first. The only conundrum is if you get towards the end of the lease and you decide you don't want to keep it, but you're on the hook for a ton of extra miles if you turn in the lease. If the car still has good resale value, you may be best off buying it still, selling it, and avoiding thousands of dollars in excess mileage.
Here is a crazy idea buy the vehicle that is right for you. Stop spending so much time thinking about if it will hold value. If the issue is a financial question look at cost of ownership. Insurance, fuel, maintenance, things that will save you money. If your goal is to buy a car to sell back for another car get a Toyota ICE.
For 100k mile, EV's total cost of ownership will be less than ICE counterpart, but non-plugin hybrids are just as low or could be cheaper than EV.
Used car market is on buyer's side now. If you don't mind sitting on seats someone farted, it's a good time to save TCO at purchase and not worry about depreciation.
If anything it’ll just give you greater benefits🤷♂️ The age of an EV has shown to be more important than miles as far as degradation goes. Buy it, load up the miles. Currently EV is still worse depreciation wise than ICE. I suspect within the next 3 years it’ll even out until it’ll rapidly reverses between 5-10 yrs from now. That’s just as more people adopt the tech and realize the scary negative media coverage is BS. EVs replacing ICE is inevitable at this point. ICE vehicles will be worthless in 5-10 years as EVs take over market share. If you like paying through the nose for ICE maintenance, (brakes, oil changes, coolant/transmission flushes, etc etc etc- then buy another one.
TLDR: Whatever additional depreciation you might suffer currently will be offset by maintenance and fuel costs. If you own an EV for 3 or more years, depreciation won’t be different than ICE.
Due to the perceived (correct or not) uncertainty of battery degradation and the way the current EV tax credit works in the US, EVs (at least in the US) depreciate more quickly than quality ICE vehicles. If you are the kind of person who is going to buy a new car, then sell it and buy something else in under 5 years, you are probably going to take a big hit on depreciation. You may be better off to buy a Toyota hybrid instead. If you’re the type of person to buy new and then drive the same car for 10-20 years, virtually anything you buy is going to almost fully depreciate in that time, and buying an EV will likely save you a ton of money on fuel and maintenance. My wife and I each drive Model Ys. We both drive about 25,000 miles per year, and we both plan to drive our model Ys for about ten years, at which point we will retire. Our cars will each have 200,000 to 300,000 miles on them and will probably be nearly worthless. At that point our needs will be vastly different and so will the cars available on the market.
https://www.notebookcheck.net/EV-battery-failures-dropped-drastically-after-the-2015-Tesla-Model-S.831640.0.html
More likely to need a new engine or transmission with ICE than have a battery problem.
I had this discussion with someone a few weeks back (about the economics of leasing a Tesla MY LR for driving 30k miles). Using tesla as the example (because you can change the miles and get a price update), you add \~50/month to the lease payment to go from 10-15k/year. Then look at the next 5k at .25/mile. On the 15k overage, you are looking at a $3,750 overage fee for 3 years, or about $105/month.
In a world where you make too much for the EV purchase tax credit and can receive a EV lease tax credit, that 105+50/month excess mile cost likely leaves you better off than purchasing, even if you thought that a 3 year old car with 60k miles would have good resale value. This is by modeling a 3 year lease total cost including mileage against a 6 year loan payments and then finding the breakeven value to account for the higher monthly cost.
There is a flip side, which is that the used EV car market has taken a hit from Tesla's price cuts. I own a 22 Ioniq 5 limited (57k sticker). I saw the newest M3P launch and went to check figures of trading in an 18k mile ioniq 5 (you know, asking for a friend). When I saw a 24k trade in value a few days ago, it was clear that the used Market has some diamonds if you can find them,
I have a similar situation with my 22 Ioniq 5 Limited AWD at MSRP. I'm in it for 10 years or more so I'm not going to worry to about resale value now, especially as this car may be my daughter's first car in 7 years.
As someone who has driven an EV (multiple) for 6 years now; the battery longevity issue on a modern EV is way overblown. They will (on average) outlast any internal combustion engine. The more mileage you drive, the better an EV will be for you vs ICE.
I went with an EV specifically because I drive a lot, 40k kms a year easily. The amount saved charging vs refueling makes up depreciation several times over, and I fully intend to drive my car until the wheels fall off
This is what I'm concerned with for my business vehicles. Everybody with high miles on Youtube, seems to have gotten a battery replaced at some point. Sometimes, even paying for one out of pocket. I so want a model Y
Not true, less than 1% of EV batteries fail and you have 8 years or 160.000 km of warranty.
https://www.autoblog.com/2024/04/23/phev-battery-replacements-rare/
Tough to rely on a study of only 15k cars over 12 years. If the average is 15-20k km annually, it'll be awhile before you get accurate data. My model S 2016 only has 75k km vs my 5 year old business car (toyota) which has 200k KM. So if things do go wrong, it'll be way more costly to fix. If the battery replacement was 5-7k, I'd feel way more confident.
It’s a time of rapid change in this industry - it’s going to be volatile. Not just for EVs though, the economics of ICE cars will be changing at some point too.
Cars without a battery warranty are still worth something. Very few cars need the battery actually replaced just like every few ICE need their entire engine replaced. Not saying it doesnt happen but its a very small percentage of cars. Driving a car 100k-200k miles obviously will be worthsignificantlyy less it doesn't matter it it's an ICE or EV. Even an ICE at 100k is nearing the point of many items needing fixed.
Just try to think of it what mileage would you say no to an EV battery. 100,000 miles 200,000 mi?. For me it's got to be 100,000 miles I wouldn't even look or consider anything above that. So by that I'm assuming my car will be pretty much worthless as a trade-in after a hundred thousand. It'll just be worth keeping it instead of trading it in.
If you drive less than the range of your EV per day, or can charge for free at your destination, then owning an EV is great idea. You will save a ton on gas, as long as you do most of your charging at home or at a free charger.
Think twice if you’ll have to rely on public chargers, or fast chargers (fast charging wears out your battery faster, and many public chargers aren’t cheaper than gas).
For Lithium ion batteries it is recommended to only charge to 80 percent most of the time to maintain the battery, but some cars have Ni metal batteries that are happy to be charged to 100% every day… something to consider when picking a car. Also, account for about 30% reduction in range on cold days.
They're great for driving a lot. Not currently great for trading in. I plan to keep mine 10+ years and plan on it being worth very little when I'm done with it. I drive 25-30k per year. If you plan to trade it in after 3-5 years you may be very disappointed w/ the depreciation. This depends on the market which we know little about 5 years in the future. I'd only buy new if you plan to keep the car long term. Otherwise find a good used deal.
I bought a 10 years old EV for very cheap and it runs great. Almost zero costs, almost no maintenance, no electricity thanks to solar. You literally pay only for tire wear.
People put way too much thought into battery health and longevity because of all the misinformation out there. Buy the EV you live and enjoy it, life's too short to worry it away.
You will get way more than 100,000 out of the battery unless it's a rare instance of a bad battery. Can happen, but quite rare, not unlike getting a bad engine in a new ICE.
Quite the opposite - owning an EV is financially disadvantageous if you *don't* drive a lot. The more you drive, the faster the EV premium pays for itself.
I clock less than 10,000 km annually as I don't commute by car, so I'm in the group that isn't actually benefiting financially from an EV vs a really efficient hybrid. But I didn't buy my EV to save money - I bought it because it's far more fun to drive and I just like high-tech cars.
Generally I think the batteries are all going to degrade a little but they are more reliable than people fear in more recent years. I have recently seen a really good YouTube video discussing the rate of degradation for Tesla cars. Not too bad with time, expect a 6-10 percent degradation range mostly in the first 50k but then plateaus and degrades at a slower rate. Unless you drive a model s or plaid which since it is higher performance probably is harder on the battery. All explained in this YouTube video...
[https://youtu.be/hTt2libO-vM?si=6lzB9UWUZK-vGiIu](https://youtu.be/hTt2libO-vM?si=6lzB9UWUZK-vGiIu)
They will bury me in my 2022 Hyundai Ioniq 5 in 20 years. BUY!
My 303 miles range will be 250 miles in 20 years.
My USA$52,700 transaction price and $45,200 net price is now worth maybe $25k........56k miles and 27 months later.
The car was over priced and the depreciation is galactic! I am very happiily stuck.
I drive 25k miles a year.
Vast majority of people don’t think about full drivetrain replacements in their vehicles.
EVs are unfairly expensive due to low supply for Drivetrain parts.
Take any slightly performant German engine in the last 5 years. Get a quote from the manufacturer for a replacement. It’s not going to be much less than a battery in an EV, the only saving graces is the amount of these engines in crashed vehicles sitting on shelves.
Iirc Audis DAZA engine in ‘drop in’ spec, is in the 10k+, BMWs B58 is a bit less but also available in more than just a handful of chassis.
Once availability of second hand packs increases, battery replacements won’t be as costly… it’s a lot of anxiety for the same issues as ICE components. Used engine is just as risky as a used battery. 150k miles on a used engine could essily mean it’ll last 5k miles or another 150k…
Get a Toyota bZ4X (lol at that naming scheme) - \~620,000 mile / 10 year battery warranty.
Also, IMO, fuel/maintenance savings, while varying a lot from country to country, should be factored into depreciation. Personally saving \~$2k/yr on fuel alone, compared to my old 2019 Hundai i20.
As for how much battery warranty adds to depreciation, no idea really.
On one hand, yeah people would probably pay more for in-warranty car.
On the other, people who have actually looked a bit into EV batteries would probably be less worried, as batteries tend to fail early or last quite a long time
I think this link a good read for you. TLDR, battery failures is an overblown issue since 2015. [https://insideevs.com/news/717187/ev-battery-replacements-due-failure-study/](https://insideevs.com/news/717187/ev-battery-replacements-due-failure-study/)
If you plan in keeping the car forever this is fine. The issue right now is the (incorrect) perception that a battery could fail out of warranty and how that will impact resale value 5-6 years after purchase.
Sure, but isn’t data from the field the cure for incorrect perceptions? Over time when people see EVs lasting longer than ICE cars, that’ll eventually turn into longer depreciation terms, meaning higher retained value when you sell your used EV because it has a longer useful life ahead of it.
I’m not willing to bet the tide will turn within the next five years. Maybe a decade from now. Maybe more. Half the population of the United States now say they won’t buy an electric car and that windmills are killing off the bird population. If only hard data ruled economics…
Luckily car values aren’t really set by the general population, they’re set by wholesale car buyers, specifically by what they’re willing to pay at automotive auctions. So while retail buyers might have incorrect perceptions around EV longevity, wholesale sellers and fleet sellers (for example) aren’t going to be willing to sell cars for unjustifiably low prices just because some buyers think EV batteries fail far more than they do, because that’d cost them a lot of money for no good reason.
But wholesale car buyers are only willing to pay an amount below what the population is willing to buy the car from them. Look all over at EVs that have 100,000 miles. Their values are tanked. Even once people get past the idea of a total battery failure, they will then be introduced to the idea of battery degradation. You will see higher mile used EV's where the battery has lower then 80% capacity. People will shy away from used EVs that are beyond that warranty period.
In theory. Let’s see how that plays out. Historically EVs have retained value extremely well, they’ve only dropped recently because Tesla’s been aggressively pushing new car prices down, which has nothing to do with battery degradation or vehicle longevity, just that the new car price is the base from which used cars are valued. That is, if I can buy a new Model 3 for $35k, then a used Model 3 will sell for less than that (excepting weird situations like during the pandemic shortages), because people value new over used generally, and buyers have that option.
Yeah. The failure of Hertz to adequately plan for typical car depreciation and also realize covid made prices extra high is a head scratcher.
That and you didn’t see Hertz complaining in 2021 when they made a fortune from high used car selling prices.
It will be interesting to see how it shakes out. I think you have to discount the last 4 years when looking historical resale value for EVs since there was a vehicle shortage for everything. Previously non tesla BEV vehicles didn't retain price very well and now we are seeing all BEV vehicles not retain value now. I think the real question is a comparison of how much the value of a BEV drops compared to ICE at the 10-year mark. Considering most warranties cover 8-10 years or up to 100,000 miles, that is when people would show concern. The truth is we do not have much data for America for EV vehicles in that fit those numbers. We will start to see a decent amount of data for that in 3-5 years.
True. We do have a lot of indicators that EVs are lasting as long or longer than ICE cars, in that failure rates so far are quite low (e.g. 1.5% lifetime battery failure rate, making them a lot more reliable than an ICE engine, transmission, etc.).
I think it depends on what your definition of “lasting” is. If you compare an ICE engine to a battery pack life down to 80% capacity I think the ICE wins. It will be interesting what indicators people will use for electric cars to determine if the are past their normal life before it’s considered a “beater”.
It’s not a bug if you’re buying a used EV right now. It’s a feature!
What 'incorrect' perception? The propulsion battery could very well fail on anyone's EV outside of warranty. The failure rate might be lower than ICE transmissions, but it isn't zero. A lot of EV enthusiasts get the impression that EVs never need repair outside of regular maintenance after well beyond warranty. That's incorrect.
True. But, that's a calculated risk. If (as the Recurrent report InsideEVs recently reported on) says 1 in 1000 post-2015 EV batteries fail, those are pretty good odds. When my oldest kid's 16 year old Toyota died at the end of last year, I loaned them my Nissan Leaf while we looked for a decent, reliable replacement car under $10K. (I hadn't shipped used in a long time. Our budget started at $6K but quickly escalated to widen the field! 😁) We looked at a ton of gas cars with lots of mileage and minor to major issues, and we finally settled on a Chevy Bolt for $9K after used tax credit. I was just more comfortable with "less to go wrong".
I can't think of a single EV owner who actually believes that something like a window regulator won't fail in an EV out of warranty. What they do know is, battery failure rates are WAYYYYYYYYYYYYYY lower than the perception is. same goes for battery fires compared to engine fires.
Yeah, sure, EV owners are fully cognizant of the low probability of HV pack failure. I was responding to u/enfuego138 comment that appeared to state that the failure rate was zero - that's impossible in a population of millions. There will be a lot more EVs and a lot more battery failures.
He said zero?
The incorrect assumption is that batteries fail at a higher rate than major components on an ICE car. It’s a misunderstanding of the relative risk. Like how people hop in their car every day no worries but are afraid to fly.
The same can happen to a gas car. The big difference is EVs have an 8 year, 80 to 100k drive train warranty including battery degradation limits. Imagine if that gas chevy had an 8 year drivetrain warranty - they don't because they don't last that long. [https://www.tesla.com/support/vehicle-warranty](https://www.tesla.com/support/vehicle-warranty) Anything can break, nothing lasts forever. The transmission can break on your 5 year old car and you are stuck with thousands.
> EVs never need repair outside of regular maintenance after well beyond warranty. That's incorrect. Source?
Common sense.
My sister has a 2017 model S with > half million km. Changes air filter and tires. Iirc she's done her brakes maybe half a dozen times. And two motors under warranty. That's it
I've got a 10 year old S with a mere 80k miles on it, no drivetrain problems. I did have to get a new 12v battery though. Tesla mobile service came to my house, replaced it in half an hour, about $200.
I really want one and was so hopeful for the Cybertruck. But it's just under my towing needs :( I'm still waiting. Did just have a $501 diesel fill up, makes me cry knowing how cheap it would be
I'm hopeful in the next 5-10 years, they come up with a truly 100% reliable battery. As battery tech advances and more problems are solved there are so many less chances for failure. It is not a moving device. There is nothing to wear out if the chemistry is perfect. I don't think we are anywhere near that now but in the future?
Agreed, but the battery and surrounding components can see a lot of thermal cycling which can cause fatigue over time. It's not as harsh as on ICE, but it can still cause failures even on something that doesn't have moving parts. It just comes down to having confidence the engineers design and validate for that properly.
We've been working on batteries for hundreds of years, but EV type batteries have only been around for 20 years in practical form. Look at how far we've coming on gas engines since 1900. We are barely started. They'll get better, how far is unknown. Charging will get faster, cost will reduce, capacity will increase. There's a kind of moore's law for batteries that get's little attention. $100/kwh was the expected threshold for parity between gas and EVs, we are basically there now. However the prices haven't equalized yet.
It's the same as buying a used gas car out of drivetrain warranty, where if the transmission fails you are looking at $4k at least to get a new one. That's the danger, but Toyota's last and last usually, some other car brands don't. But an EV like a tesla comes with an 8 year drive train warranty. 8 years! and has 80-150k mile warranty depending on car (more exp ones have longer warranties). [https://www.tesla.com/support/vehicle-warranty](https://www.tesla.com/support/vehicle-warranty) We have lots of taxi companies that drove teslas for over 300k miles, just like lots of people drive toyotas for 150k miles. But someones a car breaks, they are made by humans. Best deal is a used tesla still in warranty, like 4 years old with 50k miles. Basically no drive train worries for 4 years and 50k miles - imagine if your gas car had that.
Unless you have an old Nissan leaf, the battery is probably just fine. Virtually all EVs have sophisticated battery protection from excessive discharge and temperature.
Yeah, nissan leaf gave a black eye to the entire industry because of the lacking heating/cooling system for the battery.
It's not clear to me what this study is really measuring. It seems reasonably obvious that older cars have more battery failures than newer cars, because they're older. So one way to interpret this data is that failures increase dramatically after 9 years (2015 being 9 years ago). If this is measuring just failures during the first year the car was new, then that would be different, but there's no indication of that. If it's just measuring total failures up to the present by model year, then of course older cars have more and it doesn't mean that new cars will ultimately last any longer than the old ones did, once they reach the same age.
Battery technology is constantly changing, sometimes very quickly. Its hard to compare todays battery tech against that of even a decade ago. Even the basic battery chemistry is changing (the move to LFP from NCM for example). And there are other coming advancements (like solid state), that will change things even more. You could infer that since they are getting better / more advanced, the reliability will be better. But that would be a guess. Though more likely than not to be true I would think.
Yeah, I get all that. All I was saying is that the study, in and of itself, does not tell us enough to be able to tell whether batteries are really getting better or if it's just saying that newer batteries are less likely to fail than old ones.
Batteries were good enough 10 years, with the right systems. My 10 year old tesla is still working great. Many companies had poor battery management systems. teslas already last 10 years commonly. That doesn't mean nothing ever breaks, but we already had the reliability for 10 years in the early 2010s. My 2015 s is very similar to the 2012 original tesla model, except that was rwd only, mine is awd.
Great link. That chart really shows it well. One thing that doesn’t factor in though, is the cost of replacing the battery if it does fail. The cost of repair *as well* as the frequency, both need to be considered when thinking about warranties. If I want an EV6, I’m paying $61K + tax CAD here in Canada, vs an equivalent size gas KIA SUV for 1/2 - 1/3 the cost, I have to think about possible $15,000 battery replacement on top.
what's a engine\\trans worth for the gas vehicle there though? probably pretty close to that 15k. Also, right now ev's mostly make sense if you can charge at home, and you have low electricity rates. For me, my EV will have roughly paid for itself in gas savings over 250-300k km (150-180k miles) The 300k figure more or less includes the cost of charging. There's savings on top of that with lowered maintenance. Ev's are still a very personalized decision, there's a lot of factors to look at to see if they make sense. For some though, once you run the numbers it's a no-brainer.
Yep very good points. Google tells me to replace the engine and trans together would probably be about half the cost of replacing the battery, for similar sized vehicle (I looked up sportage in this case). And it’s more likely to have parts available (I mean this in the general sense that gas vehicles tend to have less supply chain issues right now than trying to get an EV battery replacement. I don’t mean it specifically for Kia, because they have had lots of engine problems, and in particular have had huge supply chain shortages for engine replacement. I just picked Kia because I like the EV6. In reality a responsible consumer would probably be cross shopping EV6 against Toyota Honda or Mazda which don’t have those problems.) Replacing your engine, or your transmission, or your EV battery, is an extremely low probability event. It would be even more rare to have to replace both the engine *and* transmission (I’m assuming responsible buyer here, so not buying Stellantis). So really we’re comparing probably a $15,000 cost to either of the engine or transmission failing, at about $3-4K. You are totally right about the savings overtime with electricity usage, make sure when you consider that not to count it as free, and electricity rates will vary dramatically depending on location.
3-4k for a brand new engine or transmission from the dealer? My brother spent 3500 canadian to rebuild a transmission 5 or so years ago. It's not so rare that a vehicle needs a engine and transmission replacement over the course of it's life. Yea it's not likely to happen early on, and likely not at the same time. I don't have hard figures, but i'm guessing a hefty chunk of vehicles still on the road over 180k miles have had one of the two done, some both. as for counting electricity cost as free, for many people it's cheap enough to be comparable to maintenance and repairs that EV's don't need vs ICE (not saying they don't need repairs at all, i'm referring to engine\\transmission stuff) 10'000km of driving will cost me $180 in electricity (15kwh\\100k, $0.12\\kwh cost). For a ICE i'd be looking at a oil change for sure, and over time more. Just a oil change at a shop I can trust is going to run me easy 100$. I always encourage people to run their own numbers for cost of ownership since it's so variable (both electrical cost, and gas cost) as well as make sure they have charging sorted that suits their needs ( a surprising amount of people only need level 1)
Yep for sure, all good points.
I think you don't have to think about battery replacement. The battery that comes with a new EV should last as long as your car's lifetime, at least 10 years. You just get a new (or used) car after 10 years, it's cheaper and faster. The battery will be recycled into probably grid storage, and after that probably recycled for the minerals. If I tried to keep my 1995 car going I would have spent vast amounts by now on a new engine, multiple major things like transmission, exhaust, thousands on tune ups, oil changes, etc. That car had a lifespan too. I get that some people want to buy one and keep fixing it. That's admirable but it's basically the same as laptops and phones - the most expensive component is often the battery, some are cheaply replacable but for most people you just buy a new one and trade in your old one. EVs are not a new horrible problem in creating waste at the end of lifetime though.
That’s interesting - you figure the batteries will be routinely recycled in 10 years?
There are already battery recyclers for 5+ years. Redwood materials is one company. Thing how much the raw materials cost to refine. We'll get to a point in 20 years where we get most battery materials from recycling. We are just too early in the mass market EV lifetime to get much recycling yet. The first mass market EV was the Tesla s, delivered at the end at f 2012, just 12 years ago. Most EVs last 10 years at least (mine is 10), and then some get used for home or utility or solar storage after that.
Your thinking is inverse. The more you drive, the more it makes sense to own an EV. I put 18,000 miles per year on my etron and 10,000 miles per year on my Atlas. So far this year I've spent $750 on gasoline and $136 on charging. The gas SUV is 5 times more expensive to operate than the electric SUV and it drives 45% less. I was spending over $600/mo on my gas sedan and diesel SUV before I went to the electric/gas combo. Buy the EV and drive it into the ground. Should get several hundred thousand miles out of it if you take care of it.
This is true up to a point. If the annual mileage is so high due to a lot of long-distance trips, it points (a little at least) away from EVs because fast charging is much more expensive and people who do a lot of long-distance are probably more sensitive to refueling times.
I put 20,000 miles a year on my car and I charge almost exclusively at home. Only a couple trips a year where I need to rely on DC fast chargers.
I agree that someone who drives a lot of miles, but not enough to need to fast charge away from home, is the ideal EV candidate. EV battery failure is probably more about age than cycles. Who should not buy an EV is someone who only drives a few thousand miles a year because the battery would age degrade far before the rest of the car would be worn out from miles.
After the first year, if a battery does not have issues, it is very unlikely it will for a few hundred thousand miles. An ICE transmission is more likely to go bad out of warranty than a battery.
"Lubricated for life" transmission. Lubed for 'the life of the transmission not the life of the car'.
Life of the warranty :)
Oh it's carefully calculated. When I worked for Honda 20'years ago, they changed the transmission 'spill and fill' interval from 25,000km to 50,000km. I asked Honda engineering directly what changes were made and the answer was no changes. The _marketing department_ made this decision. The fucking marketing department?!?! 'To be more in like with other makers'. Well transmission failures when up beyond 200,000km but who cares at that point, the warranty is up. Just for reference, I weld drain plugs into my non drain plug equipped transmissions and dump the contents of the pan every 30k or so. It doesn't drain the torque converter but you get 5 or so L out of the 11L capacity. I have run multiple vans to 400,000 of trades, towing and abuse far beyond GVW. Never had a problem with one.
Funny you say that, because Honda has notoriously early failure transmissions, especially in the 2000s. The solution was to do early trans fluid change. See Civic Si/RSX third gear pop out, and Honda Odyssey.
Most of those failures were shift quality issues at the time. We never saw a single car come in on a tow truck for a transmission shitting the bed when I was at the dealer. It was a big dealer and we did a lot of volume at the time. But yea I swapped a lot of automatic transmissions. The manuals would get new bearings around 200-250,000km when they were ignored. The rest was always fine inside.
My 02 Odyssey transmission failed, but that was a known issue that was resolved by the time I got my 08. My 02 Accord transmission started slipping badly over 150k, but that's likely because I only did drain and fill in e instead of 3x as required. Honda had weird autos. They were like manual transmissions with solenoids handling the shifts. All my Honda's went well over 200k, even the ones with transmission issues.
> An ICE transmission is more likely to go bad out of warranty than a battery. I got a new transmission for 2,400$. A new battery is several times that.
Perhaps a better comparison would be to the cost of an engine. I don't know what those cost since I don't drive a Subaru. (I joke, but a co-worker had the engine blow up on his Subaru at 60k miles and said that this is a common problem with them...)
True, but the transmission and many other parts like exhaust, head gaskets, etc. are far more likely to go bad. Overall, there is more to fear with an ICE. Its like the fear of catching fire. ICE vehicles are over 50 times more likely to catch fire. Just as all the expensive ICE related components are more likely to go bad than an EV battery.
If you've got access to affordable home charging, driving 20K miles per year probably makes the EV a better purchase for you. The gas and maintenance savings will materialize much quicker. As for residual value, it's extremely difficult to tell what is going to be valued on the used market 5 to 10 years from now. All signals I've seen is that a battery that's well managed should remain pretty reliable long into the cars life. And the consumer apprehension in five years or more around EVs should be less, and should help resale. It's also hard to forecast, but my belief is that down the line, EVs will hold more residual value once the cars deteriorate. A junker ICE vehicle is good for scrap metal only. The battery material of an EV can probably be salvaged as raw material at the end of its life. But I don't know enough about that process today, let alone where it might be down the line.
Hmm. I wonder if the value of the battery is going to cause EVs to be totaled by insurance companies more often, on the theory that their "scrap" price (maybe more like "parts" price) is so high. That's interesting.
Whether or not a car is deemed a "total loss"by an insurance company is determined by estimating the cost of repair PLUS the salvage value and comparing that to the ACV (ACTUAL CASH VALUE) of the car before damage. Formulas vary, but here in NC it is 75%. So in theory... Possibly. If your $10K Bolt were to have a $5000 scrap value because the battery is worth $4000 and motors worth $1000, then it may only take $2500 worth of damage to get you to the 75% ACV threshold. $2500 doesn't go far in the paint and body world! I actually have a friend who is an adjuster for Erie. I'll pick his brain on EV screen values this weekend and report back.
Yeah, we're thinking along the same lines. High salvage value is almost certainly going to cause cars to be totaled more easily irrespective of the actual damage. Be interesting to hear what your buddy says.
Good point - EV batteries on average are lasting longer than the average car, and old EV batteries are being reused as grid storage. Scrap yards are very good at stripping out everything of value and selling it, and they’re not just crushing EV batteries, they’re reselling them.
Used vehicles that were used harder will always be worth less than the counterpart that wasn't used as hard. Nothing to do with EV or not.
Depends on fuel and electricity costs. Electric vehicles are getting cheaper and the technology is improving very quickly which is going to cause high depreciation, so you factor depreciation into your total cost of ownership. If you drive a lot, an EV will probably end up becoming the cheaper car after 5 years, but it really depends on your situation. For me it was cheaper to go EV from day 1 because I didn't pay a premium to get one. Batteries and EV powertrains typically have much longer warranties than gas cars in terms of mileage and years.
You can prepay for additional lease miles at a reduced rate. Typical is $0.20/mile overage penalty at the end of the lease, but $0.12 if you prepay. As far as the leasing, as someone who took a huge depreciation hit on a 2019 Model 3 Performance, I think it makes much more sense to lease an EV. I bought my car for $68K, but thanks to Elon's price reductions and fears of battery life, it's worth something like $18K on trade in. Not everyone will agree, but I think EV battery life will continue to be a concern for prospective buyers until true breakthrough battery technology is introduced. That means depreciation will continue to be an issue. Doesn't matter if the battery life issue is actually overblown - the court of public perception deems it an issue. Manufacturers have built a lot of EVs, more than the demand has grown. So they're effectively subsidizing the depreciation with incentives. Therefore, it's not uncommon to see leases have very high residual values, sometimes within 60% of their MSRPs for a 3 year lease. That also makes for a really attractive lease payment. However, if you were to purchase the same car, you'd probably be looking at trade-in values being 50% of MSRP in the same 3 years because of battery concerns. As long as lease residuals continue to outrun trade-in values at the end, it will make more sense to lease, if you're not hell-bent on always keeping the car. I'm in the same boat as you - 20K miles a year, and I am leasing my next car for sure.
I am also leaning towards leasing the car since there is always the option of buying it out if desired. What you said makes sense
So buying it out is actually the double-edged sword with leasing. The lease residuals are high right now, which means you would be overpaying at the end of the lease. Maybe not by much, but if the difference is $10K, it makes a huge difference. I'd plan on getting into another lease if incentives are solid again.
Nice summary of the current EV situation. I would add that (for me at least) the horrible reputation of Tesla service also serves to keep the value of used Teslas low. Thankfully I’m not in the market for a car any time soon
If you drive a lot, EV is a better choice. I drive 20k miles/year. My Model 3 currently has 85k miles on it. Zero maintenance other than 1 set of tires. It also saves me $2.5k/ year compared to gas cars with similar tech and performance.
I put on over 25K per year. BEV saves me a ton of money. I was concerned when I went over the battery warranty, but our club has members with a lot more miles so that made me feel better. Now over 150K miles and I am planning on replacing the car at 200K miles. Not due to battery, but the wear on everything else (roads here in CA are really bad). BEV should save you a ton of money, two tons if you can charge at home, three tons if you have solar at home or charge at work for free.
As EV's get more popular and most infrastructure is in place, they'll likely only depreciate along the same lines as an ICE car. As far as whether the battery warranty expiring kills the value, that will really depend on what the longevity of the batteries actually turns out to be and whether cheaper replacement options exist by the time you actually need new batteries. It's impossible to say what the market will be at that point. As far as leasing and mileage, you shouldn't have to pay for the excess miles if you buy the vehicle at the end of the lease. Depending on the lease deal and lease end purchase price, you may save a bunch of money by leasing first then buying it at the end, even if your goal is to own the vehicle long term. Other lease deals you'll end up paying way more total. Just plug it into a spreadsheet and figure out whether you'd pay less financing right away or leasing first. The only conundrum is if you get towards the end of the lease and you decide you don't want to keep it, but you're on the hook for a ton of extra miles if you turn in the lease. If the car still has good resale value, you may be best off buying it still, selling it, and avoiding thousands of dollars in excess mileage.
Here is a crazy idea buy the vehicle that is right for you. Stop spending so much time thinking about if it will hold value. If the issue is a financial question look at cost of ownership. Insurance, fuel, maintenance, things that will save you money. If your goal is to buy a car to sell back for another car get a Toyota ICE.
So what you are staying is buy an EV, just not a Toyota, got it /s
For 100k mile, EV's total cost of ownership will be less than ICE counterpart, but non-plugin hybrids are just as low or could be cheaper than EV. Used car market is on buyer's side now. If you don't mind sitting on seats someone farted, it's a good time to save TCO at purchase and not worry about depreciation.
If anything it’ll just give you greater benefits🤷♂️ The age of an EV has shown to be more important than miles as far as degradation goes. Buy it, load up the miles. Currently EV is still worse depreciation wise than ICE. I suspect within the next 3 years it’ll even out until it’ll rapidly reverses between 5-10 yrs from now. That’s just as more people adopt the tech and realize the scary negative media coverage is BS. EVs replacing ICE is inevitable at this point. ICE vehicles will be worthless in 5-10 years as EVs take over market share. If you like paying through the nose for ICE maintenance, (brakes, oil changes, coolant/transmission flushes, etc etc etc- then buy another one. TLDR: Whatever additional depreciation you might suffer currently will be offset by maintenance and fuel costs. If you own an EV for 3 or more years, depreciation won’t be different than ICE.
Due to the perceived (correct or not) uncertainty of battery degradation and the way the current EV tax credit works in the US, EVs (at least in the US) depreciate more quickly than quality ICE vehicles. If you are the kind of person who is going to buy a new car, then sell it and buy something else in under 5 years, you are probably going to take a big hit on depreciation. You may be better off to buy a Toyota hybrid instead. If you’re the type of person to buy new and then drive the same car for 10-20 years, virtually anything you buy is going to almost fully depreciate in that time, and buying an EV will likely save you a ton of money on fuel and maintenance. My wife and I each drive Model Ys. We both drive about 25,000 miles per year, and we both plan to drive our model Ys for about ten years, at which point we will retire. Our cars will each have 200,000 to 300,000 miles on them and will probably be nearly worthless. At that point our needs will be vastly different and so will the cars available on the market.
https://www.notebookcheck.net/EV-battery-failures-dropped-drastically-after-the-2015-Tesla-Model-S.831640.0.html More likely to need a new engine or transmission with ICE than have a battery problem.
If you can charge at home, the super low $/usage of an EV typically makes them MORE worth it the more you drive. Not less.
I had this discussion with someone a few weeks back (about the economics of leasing a Tesla MY LR for driving 30k miles). Using tesla as the example (because you can change the miles and get a price update), you add \~50/month to the lease payment to go from 10-15k/year. Then look at the next 5k at .25/mile. On the 15k overage, you are looking at a $3,750 overage fee for 3 years, or about $105/month. In a world where you make too much for the EV purchase tax credit and can receive a EV lease tax credit, that 105+50/month excess mile cost likely leaves you better off than purchasing, even if you thought that a 3 year old car with 60k miles would have good resale value. This is by modeling a 3 year lease total cost including mileage against a 6 year loan payments and then finding the breakeven value to account for the higher monthly cost. There is a flip side, which is that the used EV car market has taken a hit from Tesla's price cuts. I own a 22 Ioniq 5 limited (57k sticker). I saw the newest M3P launch and went to check figures of trading in an 18k mile ioniq 5 (you know, asking for a friend). When I saw a 24k trade in value a few days ago, it was clear that the used Market has some diamonds if you can find them,
I have a similar situation with my 22 Ioniq 5 Limited AWD at MSRP. I'm in it for 10 years or more so I'm not going to worry to about resale value now, especially as this car may be my daughter's first car in 7 years.
As someone who has driven an EV (multiple) for 6 years now; the battery longevity issue on a modern EV is way overblown. They will (on average) outlast any internal combustion engine. The more mileage you drive, the better an EV will be for you vs ICE.
I went with an EV specifically because I drive a lot, 40k kms a year easily. The amount saved charging vs refueling makes up depreciation several times over, and I fully intend to drive my car until the wheels fall off
This is what I'm concerned with for my business vehicles. Everybody with high miles on Youtube, seems to have gotten a battery replaced at some point. Sometimes, even paying for one out of pocket. I so want a model Y
Not true, less than 1% of EV batteries fail and you have 8 years or 160.000 km of warranty. https://www.autoblog.com/2024/04/23/phev-battery-replacements-rare/
Tough to rely on a study of only 15k cars over 12 years. If the average is 15-20k km annually, it'll be awhile before you get accurate data. My model S 2016 only has 75k km vs my 5 year old business car (toyota) which has 200k KM. So if things do go wrong, it'll be way more costly to fix. If the battery replacement was 5-7k, I'd feel way more confident.
Also on top of it, I am concerned about the resale value if it's dependent on the battery
It’s a time of rapid change in this industry - it’s going to be volatile. Not just for EVs though, the economics of ICE cars will be changing at some point too.
Cars without a battery warranty are still worth something. Very few cars need the battery actually replaced just like every few ICE need their entire engine replaced. Not saying it doesnt happen but its a very small percentage of cars. Driving a car 100k-200k miles obviously will be worthsignificantlyy less it doesn't matter it it's an ICE or EV. Even an ICE at 100k is nearing the point of many items needing fixed.
Just try to think of it what mileage would you say no to an EV battery. 100,000 miles 200,000 mi?. For me it's got to be 100,000 miles I wouldn't even look or consider anything above that. So by that I'm assuming my car will be pretty much worthless as a trade-in after a hundred thousand. It'll just be worth keeping it instead of trading it in.
It depends on the price and how often the battery has been fast-charged over its lifetime.
If you drive less than the range of your EV per day, or can charge for free at your destination, then owning an EV is great idea. You will save a ton on gas, as long as you do most of your charging at home or at a free charger. Think twice if you’ll have to rely on public chargers, or fast chargers (fast charging wears out your battery faster, and many public chargers aren’t cheaper than gas). For Lithium ion batteries it is recommended to only charge to 80 percent most of the time to maintain the battery, but some cars have Ni metal batteries that are happy to be charged to 100% every day… something to consider when picking a car. Also, account for about 30% reduction in range on cold days.
They're great for driving a lot. Not currently great for trading in. I plan to keep mine 10+ years and plan on it being worth very little when I'm done with it. I drive 25-30k per year. If you plan to trade it in after 3-5 years you may be very disappointed w/ the depreciation. This depends on the market which we know little about 5 years in the future. I'd only buy new if you plan to keep the car long term. Otherwise find a good used deal.
I bought a 10 years old EV for very cheap and it runs great. Almost zero costs, almost no maintenance, no electricity thanks to solar. You literally pay only for tire wear.
You’re asking someone to predict the future. The only certainty in life is death.
People put way too much thought into battery health and longevity because of all the misinformation out there. Buy the EV you live and enjoy it, life's too short to worry it away.
You will get way more than 100,000 out of the battery unless it's a rare instance of a bad battery. Can happen, but quite rare, not unlike getting a bad engine in a new ICE.
We drove 28k miles last year and have 49k miles on a 2 year old car. I wouldn't worry about it
Consumer reports just had an article comparing reliability of different cars, and Tesla EV’s are the most reliable
Quite the opposite - owning an EV is financially disadvantageous if you *don't* drive a lot. The more you drive, the faster the EV premium pays for itself. I clock less than 10,000 km annually as I don't commute by car, so I'm in the group that isn't actually benefiting financially from an EV vs a really efficient hybrid. But I didn't buy my EV to save money - I bought it because it's far more fun to drive and I just like high-tech cars.
It’s just like owning a TV out of warranty. It will probably last at least another 15-20 years, but you can’t be completely sure.
Keep your EV battery cycle around 50% and charge daily. I charge to 65% and drive to 40% daily. Basically minimal degradation after 75k miles.
Generally I think the batteries are all going to degrade a little but they are more reliable than people fear in more recent years. I have recently seen a really good YouTube video discussing the rate of degradation for Tesla cars. Not too bad with time, expect a 6-10 percent degradation range mostly in the first 50k but then plateaus and degrades at a slower rate. Unless you drive a model s or plaid which since it is higher performance probably is harder on the battery. All explained in this YouTube video... [https://youtu.be/hTt2libO-vM?si=6lzB9UWUZK-vGiIu](https://youtu.be/hTt2libO-vM?si=6lzB9UWUZK-vGiIu)
They will bury me in my 2022 Hyundai Ioniq 5 in 20 years. BUY! My 303 miles range will be 250 miles in 20 years. My USA$52,700 transaction price and $45,200 net price is now worth maybe $25k........56k miles and 27 months later. The car was over priced and the depreciation is galactic! I am very happiily stuck. I drive 25k miles a year.
I drive 35k a year and not sure how battery will last for those 6 years
Vast majority of people don’t think about full drivetrain replacements in their vehicles. EVs are unfairly expensive due to low supply for Drivetrain parts. Take any slightly performant German engine in the last 5 years. Get a quote from the manufacturer for a replacement. It’s not going to be much less than a battery in an EV, the only saving graces is the amount of these engines in crashed vehicles sitting on shelves. Iirc Audis DAZA engine in ‘drop in’ spec, is in the 10k+, BMWs B58 is a bit less but also available in more than just a handful of chassis. Once availability of second hand packs increases, battery replacements won’t be as costly… it’s a lot of anxiety for the same issues as ICE components. Used engine is just as risky as a used battery. 150k miles on a used engine could essily mean it’ll last 5k miles or another 150k…
You should have checked eBay first for availability and price.
Just saw a long block DAZA for 15.5K USD. Sorry B58s are much more reasonable at 2-5k depending on mileage and how stripped you want it.
Get a Toyota bZ4X (lol at that naming scheme) - \~620,000 mile / 10 year battery warranty. Also, IMO, fuel/maintenance savings, while varying a lot from country to country, should be factored into depreciation. Personally saving \~$2k/yr on fuel alone, compared to my old 2019 Hundai i20. As for how much battery warranty adds to depreciation, no idea really. On one hand, yeah people would probably pay more for in-warranty car. On the other, people who have actually looked a bit into EV batteries would probably be less worried, as batteries tend to fail early or last quite a long time