It’s anecdotal but people shopping for new cars this past month have cleaned out the EV inventory in Calgary. It took a bit of disgust on the price of gas to push them over the EV fence. My buddy picked up a Cadillac Lyriq with 0 % financing.
EV lots getting cleaned out.
- Thread starter Snagglefoot
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slo town
$200 Site Donor 2026
I hope he never needs parts, even something as simple as a front bumper. Check out Steve Lehto’s YT video about trying to get a replacement front bumper for a Lyriq..
Scott
Scott
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How much is gas?
I am not commenting on EV / not EV - but I guarantee that swapping cars just to save gas will likely never pay out. If you needed a new car anyway that would be different.
I am not commenting on EV / not EV - but I guarantee that swapping cars just to save gas will likely never pay out. If you needed a new car anyway that would be different.
Impulse buys rarely work out well...
Good choice. My LYRIQ is spectacular. Probably will lease a VISTIQ as soon as the 2027s hit the lot. (To replace a 2014 BMW X3). Used LYRIQ pieces have gone up a lot lately. My 2025 CPO Sport3 was $50K in October. Same car at the same dealer is $56k today.
I remember the "gas crisis" of the 70's. People were getting into fist fights over Ford Pintos. While full sized sedans could not be given away. As soon as it ended, the opposite happened. People change faster than the weather.
Using gas prices as a barometer for auto sales, is like trying to guess what will be the next women's fashion craze.
Using gas prices as a barometer for auto sales, is like trying to guess what will be the next women's fashion craze.
You got that right, the "crisis" with odd even rationing. The minute gas prices dropped people started buying gas guzzling land yachts all over again. History seems to repeat itself over and over again.
My little sister just bought a Subaru all electric EV. There are getting to be lot's of hybrids and EV's in my area. High gas prices make people change their habits.
This is getting so critical I think I'd better stock up on toilet paper.
The first big oil shock was in 1973. Here is a photo of a 1974 Chevy Impala. By 1977, GM threw in the towel and came up with the downsized 1977 Impala. The “ full size” cars never got big again. Mods, I used screen shots from Wiki to show the down sizing effect.
True, but many were replaced with SUVs like the Suburban, Escalade, Expedition, etc. and pickup trucks grew in size. Once things stabilize this will be a blip on the radar screen imo.
Or the cost of "free electricity" from solar panels. In 2026 are solar panels free, no leases, no finance deals, just free?I always get a laugh regarding this. To save maybe 1 thousand a year on fuel, people will head off to spend and most likely finance an EV vehicle at atleast $50k.for over five years. Electricity cost isn't even factored in....
We took a Tesla model 3 in on trade in February. We auction EVs. And we don't have the time to put everything on a lift before listing it for auction. There was undisclosed underbody damage by the owner. It went to arbitration. We lost and relisted it with full disclosure. And sold it last week for $4000 more than we paid for it in February.
A quick back of envelope estimate on my solar array puts the cost at under 9.7 cents per kWh assuming a 25 year life span. The panels themselves are warranted to produce 92% of faceplate capacity at the end of year 25 which means the assumed life span is conservative. @JeffKeryk may have a better set of numbers given how sunny it is in Califirnia.
My XL Yukon is getting 16.2 calculated MPG in town and 20.1 on Highway with the 5.3 before the cylinder deactivation crap. It can haul 8 people and does that often enough. Saves us from using two 30 mpg cars to haul everyone. Front and rear AC works good too. It has 229k miles on it too. I have 2 Mazdas that we use for smaller groups but its fun to go with everyone together.
For some reason not seeing many EVs around here in upstate NY. Two friends own them, but also have gas cars for long trips so I'm not sure they save much on fuel. One friend says he regrets the EV but the other likes it for local driving. Just too many hassles still with charging, especially on trips. My wife would hate having to consult an app to determine where she can stop and when she would have to stop, if she could figure out how it worked.
That's great, but the panels aren't free, and in their 25 year life span depending where you live you're probably going to need a roof. In NY a roof lasts about 20 years, Florida and sunny CA is another story, a shorter story. Replacing a roof with solar panels adds cost to the job, quite a bit in fact. Then is someone going to throw old solar panels on a new roof? I wouldn't, so that cost gets added on. Maybe in 25 years the norm will be solar shingles, odds are I won't be around to see that.
Of course not, but doing the math on our house in Florida - the payback on solar will be just under 8 years.
Put another way, I take the money I will spend on solar (paying cash) and the ROI on that purchase is roughly 12%.
Guaranteed.
Hard to get 12% on your money in any case, and an assured 12% is great.
This assumes that electricity prices stay the same, of course, which I don’t think is true.
Bring on the sunshine!
Every utility rate increase will likewise increase your ROI and decrease the payback period. I factored that into the analysis but it turns out that I was way to conservative on what the rate increases would be.
