Should You Buy an Electric Car?

online.wsj.com

4 pointssoftdev124 comments

These articles never mention the option of buying a regular used car. What if I buy a used Honda Civic for $8,000, a car like that can easily last 10 years, and beat every car in their table on total 5 year cost even with thousands in repairs.

Also they mention 18% loss of battery pack capacity in only 2 years. It seems like someone might want to buy a new battery pack after 5 years and I wonder how much that would cost. I really want to buy an electric car, but they just don't make sense to me yet.

You can't get a cheap used Civic because its a sellers market. 3 yr old civics cost as much as new. Dealers aggressively try to buy back Civics they sell.

A quick search on my local classifieds section shows a 2006 for $6,000, and a 2008 for $10,000, all the way to a 2011 (with rebuilt title) for $7,500 and everything in between. Used cars are almost always a better choice.

What a refreshing journalistic style. Mostly just the plain quotes from people.

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