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Fiat 500e EV
- Thread starter vfx
- Start date
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- Electric Vehicles
Zapped
Model S - PURE EV
Perhaps it is not a matter of education. Rather personality type.
With a small car, it's a question of risk.
With a small car, it's a question of risk.
gabeincal
Active Member
Bought one yesterday, 2014 11k miles $7k
Very happy with it so far. But god forbid a high speed crash...
Here in So Cal we get some of these 500e down to $5995 and less, but most of the least expensive are lemon law buybacks.Bought one yesterday, 2014 11k miles $7k
jerjozwik
Active Member
at that price its almost worth it to just buy them used, rip out the battery and scrap the rest of the car. surprised the ev conversion market is not picking these up for cheap.
gabeincal
Active Member
You're right, that might start to happen considering the electric part is the solid thing on these Italian/American cars made in Mexico
Also, I hope there will be a lot of tweaking, hacking, etc with these cars at these prices. I hope...
jerjozwik
Active Member
i guess $4,500 will be the tipping point.
2013 Fiat 500E 24 kWh Lithium-Ion EV Electric Vehicle High Voltage Battery | eBay
2013 Fiat 500E 24 kWh Lithium-Ion EV Electric Vehicle High Voltage Battery | eBay
I bought a used Leaf from these guys who had a lot of Leaf's in stock and at great prices. Now they have a bunch of Fiat 500e's. Take a look at how low the prices are!
Fiat Used Cars Auto Brokers For Sale Anaheim Anaheim Pre Owned Cars
Fiat Used Cars Auto Brokers For Sale Anaheim Anaheim Pre Owned Cars
jerjozwik
Active Member
gabeincal
Active Member
I would advise against it. We noticed poor wet weather handling with ours. When we swapped out the tires, it helped some, but still didn't handle freeway driving well on rain soaked asphalt. Our replacement Leaf handles the wind and rain much better. For cold temps, it did average if you blast the heat in below freezing temps. Keep the temp set to the high 60s and use the seat heaters and it's not too bad. We never drove it in snow though, so I can't provide feedback there. I would imaging with the front wheel drive and good snow tires it should be fine.
Also, being a compliance car, the local dealership may not be willing to do any work on it. So if you do decide to go forward, make sure you can verify there's a shop nearby that will service it.
Also, being a compliance car, the local dealership may not be willing to do any work on it. So if you do decide to go forward, make sure you can verify there's a shop nearby that will service it.
gabeincal
Active Member
24 kWh battery and management system from Bosch. They don't even degrade within a couple years... Not a bad idea.
jerjozwik
Active Member
so i emailed evwest, an ev conversion company out of san diego about the 500e. they are currently selling a vast supply of tesla batteries from the smartev. mentioned how the 500e prices are dropping fast and asked if he knew anyone reverse engineering the control box or motor. he mentioned they have sold some to a few people but they dont have it unlocked yet.
Bump...
Anyone leasing one of these tried to negotiate a better deal on the residual on lease return?
@Mrs Rubbertoe has one coming due in March with a $19,000 residual. Since she can buy one from the Anaheim guys for say $8,000, maybe the dealer would sell it to her for close to that versus whatever they end up doing with it?
Not sure who really ends up taking the loss on these kinds of situations.
RT
Anyone leasing one of these tried to negotiate a better deal on the residual on lease return?
@Mrs Rubbertoe has one coming due in March with a $19,000 residual. Since she can buy one from the Anaheim guys for say $8,000, maybe the dealer would sell it to her for close to that versus whatever they end up doing with it?
Not sure who really ends up taking the loss on these kinds of situations.
RT
Generally, when you return a lease, it goes to auction and the leasing company gets the proceeds from that auction. So, in the case of these EVs that have promotional leases to hit certain monthly payment targets, the carmaker's captive finance operation takes the hit and passes the loss to the automaker's consolidated financial statement after offsetting any profits from leasing conventional vehicles.
Toyota has a hard and fast policy that they do not negotiate residuals, so a number of RAV4 EV owners are buying cars on the used market and returning theirs due to the thousands of dollars gap between the used market and their residual. I don't know what FCA's policy is on residuals, but that gap between the used market and the residual is massive and definitely plays into the "we lose X thousands of dollars per car" narrative.
@Mrs Rubbertoe has a 60 mile daily commute, and actually likes the car. It's basically free at $98 per month. If I end up getting a loaded Model 3, she may just lease a new 500e as a commuter car for another 3 years. That makes more sense than buying a used one for $8,000 and risking problems. We switch cars to keep the miles under the lease limit since I have a much shorter commute.
Another possibility is she gets the $35,000 Model 3 to take advantage of the $7,500 tax credit, since if she leased another 500e she would never get a $7,500 discount on a Tesla due to them hitting the 200,000 next year.
It's hard to pass up $99 monthly with no money down, especially when she gets to drive a loaded Model 3 if she can wrestle the keys away from me.
The next Powerball drawing could make the decision much simpler...
RT
Another possibility is she gets the $35,000 Model 3 to take advantage of the $7,500 tax credit, since if she leased another 500e she would never get a $7,500 discount on a Tesla due to them hitting the 200,000 next year.
It's hard to pass up $99 monthly with no money down, especially when she gets to drive a loaded Model 3 if she can wrestle the keys away from me.
The next Powerball drawing could make the decision much simpler...
RT
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Are those deals still around? I checked out the 500e for this reason back when i was in the market, but it didn't seem available at the dealer I went to back in December of 2014.
@Mrs Rubbertoe just checked on this over the weekend. Only catch seems to be that they take the $2,500 State rebate (you end up putting $7,500 down) then get the State rebate. You also need to have a current lease with another company to save $1,000. I'll find out which specific dealer had the $99 and let everyone know.
RT
