Is now the right time to swap??

[Danny_F]

Looking at the cost of utilities now and what they will look like in Jan I am wondering if it is the right time to swap out my car?

I am currently driving a BMW 430d, had it from new, get over 600 miles from a 55 litre tank of fuel and it’s been dynoed at over 300bhp so no slouch.

If the price of electricity goes up to what they are predicting, what sort of cost would I be looking at for my 60 mile round trip to work and back? Will it still work out less than what I am paying in diesel?

I’m currently on a variable rate with British Gas for my electricity, have looked at octopus but their website is forever saying I can’t switch and if I am honest I wouldn’t know a good tariff from a bad one at the moment?

What’s peoples thoughts? I don’t know how to work out cost per mile for an EV so hard to compare? I also did an insurance quote last night even though not looking at getting the MY until Nov-Jan and that’s nearly £700 which is double what I’m paying for the 430.

 

[debrooker]

I would not base a decision to switch on financials. If you own ouright your BMW then the cost to change is significant, and how many years of diesel/road tax etc does £50K+ buy you.

Also with electric prices continually going up at the mo, we have reached a point already where there is roughly price parity for cost per mile between a diesel and electric (based on instavolt's 66p/Kw).

Charging at home is still significantly cheaper, but again you need to work out the figures (unless there is some online calc on the interweb to help)

 

[GeorgeSymonds]

The cost per mile for electricity when charging at home is about 1/3 of your kw/h price. It could be better than that but there are also some inefficiencies in charging and vampire drain which people don;t always notice. So, if your tariff is like mine, about 28p kw/h, its about 9p per mile. You get roughly 10 miles per litre of diesel at around £1.80 so 18p a mile. So in theory you can half your fuel bill.

A couple of twists, if you charge in public it can be double that, so it would be the same price. On the other hand, if you loiter around Tesco car parks you can charge for nothing, albeit slowly. I'd err on the "no less than 9p" and probably if electricity goes up higher the gap will close. Your round trip 60 miles might be about £6 cheaper now.

You can usually argue the case both ways, a MY is expensive and its either a lot of cash tied up in one or you're on finance which might get expensive, on the flip side depreciation is low at the moment, but but...

If you're happy with what you have, then I'd probably sit on my hands and see how things pan out for a little while, certainly until the price cap changes are announced. That said, if you ordered one, you can always cancel, and get your deposit back, Tesla tell you its not refundable but they give in quickly when you mention distance selling regulations.

 

[muster39]

Everyone’s situation is different and the best advice will be specific to your own situation. If you are ready or due to change your car then certainly consider an EV if you can charge at home particularly at cheaper rates. If it’s a company vehicle then you also get much lower benefit in kind rates than ICE vehicles. I’m currently driving a MY LR and on Intelligent Octopus tariff which allows me to charge between 11.30pm and 5.30am at 7.5p per kWh. According to the vehicle I have driven around 4500 miles since new at an average of 255 Wh/mile.

 

[init6]

Looking at the cost of utilities now and what they will look like in Jan I am wondering if it is the right time to swap out my car?

I am currently driving a BMW 430d, had it from new, get over 600 miles from a 55 litre tank of fuel and it’s been dynoed at over 300bhp so no slouch.

If the price of electricity goes up to what they are predicting, what sort of cost would I be looking at for my 60 mile round trip to work and back? Will it still work out less than what I am paying in diesel?

I’m currently on a variable rate with British Gas for my electricity, have looked at octopus but their website is forever saying I can’t switch and if I am honest I wouldn’t know a good tariff from a bad one at the moment?

What’s peoples thoughts? I don’t know how to work out cost per mile for an EV so hard to compare? I also did an insurance quote last night even though not looking at getting the MY until Nov-Jan and that’s nearly £700 which is double what I’m paying for the 430.

No-one buys a £50k+ car to save money. If money-saving is your objective buy a small second hand car. Here are the sums based on MY use of a model 3. I tend to do much shorter daily journeys so your figures will be a little different, as will the slightly different model:

Your car does 600 miles on 55 litres of diesel at £1.99 per litre = 5.48 miles per £ or 18.24p per mile
My M3 does 288Wh/mi net which is 3.742 miles per kWh. Average home electricity cost is 30p per kWh (soon to go up though) which is 8.64p per mile

However EV's lose some of their power when they are just sitting there. The battery supplies power to the electronics, the alarm and sentry mode. So Gross power usage for me has been 336kWh giving 10.8p per mile.
But there's more. The power that goes into the battery is usually less than the amount that is used by the charger - losses in the charging circuit cable resistance etc. Most public chargers with the exception of Superchargers, make you pay for the amount of electricity you use. Tesla only charge for what goes into the car. When I last checked on this loss it was around 11%, so that brings the cost of a mile to 11.18p

So would you spend £50k+ to save around 7p per mile? Probably less as I think the MY is more power hungry and my usage of the car is fairly lightweight.

 

[NC1584]

I'm in the exact same predicament with a 2016 430d and a MYLR on order. I'm very interested in how you're getting 600 miles out of a tank as I'm more like 500/40mpg - but that's for another day.

For me the comparative cars are pretty much cost neutral on the monthly non-usage costs (finance, insurance, servicing etc) with a potential likely saving generated on fuel. So my rationale to myself (and the other half) is a newer, more practical car that is either likely to be cost neutral or generate a £50-£150pm saving.

 

[roadcred]

There are so many more savings by going electric. Having an EV lets you explore new electricity tariffs which will reduce the rest of your power bills for your house. There are no maintenance costs, no road tax, no congestion charge, cheaper parking in enlightened authorities, no stinking petrol/deisel, no oil drops on your drive, less noise for you and your neighbours, negative depreciation (over 3 years since we went electric our vehicles have appreciated. The savings and lifestyle changes are so much more than the straight cash although that is also still a win.

 

[debrooker]

You still need to pay for the car, so no matter what savings you make on running the car, you are looking at a loooong payback period.

Residuals crazy as they are, will not stay like this forever - you only need to look outside your window to see how many M3s are on the road

 

[Jason71]

I’m currently on a variable rate with British Gas for my electricity, have looked at octopus but their website is forever saying I can’t switch and if I am honest I wouldn’t know a good tariff from a bad one at the moment?

No one wants new customers right now but I don't think they can actually refuse. You just have to call them.
current go rates near me are:

40p per KWH may look like a lot for a day rate but in a few weeks it might seem like a bargain and this is fixed for a year
and even at that rate. as an EV user doing 10-15K miles I manage to cram 40 -50% of my electricity usage into my night rate so on these prices I would still be under the current price cap as an average p/kwh let alone what it will go up to in a few weeks.
So for me if I needed to re-sign now I would still take this over the variable 28p price cap rate rate.

 

[pdk42]

It’s certainly a more nuanced financial decision than it was back in 2019 when I decided to swap my lovely f31 335i for a Tesla. Back then the car was about 20% cheaper than it is today and there was a decent government purchase grant. Electricity was 5p/kWh at home off peak and 13p peak; and most super chargers were around the 24p/kWh mark. But even today, if you can do most of your charging at home, it’s still a better deal with electric.

But all the domestic electricity price indicators are pointing upwards, perhaps by a significant amount, whilst forecourt prices seem to have stabilised, and since these are such a visible and sensitive price point for the government, I think there will be pressure to keep them under the £2/litre level. But EVs are about more than the running costs. It’s an important step to reducing our reliance on fossil fuels and they are much cleaner so far as air quality is concerned. This may not matter much to you , but it matters to some.

 

[Jason71]

You still need to pay for the car, so no matter what savings you make on running the car, you are looking at a loooong payback period.

Residuals crazy as they are, will not stay like this forever - you only need to look outside your window to see how many M3s are on the road

residuals for EV's will be better than ICE from now on. Maybe not at the current levels but still better

only 2% of used cars are EV's but there are a lot more than 2% of used car buyers looking for an EV and this trend will continue.
Only 15-20% of new cars are EV's right now so in 3 years time only 15-20% of 3year old cars for sale will be be EV's? Do you think more or less than 15-20% of buyers of 3 year old cars will want an EV? I do. which means there will be more buyers than cars which will make it a sellers market.

 

[TheSmithers]

Everyone’s situation is different and the best advice will be specific to your own situation. If you are ready or due to change your car then certainly consider an EV if you can charge at home particularly at cheaper rates. If it’s a company vehicle then you also get much lower benefit in kind rates than ICE vehicles. I’m currently driving a MY LR and on Intelligent Octopus tariff which allows me to charge between 11.30pm and 5.30am at 7.5p per kWh. According to the vehicle I have driven around 4500 miles since new at an average of 255 Wh/mile.

Sorry to digress from the thread topic slightly, but how come you have a 6 hour window at the cheaper rate, where I only have 4, from 0030 to 0430? Is that the difference between the Go tariff (which I'm on) and the Intelligent tariff? Or perhaps you've been with them longer and have built up some loyalty bonus or something?

 

[munkypuzel]

40p per KWH may look like a lot for a day rate but in a few weeks it might seem like a bargain and this is fixed for a year
and even at that rate. as an EV user doing 10-15K miles I manage to cram 40 -50% of my electricity usage into my night rate so on these prices I would still be under the current price cap as an average p/kwh let alone what it will go up to in a few weeks.
So for me if I needed to re-sign now I would still take this over the variable 28p price cap rate rate

Jason,

I literally switched to that this morning - it will go live next week. My Model Y is currently half of my electricity usage - so I will be paying roughly 24p kw for the next 12 months fixed. That cannot be ignored with what WILL happen in the coming months...

 

[C225]

You can switch to octopus if you call them, but unless you have a compatible smart meter already then there is a wait to get on installed if your lucky on the variable tariff or unlucky one of the expensive fixes for an indefinite amount of time.

I tried to switch but as i have an older smart meter they won't replace it with a new one they only replace dumb meters with smart meters apparently, so come October i'll be paying 52p/kWh even at home until e.on decide to reintroduce their smart ev tariff. I can see me parking my car for hours at a time at the few remaining free chargers near me for a while

 

[debrooker]

Jason,

I literally switched to that this morning - it will go live next week. My Model Y is currently half of my electricity usage - so I will be paying roughly 24p kw for the next 12 months fixed. That cannot be ignored with what WILL happen in the coming months...

Same here changed today to Octopus (call them), fixed 39p electric, variable gas (don't use much) for 12 months. Even at 39p with my usage its cheaper than my flat 28p

 

[Jason71]

Same here changed today to Octopus (call them), fixed 39p electric, variable gas (don't use much) for 12 months. Even at 39p with my usage its cheaper than my flat 28p

We also schedule the dishwasher, washing machine, tumble drier charge the lawn mower etc during the window. Mine is 20:30-23:30. I have not yet convinced the family that 21:30 is a great time to have tea but I am working on it.....

 

[init6]

I have not yet convinced the family that 21:30 is a great time to have tea but I am working on it.....

Have you thought about changing all the clocks in the house?

 

[Jason71]

Have you thought about changing all the clocks in the house?

Not sure the smart meter will fall for that

 

[muster39]

Sorry to digress from the thread topic slightly, but how come you have a 6 hour window at the cheaper rate, where I only have 4, from 0030 to 0430? Is that the difference between the Go tariff (which I'm on) and the Intelligent tariff? Or perhaps you've been with them longer and have built up some loyalty bonus or something?

Have a look at this link. The Intelligent tariff only works with some EVs and Octopus can control the charging period. In return you get 6 hours of the cheaper rate. So I use this to top up my solar battery during the night, probably more useful in the winter than the summer.

 

[init6]

Not sure the smart meter will fall for that

No, but the family might