Gen 1 GM Volt Plug-In Hybrid (2011-2015)

[LEAFer]

Yes, I know about the $350 lease they are talking up, but I have to believe there is a catch.

It's worth finding out about or confirming that. Why don't you let them quote you a lease deal ? (Firm, with all the details, just short of a deposit.)

 

[LEAFguy]

Yes, I know about the $350 lease they are talking up, but I have to believe there is a catch.

Here's a quote from this New York Times article:

In Texas, the Volt will first available (sic) only in Austin, and in New York, the car can only be bought in New York City for now, Mr. DiSalle said. (My emphasis)

If the car cannot be leased in New York, perhaps it will not be available for lease in other markets as well. Or, perhaps it was just a poor choice of language by the reporter.

 

[cinmar]

If I had any doubts before about my commitment to the Leaf, they have totally evaporated.

+1

 

[AndyH]

Here's a quote from this New York Times article:

In Texas, the Volt will first available (sic) only in Austin, and in New York, the car can only be bought in New York City for now, Mr. DiSalle said. (My emphasis)

If the car cannot be leased in New York, perhaps it will not be available for lease in other markets as well. Or, perhaps it was just a poor choice of language by the reporter.

GM has already reported that they will only lease the car to folks in the roll-out areas. While folks from other parts of the country can travel to a roll-out area, they can purchase but not lease the car.

 

[planet4ever]

Yes, I know about the $350 lease they are talking up, but I have to believe there is a catch.

It's worth finding out about or confirming that. Why don't you let them quote you a lease deal ? (Firm, with all the details, just short of a deposit.)

At this point I have neither the time nor the inclination. Many, many, years ago my parents taught me that if something seems too good to be true then it almost certainly isn't true. I have avoided a lot of bad deals in my life by following that precept.

 

[LEAFfan]

The Volt is an impostor. It is not an EV. It is a hybrid that only gets 37 EPA mpg when running on PREMIUM gas. A lot of drivers will take the governments $7,500 and run the car on gasoline most of the time. Arizona wasted $100 million+ on alternative fuel cars and many of them are using gasoline.

Check out the following for details on true non-electric mileage and fuel quality:

http://blogs.insideline.com/straightline/2009/11/2011-chevrolet-volt-if-not-230-mpg-then-what.html

http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/ch...t-a-drop-of-premium-gasoline/#comment-1644898

To make it clearer, the AZ legislature is a group of morons...instead of giving the 50% off to DEDICATED cng cars like mine, the Honda Civic GX (bought after they stopped the rebates), they allowed people to buy a regular gasoline (usually an expensive SUV) vehicle at half off the sticker price including 'extras', and all they did was add a teeny little propane tank to their gas guzzler, which would then allow them in the HOV lanes, even though they rarely used the propane. So these selfish and unethical people ruined it (used up all the monies)for the true dedicated cng users. Karma has taken care of 'em! I even testified in front of these idiots for them to just change the wording so as to only include DEDICATED (only cng)vehicles, but they just ended it for ALL vehicles. What a bunch of imbeciles!

 

[LEAFfan]

If I want to place an order, I can come in and put down $500 and get one of the first 11 (he has 3 $500 deposits so far).

Did he ask for anything above MSRP ?

Nope. I asked and he said they would be selling at sticker.
I'm a little surprised he didn't have a longer deposit list. Maybe most want to drive one first.

Maybe that has to do with the high price and the ICE engine? Because it has an ICE, I wouldn't buy it for $20K even if it obtained 100mpg! I'm done with ICEs. And since people are saying that you won't get 100 miles with a LEAF (which I think they are very mistaken), then they won't get any 40 either with the Volt.

 

[evnow]

To make it clearer, the AZ legislature is a group of morons...instead of giving the 50% off to DEDICATED cng cars like mine ...

Wait. They are giving 50% OFF for a cng car - but no one cribbed ?

 

[LEAFfan]

To make it clearer, the AZ legislature is a group of morons...instead of giving the 50% off to DEDICATED cng cars like mine ...

Wait. They are giving 50% OFF for a cng car - but no one cribbed ?

This was in '98, and yes, some people did get their Civics half off (before the state cut off the funding)...it wasn't a tax credit...something similar like in CA...they sent you a check. But, the whole idea was to USE cng or propane, not gasoline, so the unethicals used up most of the monies.

 

[evnow]

This was in '98, and yes, some people did get their Civics half off (before the state cut off the funding)...it wasn't a tax credit...something similar like in CA...they sent you a check. But, the whole idea was to USE cng or propane, not gasoline, so the unethicals used up most of the monies.

I get that - I mean so many people are hyperventilating about subsidies given to EVs, shouldn't there be "free market" types protesting the 50% off ?

 

[planet4ever]

Yes, I know about the $350 lease they are talking up, but I have to believe there is a catch.

It's worth finding out about or confirming that. Why don't you let them quote you a lease deal ? (Firm, with all the details, just short of a deposit.)

At this point I have neither the time nor the inclination. Many, many, years ago my parents taught me that if something seems too good to be true then it almost certainly isn't true. I have avoided a lot of bad deals in my life by following that precept.

I've thought some more about this and I'm convinced there is a catch -- probably two of them:

1. It turns out the monthly lease cost is based on "Net Capitalized Cost", and that is not a constant, even with a given down payment and tax allowance. GM's claim of $350 is, I am sure, based on MSRP - $2500 - $7500. If a dealer sets a price $7500 over MSRP, then the monthly lease payment will go up, by my calculation, about $120!

2. There are only two ways to rationalize a $350 lease, even calculated at MSRP. Either the interest rate (which they like to divide by 24 and call the "money factor") has to be very low or the residual has to be very high. I doubt if the leasing company will buy into a very low interest rate, so my bet is on a high residual, something well above 60%. (Low 50's is typical.) That either means this is a very exceptional car, or only very stupid people will buy at the end of the lease. Instead the customer gets pushed into a permanent car payment cycle.

 

[evnow]

That either means this is a very exceptional car, or only very stupid people will buy at the end of the lease. Instead the customer gets pushed into a permanent car payment cycle.

Subsidized leases are quite common. You can get a Prius for $199, for eg. Since most auto majors own their finance companies they can do that ...

 

[evnow]

Are Republicans using Volt as a proxy to attack Obama ?

http://evworld.com/news.cfm?newsid=23754

President Obama has averted the Bush-Cheney depression, and given the US auto industry a fighting chance. Needless to say, that isn’t the narrative either conservatives or the status quo media want to push right now.

But it’s hard to attack the auto industry directly, especially since it is doing much better than anyone could have expected given overall economic conditions. And so we have that bastion of the status quo media, the Politico, giving Rush Limbaugh a whole story on his “Obama Motors” spiel and nonsense like this, “Limbaugh said the Volt, as well as other hybrid automobiles — such as the Toyota Prius, which sells for roughly $30,000 — are nothing more than an expensive way to promote the environmentalist agenda.”

 

[evnow]

Charged Up and Ready to Roll: Volt vs. Leaf

http://cartalk.com/blogs/jim-motavalli/?p=296&cpage=1#comment-97

Both the Leaf and Volt are probes into the unknown. Neither company will make these battery-based cars in great numbers until they see the market taking off. And if it doesn’t, well they can always go back to what they’ve been doing forever—making gas guzzlers.

 

[AndyH]

I just finished reading "Crash Course: The American Automobile Industry's Road from Glory to Disaster" by Paul Ingrassia which covers the industry thru the GM bankruptcy.

Late in the book the author talks about the decisions about which GM brands to keep and which to dump. The initial plan to to retain Chevy and Cadillac and sell/retire the rest. About GMC:

As for GMC, its trucks were basically Chevrolets with steroidal styling. To Wilson and his task force colleagues, Buick and GMC had become distractions instead of assets.

But we get to the bottom line:

Well, Henderson explained, GMC was "extremely profitable" because it carried more cachet than Chevrolet. "It wouldn't make good business sense," he added, "to try to collapse that into Chevrolet." Put another way, A GMC truck adorned with a macho grille and marketed with country music commercials could be priced thousands of dollars higher than a nearly identical soccer-mom truck from Chevorolet. it was the sort of "badge engineering" that had blurred the differences among too many GM vehicles over the years...

The book goes into the deep details of CEO personalities, board decisions, UAW contracts, retiree plans, and which creditor got what in the bailouts and later in the bankruptcy. Two things that stood out to me with regards to emissions and EVs:

- The CEO of Fiat, speaking with President Obama's Automotive Task Force, outlined his plan for Chrysler and described why they would be a good fit:

Fiat was strong in international markets, he said, but had little presence in the United States, which was Chrysler's citadel. Chrysler had strengths in trucks and SUVs, he added, while Fiat's strong suit was small cars. Without Fiat, Marchionne argued, Chrysler wouldn't meet future fuel-economy requirements under the CAFE law. But to his surprise, the task force members really didn't care. Their mission was to save jobs and the economy, not the environment.

- The only mention of the Volt in 306 pages was during a GM 'dog and pony' show for the Automotive Task Force prior to the bankruptcy and Wagoner's resignation:

GM trotted out an assortment of existing and experimental GM cars for the team to drive, including cars powered by hydrogen fuel cells and the vaunted Chevy Volt. It was exactly the sort of display that GM - and every car company in the world - had used for years to impress board members, Wall Street analysts, and journalists. But this time it backfired.

Despite all the hype and hope heaped on the Volt, Rattner and Bloom found it simply irrelevant to saving General Motors. With its likely $37,000 price tag and sale sprojections of only some ten thousand vehicles over the next three years, the Volt couldn't conceivably help a company that was running out of time. The more Wagoner touted the car, which he did at every turn, the more Rattner and Bloom became convinced he was removed from reality.

A bit later, after the final bunch of meetings, Wagoner was asked to resign.

Rattner was concluding that General Motors might be the worst-managed company he had every seen. Bloom compared it to Bethlehem Steel, the quintessential industrial dinosaur that had collapsed in 2003 due to a cloistered management culture, crushing debt, costly labor contracts, and multiple retirees for every active worker. It had had problems, in short, not unlike GM's.

The Volt was conceived and gestated during a time when GM was losing tons of money and was finally admitting that they had a problem. Instead of doing the difficult work needed to turn their ship around (like Ford), they kept relying on smoke and mirrors and stick-on smiles. That's got to be hard on a 'kid'...

I'm thinking the Volt will be little more than a low-volume showpiece that GM will push aside while they continue to concentrate on vehicles with a better profit margin. They've got more than 30 years of inertia to overcome - that's more than even bankruptcy and a new CEO can easily overcome.

 

[evnow]

I'm thinking the Volt will be little more than a low-volume showpiece that GM will push aside while they continue to concentrate on vehicles with a better profit margin. They've got more than 30 years of inertia to overcome - that's more than even bankruptcy and a new CEO can easily overcome.

I wonder what the new CFO will do. He was in one of my home town companies, Microsoft, when it laid off 5,000 people ...

 

[curtegg]

Their greedy dealerships will be the Volt's undoing.

 

[AndyH]

I wonder what the new CFO will do. He was in one of my home town companies, Microsoft, when it laid off 5,000 people ...

Dunno. Closing plants and laying-off people is a quick way to cut overhead but eventually one or the other runs out and the 'brain surgeons' have to come up with Plan B.

One thing I am absolutely certain of -- I am so very happy that I listened to my 'gut' many years ago and chose NOT to study auto engineering at UofM and then follow my dad to a career with 'Generous Motors'.

Not everyone likes Michael Moore's style, but his movie "Roger and Me" gives a very accurate view of what GM did to Flint Michigan. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0098213/ The biggest thing happening in Flint these days is Habitat for Humanity.

 

[lne937s]

Are Republicans using Volt as a proxy to attack Obama ?

http://evworld.com/news.cfm?newsid=23754

President Obama has averted the Bush-Cheney depression, and given the US auto industry a fighting chance. Needless to say, that isn’t the narrative either conservatives or the status quo media want to push right now.

But it’s hard to attack the auto industry directly, especially since it is doing much better than anyone could have expected given overall economic conditions. And so we have that bastion of the status quo media, the Politico, giving Rush Limbaugh a whole story on his “Obama Motors” spiel and nonsense like this, “Limbaugh said the Volt, as well as other hybrid automobiles — such as the Toyota Prius, which sells for roughly $30,000 — are nothing more than an expensive way to promote the environmentalist agenda.”

I think right-wing talking heads may be using it. The GM bailout is a terrible thing from a conservative ideological standpoint.

However, I doubt you will hear much from the Republican establishment. Ed Whitacre is a key figure in the Texas Republican party, is very close to the Bush family, was a Bush Ranger (top tier fundraiser), McCain fundraiser, and has been a friend of Karl Rove since before W was elected. No doubt this was an Obama compromise to prevent the majority of Republican outrage about the politically unpopular bailout.

 

[lne937s]

Their greedy dealerships will be the Volt's undoing.

Yeah, one California dealer is charging 20,000 above MSRP:

http://blogs.edmunds.com/greencaradvisor/2010/08/think-41000-steep-for-a-chevy-volt-one-dealer-wants-20000-premium.html

Meanwhile some California Nissan dealers are offering $1000 off MSRP to get people ordering through Nissan to select their dealership for delivery. When you add in the $5000 California tax credit, the LEAF comes in at less than half the price some dealers are selling the Volt for.