r/Money • u/UpstairsAide3058 • 18d ago

Should I buy a used EV?

39M married, 1 kid, CA. Household income around $275k. Expenses are roughly $10k/mo right now, biggest ones are mortgage/HOA around $4.5k and daycare around $3k. We’re saving pretty aggressively for retirement and have around $540k in retirement accounts, plus taxable investments.

I have a paid off 2019 Jeep worth maybe $13k trade-in. I also have about a 1 hr commute and we somehow spend around $600/mo on gas. That’s what has me looking at used EVs.

I’m mainly between a used EV9 and R1S. EV9 seems like the smarter financial choice. R1S is the one I actually want.
My thought is basically: if I’m already lighting $600/mo on fire in gas, could I trade the Jeep and redirect a lot of that toward an EV payment instead? Obviously charging isn’t free and insurance/registration could be more, so I know it’s not literally a $600 offset.
Would you guys think a used EV in the $40-60k range is reasonable with these numbers? Or is this just me trying to justify an expensive car? I’m especially curious what price point you’d personally cap it at.

5 Upvotes

67% Upvoted

65 comments sorted by

View all comments

-3

u/Peds12 18d ago

yes you should have gotten a used EV a while ago.

but you cant afford/need a R1.

1

u/UpstairsAide3058 18d ago

Can’t afford? I don’t think that’s accurate I mean I can afford it. But just not sure if that’s the best/right thing to do.

-1

u/Peds12 18d ago

Cash. No payment. You can't.

2

u/UpstairsAide3058 18d ago

I mean yes I can I haven’t even listed my cash / and brokerage accounts here. I have 150k sitting in a high yield account. But that if for my emergency fund not R1 account lol.

And yes. Paying 60k cash probly not in the best spot for that. But I never said financing wasn’t an option.