At the end of 7 years, you can expect the car to be worth more than $20k (obviously depends on usage).
That's $17k in present value.
That reduces you're real payment to ~$410/m.
This is way worse for cash-flow. Way worse short-term, and obviously worse long-term, too.
I'm not sure how companies like this can find customers.
Between the 3 groups, the company might be able to find enough customers to make it happen. Given the egregious profit margins baked into their model, they don't even need to find that many to make it happen.
At $20K, the first auto loan calculator I tried estimates a $278 payment, zero down, ignoring resale value.
Unless this service lets you switch EV types at will (sedan, SUV, compact, truck, rivian, etc...), I really don't see the point of paying the startup fee.
Still doesn’t seem worth Autonomy’s prices to me though.
While the deposit is refundable, the start fee doesn’t appear to be. So in 1yr, your total outlay is $16,680 for a $48,600 car. That’s essentially a 3 year payoff + 500 for deposits, and you don’t end up with a car after.
It’s not immediately clear what the advantage is here, I guess unless you can’t qualify for a regular car loan. But the equity cost here is very high.
They claim a loan on this car at 4.25% would cost 1900/mo, but it’s more like 1300. And Tesla financing is as low as 2.9%, which is 1277/mo if you put 4500 down. Those go to 1203/mo and 1178/mo respectively if you put down 7900.
I dunno. Nothing about this seems like a particularly good deal or good for it’s users. They don’t get the tax credits, they don’t get the equity, they just get a more economical rental. It doesn’t even look like there’s a purchase option in the end like a regular lease.
Maybe I’m being cynical here, and I will admit I have never quite understood the appeal of leasing anyway, but this concept just totally escapes me, and the numbers don’t make a good deal of sense to me either.