The withering dream of a cheap American electric car

Quite a few $20k ish, though only the Forte actually making it under that. Forte LX starting at $19,900.

Of course that's without without the $1,155 "destination" fee, so even the Forte really starts at $21,145.

But considering inflation, $21k isn't a bad price.

We need laws that ban these junk fees. Any advertised price should be one I can get when I walk in.

I cannot get the car without registration. I cannot get the car without 'destination' fee.

Bake it into the price.

Registration cost is too variable. Varies by state, and even by city.

You'd say someone would build an API to retrieve that information by city. But I would not be surprised that the product seller can't be bothered inserting that information into their sales flow.

The destination fee isn't really a "junk" fee. it's variable based on how far away from the plant that manufactured your car or, or the distance from nearest port of entry. Delivering a car isn't cheap. There's certainly some level of arbitrage going on, but the delivery driver is usually independent of the dealership.

The dealership knows ahead of time how far they are from the plant and how much it costs to ship the car. GP was asking that the fee be included in the advertised price. That's fair.

Just ask the dealer to compute the out the door price. It really isn't that difficult and certainly doesn't require yet another stupid regulation!

So instead of easily comparing prices online, now you have to call dealers individually and ask them to compute the out the door price? Which they already know and could post online themselves?

This is exactly the kind of problem regulations are meant to solve. Preventing false advertising and bringing information to all market participants make the market more efficient.

So compute and post some defaults? At least the state and city that the dealership is located in?

Okay, so build the API, and now customers will need to enter their locality before they can see the advertised price. It won't be a popular decision.

Sure, add that to the list of disclaimers in the small print so that the customer from the next town over will have something to reference when the dealer cannot sell them the car for the advertised price.

The problem is that cars are not treated like most other commodities. E.g. You don't have to buy a license to use a microwave or register it with the government. The closest analog is if you live somewhere with sales tax.

They'll have to know your address in order to accurately tell you the OTD price. Are you willing to give that information to every dealer you're querying about price?

There are also choices you can make during the registration process that will change the costs a bit. Quoting a fixed price for that would require yet more small print disclosing that certain choices were made.

I just don't see how it works out. Registration costs money. Not just when you buy the car, but over and over and over throughout the time you own it. You should know this as a driver. Further, the registration cost does not vary by dealer, so you don't need to know it in order to negotiate the best price.

Such regulations are pro-market, too (not pro-business, in the sense of being something business owners will be thrilled about—confusing the two is a common error). Increasing price transparency is supposed to be a way to improve market efficiency.

> add that to the list of disclaimers in the small print

Correct. Instead of a vague "registration fees may apply" disclaimer now there's a "registration fees assuming <city>, <state>" disclaimer. It's definitely not worse for anyone, and is arguably better for the customers who will register in <city>, <state>. That's a green light for a utilitarian.

I didn't say pro-business. I'm sure dealerships won't like it.

> Are you willing to give that information to every dealer you're querying about price?

Dealerships generally get your name and phone number if you call them to ask about the price including fees and taxes. If you make them post defaults online, they get nothing from you. Clearly better.

> There are also choices you can make during the registration process that will change the costs a bit.

I'm curious about this. Do you have some examples?

Besides GP is also talking about things like the shipping fee, which are decidedly not variable or unknown. The dealership knows how much it costs them to ship the car from the factory and how much they want to charge you. They just choose not to disclose it.

> Dealerships generally get your name and phone number if you call them to ask about the price including fees and taxes. If you make them post defaults online, they get nothing from you. Clearly better.

I email, not call, and I lie. About my name, phone number, all of it. Best they will ever get is zip code. They could post defaults, but then I still don't know the actual OTD price -- it's already a hassle today because I have to be aware that dealers will advertise discounts that are only available in-state, and only mention that detail in the small print. I live in a metro that spans two states so this is common.

> I'm curious about this. Do you have some examples?

My state has a plethora of plate designs, and how much you pay depends on which you pick (it's really just a scheme for getting more revenue, of course). I can also choose (dependent on the vehicle, not all qualify) to pay for an extended registration period.

> They just choose not to disclose it.

I agree that they should disclose it. And they are required to by law. It's on the Monroney sticker, and it is included under "Total MSRP".

The destination fee is baked into the price in my experience. I recently priced used vs new cars, and every new car had the destination fee embedded in the advertised price. Customizing a car on the Kia website included the destination fee. No dealership in my metro tacked on an additional destination fee. The destination fee was line-itemed for total MSRP on the window sticker.

The dealer should do that. However the manufacture cannot do that - they are advertising to people all over the country - some of live next to the factory and some who live across the continent.

And yet the destination fee is the same no matter where you are. If you buy a Chrysler Pacifica in Detroit, 15 miles from the assembly plant, you get to pay the same $1595 destination fee as someone 2000 miles away in Los Angeles.

Since the fee doesn’t actually reflect anything related to cost of delivery, it’s hard to see it as anything other than hiding part of the MSRP so that they can lie about cheaper prices in advertisements.