Does anyone have experience trying to lease one of these Hyundai Ioniqs with unlimited mileage?
How can the OEM do these? Is this just a compliance car and they are ok taking a loss? Or is there away to actually pencil this out? Does anyone else offer these?
Is there a catch?
Yup, I took one and already have 100k miles on it in the 2 months I have had it 
The catch is this is a limited range vehicle, so there is a limit to how far you can drive a day
So assuming the range is optimistically 80 miles a day, assuming you drove it 80 miles every single day, you would still be limited to 30k miles a year. And we all know nobody would do that, so even the most ardent of drivers would not be able to put more than 15k miles on it … So therefore couriers, livery, uber drivers etc are not likely to use this car…
I am sure if you gave unlimited mileage on a conventional gas engine car at 275 a month, you would go out of business soon since all fleet operators would jump on it and return the car after 3 years with 200k miles on it
This isn’t the first lease to come with unlimited miles. In 2012, the Honda Fit EV leased out with unlimited miles, albeit Honda didn’t reimburse charging costs.
So look at this it this way.
They lease it for the absurd cost of $275 a month for an electric-only car with only 80 mile range. Remember similar cars like the Leaf and Ford Focus electric lease at about half this cost not to mention the Volkswagen E (money-maker or $0 lease)…
They “throw-in” unlimited miles for people to jump on this deal but they well know that no one will use all the miles like @vhooloo said.
Hence if you run the equation it’s better to give someone a promise of “unlimited” miles than to take a bigger hit on discounting the heck out of the car. Smart move by Hyundai to pad profits on the front end and take a tiny little hit on the back-end for miles.
Heck people struggle to use the full 10,000 miles allotted on regular EV-only leases…
I wouldn’t say it’s that difficult to throw that many miles on that car. With sufficient charging infrastructure it’s definitely possible to go on longer road trips with an electric car.
The car does have 110 mi range (not 80 mi) similar to the BMW i3 (which I have), and I’ve seen many people go between DC-NYC only adding an additional 30-60 min to their trip to accommodate DCFC fast charging, which the Ioniq has. This is a great deal for someone on either coast where DCFC fast charging is plentiful, or for someone that has the ability to charge their car either at home or at work.
I’m in Washington DC where charging infrastructure is still so-so, and I’m now debating whether I should have done a 15k lease instead of 12k.
The car actually has 124 miles of epa range and people have been exceeding that range regularly. This car has been on sale in europe for a little while.
Also, it includes charging reimbursement, up to 50000 miles, hyundai covers all fees and tax. Lessor only pays sales tax on monthly payment.
If you drive a lot, it actually makes sense.
Good luck finding one though. A small shipment went to SoCal and they are all gone, waiting for replenishment.
I was throwing in the average number which compensates for temp and range-anxiety. Ie you are unlikely to drive more than 80 miles before trying to figure out where to charge … thereby making it unsuitable for fleet …
True in theory you could run a fleet of these cars if you always knew where to charge at DCFC and do not mind the 1 hour downtime every other hour …
True, but if you’re able to charge both at home and at work (or at a nearby charging station), and you have an 80 mi commute each way, this can save you a lot of money.
I definitely wouldn’t jump on this if I were in the Midwest, but considering these deals are only available in CA (for now) where there’s tons of charging infrastructure this can make a lot of sense.
Nice but how? By driving at 40 mph with the heater turned off?
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The problem of course when we are thinking of cross country travel is that the Bolt/Tesla goes 3 + hours of highway travel on a charge vs the under 2 hours of the IONIQ between charges. Think 90 minutes of driving, 30 minutes of charging.
To me, that 125 miles makes the IONIQ still more of a commuter/2nd car than a Bolt or certainly a Tesla. The 100kW charger is a nice addition but in reality you aren’t going to want to travel long distances here – at least not regularly.
My car is EPA rated for 114 mi and I routinely get 130-140 mi in 50 degree or warmer weather with a 70mph highway commute. Range drops to around 90-100 in winter in 30 degree weather. The Ioniq has an active thermal battery management system like the i3, so I suspect similar performance.
Plus if you really want real-world range, just head over to the FB fan page or one of the car forums where they’re actively discussing the Ioniq.
I agree that stopping to charge sucks, but really if you’re going to take a bathroom break every couple hours while driving, you don’t need the full 30 min to charge all the way back up to full, just enough for the next pit stop. If it’s like the BMW you’re gaining approximately 1.7-2.3% every minute you’re charging as they have similarly sized batteries, and with a faster onboard charger, that number can be higher.
The EV road trip mentality takes a bit of getting used to – it took me a while to get used to it too as it does require a bit of extra planning, but when all you need to do is download an app to your phone and just plan your stops ahead of time in exchange for a ton of savings on gas, why not?
How in the world do you have 100 k miles in 2 months. Did you mean 10k?
http://insideevs.com/todays-hyundai-ioniq-electric-travelled-218-city-miles-on-single-charge-video/
Just saying, it can be done. Not saying this is a great road trip car though, obviously.
I was just kidding. The rest of the post was devoted to explaining how unlimited was not really unlimited.
It’s only limited by the amount of your life you are willing to waste at a charging station ;).
Some extra math on it:
50,000 miles max for reimbursement = 46 miles/day = $63.60/mo reimbursement = $2,289.60 over the course of the 36-month lease
Also is there no residual on this car (lease-only)?
there is a residual apparently.
msrp 36,885 for top of the line one
rv 15,680 (quote i got from a socal dealer)
anyone else have any experience leasing/subcribing one of these?
Definitely not a haggle-free deal going on here like Hyundai is claiming. It appears most dealerships are treating this as a regular lease and only using the $275, $305, $365 price points as mere suggestions. They wanted to charge me $445 a month for what should have been a $305/mo payment. Before walking out, they offered me $341 a month if I put $6,500 at lease signing, then asked me for the highest monthly payment I could do. Walked out immediately after that. Buyer beware, they might waste 4 hours of your time like they did to me.
geez…sorry to hear about your experience. when i called around to see about test driving one of these, i find that all dealers had a wait list of people interested! at least in the socal area. wait list! seriously?
definitely not cool for them to waste your time that way though. it even says on the hyundai website that all dealer fees are included.
which dealership was this btw?
This was Win Hyundai in Carson. It was really disappointing, especially considering I had placed a $1,000 deposit to assure the vehicle was mine for 24 hours after delivery.
Just a reminder that there is another unlimited mileage EV lease available for the Honda Fit EV. And since this is a corporate program I don’t think they will try to bait-and-switch you into a higher payment.