Have You Ordered Your Free Car?

Well Have You?  Did you know you could get a free car?  I did.

Would you like to know how?

Like many things, the answer is simple, but not easy.  

Currently auto companies are under legal mandates to sell a number of zero emissions cars.  Electric and Natural Gas are the two energy sources that fit this bill in California.  There is also a mandate on Electric car sales.

Tesla, as a 100% electric car manufacturer, isn't making money selling cars, rather they are about to announce a profit because they sell electric car credits to manufacturers who don't yet make electric cars or who don't sell enough on their own.  

So how does this help you get a free car?

Chevy needs to sell Volts.  Honda needs to sell electric Fits, and Nissan needs to sell the Leaf.  For whatever reason people aren't buying so rebates are flowing.

With the rebates you can lease a base model of any of these cars for $0 down and $299 a month for 36 months.  That is a total of $10,764 to drive the car for three years.  If you have the income, Uncle Sam will give you a $7500 tax credit.  That leaves $3264 out of your pocket over 36 months.  The state of California will rebate $1500, and you can get another $1500 to add a charger to your house.  Now you are down to $264 plus the charger.  

Honda is now including the charger, and the dealer kicked back the $264 to make the deal work when I picked up my Volt.  

There you have it, a car for three years that doesn't cost me anything.

It gets better.  Charging at home the Volt runs about $2.00 for 40 miles, half the price of gasoline if you get the 38-40 mpg most are getting when they run gas.  My record is 60 mpg on gas, and my monthly savings on "energy", that is my new combined gas and electric bill are $300 a month less than they were before I got the Volt.

My Volt is money in my pocket.  What are you driving?

Follow up note: You have to be careful when you lease a Volt, the dealer can take the $7500 Federal Tax credit and build it into the lease without telling you.  When you lease a car, the leasing agency is the first owner and normally gets the tax credit.  Electric Cars can have the Tax credit assigned in certain circumstances.  So watch your paperwork and talk to your tax advisor.