I’m looking to get an electric car. I currently live in a manufactured home (basically a single family house) and it already has a 120v outlet in the carport and adding a 240v outlet shouldn’t be hard. Charging would be easy and cheap.
That said, I am 34, still living with my mom, so I need to move eventually. Despite years of trying to get a home in LA, I’ve failed so far and the only thing I could afford to get would be an apartment style condo or simply an apartment. It’s been a few years but I didn’t notice many chargers a few years ago when I looked at complexes. Not sure how it is now.
Are people that live in multifamily homes able to get charging done at home these days? Do they have to rely on public charging? How expensive is fast charging compared to gas prices? I’m curious before I pull the trigger on getting an electric car.
Homes, whether multifamily or single family get charging done at the garage, or where-ever is closest to the breaker-box. Fast charging is cheaper than gas in Los Angeles.
For a Tesla Model 3 that replaced my old car that gets 25mpg driven over my work commute. It’s can be a quarter less. Gas has been $5+ most of the year. That’s $5 for 25 miles or 20 cents a mile on gas. My Model 3 over 3k miles same work commute averaged 215 watts per mile or 4.65 miles per 1kw. 1kw electricty at home is between ~25-30 cents, but peak 5pm-8pm is 60cents per kw. That’s 5-13 cents on electricty. If you are wise, you charge off peak and you let the car do the work by enabling off-peak scheduled charging and plug in sometime before you sleep.
If you are really cheap, Tesla charging has been as low as 11 cents and pretty frequently at different locations but always between early morning hours. Just like gas, their pricing changes at different locations and cheaper average tends to be mid 20 cents off peak. If you are even cheaper free charging is available out here, but nearly all are slower level 2. Slow as in think 10% every hour.
The biggest issue you’ll run into is probably insurance. My 1st quote just adding the new car to my existing policy myself online and reducing my old car to lowest until it sold was x3! Tesla Insurance was much more reasonable. It wasn’t until later when I called to remove my old car that they quoted me something that was closer to x2.
In your case, I wouldn’t recommend unless you can get free charging at work or can lock in a quote that your insurance is affordable once you buy.
You should only get an EV after you have your charging situation figured out. Owning an EV is too different of an experience to owning an ICE car and you don’t want to just jump into it without doing your research. Monetarily speaking, you’re not saving much if at all on fueling if you’re going to depend on superchargers alone. Add to that the increased time spent charging and frequency (due to lesser range compared to ICE cars) and you might have a very frustrating time.
You’re still saving if you have to rely on superchargers. No vehicle maintenance as compared to gas too.
Gas Fuel: At $5/gallon assuming 30 mpg your cost per mile is $0.17
Superchargers at $0.50/kwh (will run a tesla for 4.56 miles): $0.11/mile
That’s my fear. I played with charging with a plug-in hybrid while my car was in the shop. I didn’t actually get to charge it much. But I know it’s an area thing and that it’s slow to charge. Level 2 for 2-3 hours would give me 20 miles or so while an EV would give me more. So I wonder how different it is for pure electric.
Most EV’s should charge 40%-50% in 3 hours, on a level 2 charger. That should get you far more than 20 miles of range. More like 125-150 miles.
my apartment put in chargers, the whole chain did. I see more and more everyday and I live in what’s supposed to be the 2nd worst state for electric cars.
If you are relying on fast charging, I would consider how often you will do it, like how many miles you fix to go. This way you can plan out when you want to charge, or if you are lucky, they will be at a supermarket, target, or walmart. Spend a half hour a week getting groceries and charge at once. Now you are only making one trip, while gassers are doing 2.
I’ve seen some apartment complexes that already have chargers installed. I would just look for that and check out the parking situation (if they’re regularly accessible or always taken up at night) by driving by on a random night. Best situation of course would be to buy a place with an attached garage, then you can just instal your own in your own garage.
Fast charging in California is going to be a lot of charging at peak time (between 5 and 10 pm) and you will spend something close to what you would spend on gas for a fuel efficient car. Of course, if you get a Tesla, you will have a car with the speed of a sports car (yes, the base model 3 is not that fast, so think of it as fast as a cheaper and sporty car from the 80s; 0 to 60 in under 6 seconds is a pretty fast car) at a running cost of an economy car. So it isn’t all bad.
My building doesn’t have any charging options (not even a standard wall outlet). I’m fully EV, a 2023 Tesla Model 3 RWD and a 2016 Nissan Leaf SV.
I charge either at the Level 2 charger across the street or a 10 min drive away where there’s a Tesla Supercharger station and Chademo stall in close proximity.