Toyota discounts RAV4 EV for extra $5000 + $2500

Toyota might wait until the next gen Rav4 is out for other states to get an EV, and the Tesla one is just a stop gap for California. But that goes against their statements about the iQ EV and EVs in general.

 

Advertising is VERY expensive. If you only need to sell a few thousand cars it is cheaper to take $7,500 off the price than to buy lots of TV ads.

On the other hand if you want to sell 100,000 cars the TV ads are cheaper.

 

Sure TV advertising is very expensive, but perhaps if they did targeted online advertising, that might be a lot cheaper.

 

First thing the average car buyer will see is - 103 mile range, $49k price and do an about face. Let's see how many they sell even with all the incentives.
Will be very interesting to see how Model S sells over time.

 

some things…
–as we've covered with PiP, the $5000 cash back is probably subvention cash on TFS financing and cannot have a residency requirement
–$2500 CVRP rebate is obviously CA-specific
–RAV4 EV is available for delivery today; when are you going to get a 40 kWh Tesla S? In a year, maybe?
–out of state purchasers would obviously need to buy the car in CA and then ship and/or drive it to their home

 

Believe CARB states it will do whatever it takes to encourage EV quotas in CA, so I presume we are looking at EV as the only vehicles allowed in HOV at some future date? That oughtta get some sales.

Meanwhile states like CO and WVa give up to $7500 state credits so RAV4 EV looks like $27500 in WVa if you can buy in CA and get the CA+WV credits. One WV buyer got a NY PiP for $15.5K after credits so that gives you idea.

 

Oh no. Twinge of buyer's remorse at this news. I love my new PIP but I was *really* tempted by the RAV4 EV. I just couldn't justify the price, but with this discount ... ah well ...

 

^^^
I don't like how they ran they test. They shouldn't be adding values from the DTE/GOM (guess-o-meter) back. The Leaf's GOM is all over the place and there's sometime range left even after the GOM stops displaying a value and changes to ---. They should've taken each car to turtle mode, or its equivalent.

 

I think Toyota just added another $1000 to the package, for a total of $6000 toyota rebate.

 

Yep. I see $6K rebate AND 0% financing at
Toyota Dealerships - New & Used Car Deals & Special Offers | BuyAToyota.com
right now for 95136 zip code.

At My Nissan Leaf Forum • View topic - 2013 Jan Plugin Sales Discussion : Volt 1,140 ; Leaf 650, we've been discussing sales. Sales of the Rav4 EV last month were shockingly bad, at 25. They need to sell ~72/month to meet their goal of 2600 over 3 years. OTOH, I don't think they've ever met that or they only met/exceeded that once.

 

too bad TFS won't do a lease with the rebates and tax incentives baked in like ALLY. By putting the $6000 into the TFS financing they are blocking other banks from being able to do the lease.

 

Oh!!! I hadn't thought of that.

That explains why Toyota lists it that way and says "Bonus Cash must be applied to the transaction and available only with Special 0% APR through TFS."

 

January 2013 Plug-In Electric Vehicle Sales Report Card
"Toyota RAV4 EV: Unlike with the Prius plug-in, Toyota has a bit of a problem getting people to buy its Tesla-sourced electric conversion of the RAV4.
For January 25 all-electric SUVs were sold.
Late in 2012, Toyota slashed the MSRP on the RAV4 EV by as much as $7,500 to spur sales, however the program was not that big of a success as Toyota ended up still only selling 52 RAV4 EVs in December before trailing off even further this month." Toyota Discounts The RAV4 EV By Up To $7,500 And Offers 0% To Gain ZEV Credits

 

Toyota is giving more incentive to drive one off their lot. And no more confusing $5k +$2.5k thing this time around.

$7k + 0% for 60 month until 3/4

 

What was so confusing before? The 2.5k was from CVRP, not TFS. So if TFS is giving 7, you get a total of 7+2.5+7.5=$17k off the $50k price.
That's the price of a base pip.

 

It was confusing because before it was $5K and $2.5K "EV loyalty cash" (My Nissan Leaf Forum • View topic - Official Toyota RAV4 EV Thread). I later found out that $2.5K was supposed to go to current owners of the previous gen Rav4 EV only. It seemed like some folks were able to get it anyway by just owning another Toyota. Not sure if they just gave it to them out of goodwill.

Also, at one point, it was $7.5K off (I even posted about it at My Nissan Leaf Forum • View topic - Official Toyota RAV4 EV Thread) but then it got quickly changed to just $7K off.

 

If I had no common sense I'd jump on this car. But having a pip and a grand total of one person in the household, it would be pretty difficult to justify a purchase now lol.

 

With the incentives, I was seriously considering getting one, until I found out they refuse to service it outside of CA. That and not putting it into the new model seem like big mistakes. Of course they may not actually care if they sell very many of them, since they may not be making any money on them.

 

Yes if I lived in California, I might buy one, even though I don't like the form factor of the rav4. I would not touch it here unless Toyota was planning on servicing it locally. I don't think Toyota marketing did a good job on this one. The current price and features should make it a sell, but what I'm sure adopters in California are hearing loud and clear from Toyota corporate is that their EVs are not ready for the real world. They need to change the messaging, and that hit piece that I think they sold to reuter's definitely hurts RAV4 sales. They have plenty of time to change corporate messaging invest in a little PR, and maybe roll the vehicle to some states that actually want it.