Considering getting a PHEV - anyone happy with theirs?

@kirving - "Versus an i4, it's €12k cheaper. Admittedly a different driving experience, but the target market is similar for both. To save €12k in fuel over 3 years"

The sums are very different than that. Fuel is only one aspect. The depreciation on a 330e will be far higher than on a base i4. I'd say the total cost of ownership over say 3 years will be similar enough if you do average miles, or cheaper in case of the i4 if you do above average mileage. While you have a far superior and far faster car that doesn't pollute at the tailpipe.

No brainer. But the other way around ;-)

Im in ireland. Public charging is irrelevant to 99% of your journeys (charge at home). And even for the 1 % you can easily get a fast charge now for pittance. The best thing charging stations did was charge a high price for fast charging. I meant to mention that was for EV's. PHEV's are the worst of both worlds.

Yes so many ski resorts and mountains in Ireland.

I had an similar use case to you and went with an Outlander PHEV. Suits us perfectly - 90% of driving is on electric and I probably only fill up once every 4-6 weeks.

Would have preferred an electric and might have found one to suit but at the time of purchase any electric in our price range was either old and had high mileage/low range or too small. Any decent electric car that was big enough and had a decent range was about 20k extra

For that low regular mileage, apart from weekend trips the PHEV won't save you much money. If I was buying new I'd buy a bev but in reality in your usage case I'd probably just buy a second hand petrol.

You need to be doing close to the ev range each day on a PHEV for them to make sense, and ideally only the odd longer spin.

As @whippet said though, the gap is actually much more than €12k. Probably not the absolute fairest of comparisons, but it's not apples and oranges either. Maybe lemons and oranges going by my 330e experience...

I haven't looked at BMW finance numbers either of course, but even saving €6k on fuel over 3 years, the depreciation calculation to cover the remainder is still a bit of an unknown IMO.

The second hand market right now I don't think is indicative of what 2025 might be, for ICE, PHEV or EV.

EV is likely to do better absolutely, but new models coming every day, battery deg concerns (true or not), inevitable higher energy costs and EV taxes, and an artificially inflated second hand market now are skewing perspectives across the EV market. Overpriced second hand ICE have a cliff to fall off too. I just can't see it as sustainable when new car production catches up to demand.

Would you lose €14k less on an i4 than a 330e? Unlikely IMO. Again, different cars and I'd take the i4 personally, money no object - as many people do!

In any case, for the OP, if they go EV, then fantastic, but PHEV does have a place in the market currently, given their similar purchase cost/power/potential fuel savings vs ICE.

I think people get a bit single mined about the cost difference between an EV and the PHEV or ICE equivalent

There's other ways that an EV saves money which need to be considered. Not having to spend a fortune on petrol gives you a bit more breathing space in your monthly bills.

Maybe you take those savings and start paying off debts early, or invest in solar which enables you to save more

Maybe you combine all those savings to pay off your mortgage early, and maybe after all that you could save lots of money and retire early 😁

Or just spend it all on pizza and beer, it's up to you 😂

My point is that even if the savings on an EV might be a bit dubious over the lifetime of the car, it can enable more profitable saving methods later

As you can see from the replies, not really. With a relatively big range BEV in Ireland you can do almost all your trips without charging. In some of them you can do Dublin to Galway and back to Dublin in good conditions. But you couldn't go from Amsterdam for a weekend skiing in the Alps. If you don't have a Tesla, the fast charging network in your area of Europe could be relatively poor in which case a PHEV might be a better choice, particularly if your budget is limited and you wouldn't be able to afford a Tesla with its super reliable supercharging network, or another long range BEV

In Ireland, a BEV is almost always the better choice as there simply are almost no 1000km+ trips anyone ever does here in a day

Does anyone buy an EV to help reduce their carbon footprint. Seems like its hardly ever mentioned.

Walking the kids to school earlier and the smell of fumes is horrible

Would be healthier to hop in the car.

Personally my reasons for going EV would be more along the thinking of ICE just isn't necessary for me anymore. When I do change the 330e it will be replaced by a premium EV of some description which will have a decent range (as will probably change it in 2024 or 2025).

In terms of being better for the environment - that is a bonus for me really. I do see myself cringing anytime I see a little puff of smoke out of the back of a car outside the school when I'm collecting and I don't miss that early morning cold rattle when I was turning the ignition in my diesel moto

With your very low daily mileage during the week and long commutes at weekends you should consider something like a low mileage 2018 or 2019 Skoda Octavia, Skoda Suberb or Audi A4 petrol of course. Buying new whether ICE or EV is madness, the saving by buying used is massive and will more that make up for the little extra the petrol will cost. (Saving could exceed €25,000 !) A well cared for Vag car or similar has a lifespan of up to 20 years, compare that with the over hyped and grossly overpriced EV's, PHEV's etc. Perhaps in 10 years time when EV's become more mainstream and charging infrastructure becomes prolific, like today's petrol filling stations, things may change.

The upfront cost of the car is almost always more, so you're either spending savings, borrowing, or paying more on PCP. So until you've hit that break-even point, the EV is costing more money, even if it feels like less money. But overall I get your point, how you finance the car is very important in managing day to day cashflow.

There are of course many more advantages to an EV than cost alone, but it's a primary motivator for many buyers and proponents, myself included if the maths work out. For many buyers though, they just don't do the mileage or have the journey type to make appreciable fuel savings to offset the upfront cost vs a PHEV. For the majority of EV buyers, a PHEV would still cover the majority of their journeys on EV mode and have a low cost ICE to carry them once a month on a long trip.

Almost all cars sit parked for 90% of their lives, which is bad enough for an ICE, but I don't like to see 80kWhr worth of batteries sitting on the drive way that are charged maybe once a week. The day my journeys suit an EV, and it works out for me cost wise, I'm buying one.

Phev are not the worst of both worlds, they work for some people.

They do. But in Ireland that would be a tiny minority. The vast majority of new PHEV buyers of the last few years whose use case I was given details of, could have and should have gone BEV. Most realise this after a while but of course buyer's remorse is hard to admit, even to oneself.

IMO you can either get an EV which is reasonably priced or has a decent range, but you can't get both. Without range you are at the mercy of the charging network which isn't great - and that's the gap that PHEV vehicles are plugging at the moment