Why Connecticut

Why buy a car from a dealership in Connecticut? To understand why, I will need to take you back to the beginning of 2022. Nancy had been extolling the virtues of an electric vehicle for for quite awhile. After a couple of months, I realized this was no passing fad and I needed to start studying the pros and cons of owning an electric vehicle. I will admit that I was happy with the vehicles we presently owned, but Nancy was sold on the idea of replacing at least one of our vehicles with an electric vehicle.

As I thought about an electric vehicle, I had a number of questions I needed to find an answer to. For instance, where and how do you charge an electric vehicle, what is the range of an electric vehicle, what automobile brands make a reliable electric vehicle, and there were other minor questions that popped up as I began my research. The first and probably the most important question would be, what make/brand of vehicle should we purchase. So, I began to research the following car manufacturers:

• Chevrolet – they were warning their customers not to park one of their electric vehicles in the garage, because there was a risk of fire. No confidence.
• Ford – we previously owned a couple of Ford automobiles, and their motto should have been “Quality is job NONE”. Not again.
• Toyota, Honda, Subaru – didn’t even have an electric vehicle out yet, they are literally stuck in the past.
• Volkswagen – after renting a new Volkswagen a couple of years ago while on vacation, I felt that “The power of German engineering” was no more than being able to cheat on a car’s emission’s test. A horrible riding car.
• Tesla – For me, the elephant in the room. You need to have a respect for the automobile brand you consider to purchase. Elon Musk - don’t need to say anything more. He is one of those rare individuals who can move from California to Texas and raise the quality of life in both states.
• Hyundai & Kia – We have owned two Kia’s and they have been great cars.

We decided to look at both the Kia EV6 and the Hyundai Ioniq5. Nancy liked the looks of the Hyundai Ioniq 5 and I didn’t like the interior of the Kia EV6. So, it was settled, we would look at purchasing an Ioniq5. As I began to look at various California dealers and their inventory I soon realized this would be a little harder than I thought. There was no inventory of new Ioniq5’s and almost all California dealers were asking somewhere from $5,000-$10,000 above MSRP (manufacturers suggested retail price). Those kind of dealer markups are crazy, but it looks like buyers were willing to pay it just to get a new Ioniq5. I also discovered the vast majority of electric vehicles are sold on the East and West Coasts.

I began to look at dealers in Oregon and Washington. Most of the dealers selling at MSRP in these two states were limiting their sales to in-state purchases. I decided to look at the dealers on the East Coast. I found three dealers that were selling Ioniq5’s at MSRP and all three were high volume dealers. Two were in New York and the other was in Connecticut. I perused various electric vehicle forums, other online web sites and all three dealerships came highly recommended. At the time of my research, I decided to choose the dealership located in Connecticut. We contacted the dealer and put down a $3000 refundable deposit. We were now on the list for a Hyundai Ioniq5, the limited version. That was at the end of April.

During the summer and early fall, Nancy would call the dealer to ask about the status of where we were on their list. By August we were now number three on the list. In September, we were number two on the list. Then we got a call from the dealer, the person on the list ahead of us turned down a black model that was arriving and would we want it. YES, we would and we could pick it up that next Saturday. The next few days consisted of getting all the paperwork completed and securing proof of insurance for our new purchase. I flew from Fresno to Phoenix on Friday afternoon and took the red-eye to New York. I arrived at JFK early on Saturday morning and took a shuttle to the dealership.

This is the end of part one, stay tuned for the adventure of driving back to California in part two.