Hello everyone!
We are in Atlanta and have had our Leaf since July 2017; it's my husband's main commuting car. (In 2014 we leased a Leaf, and when it came time to give it back, I asked him what he wanted to drive next, and he thought about it and said, another Leaf.) It now has about 51K miles. We are very fond of it, but I will be the first to say we have not taken good care of it:
On top of all this, we lost the ninth bar last fall, so we should qualify for a new battery under warranty. So it's possible that the car is actually worth a fair bit more than it looks because it could be getting a shiny new 40 kWh battery. Or there could be not enough shiny new 40 kWh batteries going around and we get something of smaller capacity. I'm not sure; that's part of why I came here.
It's still drivable! (We figured that if the rats had chewed through something crucial, we'd have noticed by now.) It claims to get about 70 miles at 100% charge, though it did turtle unexpectedly on my husband once, and I get worried if I'm on the highway and I'm down to about 20. My husband's commute has changed so it works fine for him as a daily car so long as he doesn't have to run too many errands. So we haven't demanded a new battery yet while we've been figuring out our options.
Which, as I see it, are:
I went on KBB and they gave me a trade-in value of about $8K, but I wasn't sure if that took the battery swap into account. I know from reading around that if I were serious about trading in I should talk to Carvana and get cash offers. My husband is neither emotionally attached* enough to insist on repairs nor chomping at the bit to get a new car. I tried searching this forum and found some threads on repairing or trading in but it sounded like our car was in worse shape, so I thought I'd lay it all out for y'all. I'm happy to give any more information. Thank you so much for your help!
* you are free to laugh, but last year my car (a 2018 Kia Sedona) got sideswiped on the highway and I was almost in tears thinking she'd be totaled. She was not; it took ten weeks and $20K (which my insurance paid for; the other driver ran despite having lost a fair chunk of his car) but she returned to me safe and sound.
We are in Atlanta and have had our Leaf since July 2017; it's my husband's main commuting car. (In 2014 we leased a Leaf, and when it came time to give it back, I asked him what he wanted to drive next, and he thought about it and said, another Leaf.) It now has about 51K miles. We are very fond of it, but I will be the first to say we have not taken good care of it:
- There's a 1-inch or so tear in the front bumper that cannot be repaired, I got an estimate of about $1K to fix (replace) that.
- I accidentally backed into our garage door before it had fully opened, destroying the cover of the light at the top of the rear door and leaving nasty scratches in the roof. That estimate was about $1200 or so to replace. (Those two estimates were last fall; the prices have probably gone up by now.)
- There are other dents here and there; the body shop at the dealership I took it to said it would be about (IIRC) $8K to get it looking absolutely brand new.
- And then we had a rat problem over the winter. I'm not sure how much total damage they did, but what we can see is pretty significant. They chewed through the windshield wiper fluid hose. There's visible damage to the stuffing and cover of the rear seat and chew marks on the plastic in the trunk. That happened after I got the estimates above so I'm not sure how much the total cost of repairs would be now.
On top of all this, we lost the ninth bar last fall, so we should qualify for a new battery under warranty. So it's possible that the car is actually worth a fair bit more than it looks because it could be getting a shiny new 40 kWh battery. Or there could be not enough shiny new 40 kWh batteries going around and we get something of smaller capacity. I'm not sure; that's part of why I came here.
It's still drivable! (We figured that if the rats had chewed through something crucial, we'd have noticed by now.) It claims to get about 70 miles at 100% charge, though it did turtle unexpectedly on my husband once, and I get worried if I'm on the highway and I'm down to about 20. My husband's commute has changed so it works fine for him as a daily car so long as he doesn't have to run too many errands. So we haven't demanded a new battery yet while we've been figuring out our options.
Which, as I see it, are:
- Pay for the major repairs (the front and rear damage, the interior damage, replace the chewed hose), get the battery replaced, and plan to drive it for the immediate future.
- Get the battery replaced, repair only damage that could long-term affect driving, and keep the car in less-than-perfect shape because within 18 months we'll have a 15-year-old who needs to start learning how to drive.
- Trade in or sell the car (presumably to someone who would immediately replace the battery) and get something else, maybe a newer Leaf in better shape.
I went on KBB and they gave me a trade-in value of about $8K, but I wasn't sure if that took the battery swap into account. I know from reading around that if I were serious about trading in I should talk to Carvana and get cash offers. My husband is neither emotionally attached* enough to insist on repairs nor chomping at the bit to get a new car. I tried searching this forum and found some threads on repairing or trading in but it sounded like our car was in worse shape, so I thought I'd lay it all out for y'all. I'm happy to give any more information. Thank you so much for your help!
* you are free to laugh, but last year my car (a 2018 Kia Sedona) got sideswiped on the highway and I was almost in tears thinking she'd be totaled. She was not; it took ten weeks and $20K (which my insurance paid for; the other driver ran despite having lost a fair chunk of his car) but she returned to me safe and sound.