HN Reader

There are 2 big factors at play:

1. Margins. Manufacturers make huge margins on expensive vehicles and very slim margins on cheap vehicles. The numbers differ, but I think even in the lead up to the 2008 crisis automakers had to sell 5-10 "econobox" cars to make the profit they made on one luxury car, SUV, or truck.

2. Normalization of debt. For many Americans, having a monthly car payment in perpetuity is considered acceptable. Car loans have their place and can be used responsibly, but due to marketing, sales tactics, and cultural sensibilities what often ends up happening is that people start from a monthly dollar amount and then work forwards to buy the most expensive vehicle they can, even if it means taking the loan term out to 72 or 84 months. It's also very normal for people to never pay off their car, instead trading in the vehicle after 3-5 years and rolling equity in the loan over to their next car. Obviously, this consumer habit is great for dealers, manufacturers, creditors and buyers of consumer debt, as well as the US Government and investors -- it's just not ideal for the consumers themselves if they're trying to preserve wealth and build savings.

These two factors create an environment increasingly hostile to the cheap entry level car. Consumer demand is low since most don't spend responsibly, and automakers don't really want to make or sell them because the margins are so slim.

The reason the US car industry does not want a $25k car is that the financing opportunities are crap for a car of this low cost.

In the same way that airlines exist to offer you a miles based credit card, the US car dealerships survive by offering you a loan for the car. Or perhaps, a car to go with your structured finance opportunity.

https://gmauthority.com/blog/2024/08/2025-byd-seagull-ev-sta...

Reality check:

- In 2025, there are 12 new car models available under $25,000

- In 2005, there were around 10 new models under $15,000 (25k adjusted by inflation)

So the premise that “cars used to be much more affordable” is not true. This article is full of misleading or outdated information that distorts the real trend.

HN deserves better data-driven discussions.

[1] - https://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm

The more interesting question is why these cars disappeared in the US. And while many of the factors discussed here are true for both EU and US (inflation, interest rates, manufacturer profit margins etc) I am surprised no one mentioned the 'SUV loophole' of US regulations that effectively boosted the SUVs (off-road vehicles are classified as non-passenger automobiles with everything that entails, notably much less stringent emission standards) and made the small cars unprofitable to make in comparison.

For years, CAFE regulations have meant that manufacturers must meet minimum fleet fuel economy averages or else pay fines. In order to sell more profitable but less fuel-efficient F-150s, Ford also needed to sell little Fiestas or Focuses. In order to sell Suburbans, Chevy also needed to sell Cavaliers or Sonics. But now that Ford can sell Mustang Mach-Es and Chevy can sell Blazer EVs for 50 or 60 grand AND get credit for something like 100 MPG equivalent, there's no longer any incentive for them to spend huge sums developing cheap cars that will net tiny profits (if any).

While not being a petrol head I was still living in a lala land where you could buy a brand new car for 10k EUR. Nothing fancy, just "a car". Obviously it turned out to be not true.

After some digging it turned out that in the last 10 years the price of cars went double. Literally double. Same car, like Fiat Panda, with the same engine and configuration, that ten years was worth one potato is now worth exactly two potato.

Long story short, the entry level car now costs close to 25k EUR. [1]

But here's the kicker.

While subvenstions seem to fail in most cases for regular people - like gvt giving people money to buy apartements equals to apartments being equally more expensive - it seems to work wonders for automotive thanks to Chinese.

EU offers up to 10k EUR subvention for electric cars and with that in mind you can get something like BYD Dolphin for slighly less than 20k EUR. Which is mind blowing. The car is comparable to Volvo XC40. Of course this is just an example and there is plentiful of other options.

[1] If you're not familiar or comfortable with EUR just think 1 EUR is 1 USD and you'll be fine.

So while car prices keep going up, people also keep going deeper into debt to buy one they can't afford.

You can blame manufacturers or banks, but ultimately the problem is unchecked consumerism and treating cars as a status symbol, which is sadly pervasive in this country.

The cars I work on are from the early 90s and everything is very simple to understand.

e.g. Electronics are normally simple circuits that aren't much more complicated than what you would find in a door bell and finding faults is normally just tracing wires and using a multi-meter. I had issues with the brake lights / reverse lights not working, the issue turned out that the spade like connector in the fuse box was pushed through and was making partial contact. Price to fix this was £0.

EDIT: Just remembered this isn't accurate. I had to buy a new reverse light. The entire reverse light assembly was ~£20. So the price to fix was about £20. The light assembly itself was like a big bicycle light.

My newer car needs a OB-II scanner to diagnose anything with a phone app. While this is arguably quicker it can be misleading. Sometimes it will be telling you that something is malfunctioning but it is really the sensor itself. These sensors are £200-£300 a piece. Replacing 4 glow plug sensors cost me £800. I was paying essentially to make the "you must service your engine" light to go away. There was nothing wrong with engine itself.

I was in the UK for the first time last month and was struck by how many hatchbacks and sedans they have that we don't in North America.

- 2025 Nissan Versa – Starting at $18,330

- 2025 Hyundai Venue – Starting at $21,395

- 2025 Kia Soul – Starting at $20,490

- 2025 Nissan Sentra – Starting at $21,590

- 2025 Nissan Kicks – Starting at $21,830

- 2025 Hyundai Elantra – Starting at $22,125 Ok - 2025 Kia K4 – Starting at $21,990

- 2025 Toyota Corolla – Starting at $22,325

- 2025 Chevrolet Trailblazer – Starting at $23,100

- 2025 Subaru Impreza – Starting at $23,495

- 2025 Buick Envista – Starting at $23,800

- 2025 Toyota Corolla Hybrid – Starting at $23,825

With rebates a 20,000 truck. Who knows what it will cost when it actually comes out. But I love the concept.

It is now very difficult (I can count with my fingers) to find a <100k car that can have 3 child seats in a row. Or that can sit 7 people that is not a SUV pedestrian child killer.

Once chinese brands become commonplace everywhere, tradional carmakers will have a hard time taking back market share. In Europe they closed or are closing the last HCOL factories, killing any remaining brand loyalty.

That's the answer here. They can build cars better, cheaper, faster than we can.

Instead Ford wants to sell a 80k SUPER F-250 BIG MANN TRUCK. All for what, you to drive 10 minutes to Walmart, buy groceries and drive back.

The best car is the one you don't own. No payments, insurance, parking tickets.

Unfortunately most American cities are centered around driving. So much money , and space wasted on these multi ton metal boxes. In many places most(much) of the city is literally just parking spaces.

Suppliers suffer from a constant flood and drought of contracts. Crisis -> We need so save money -> Supplier contracts are frozen or cancelled -> "Oh, we can't do stuff ourselves/We need help" -> Supplier had to let go experienced staff, hire cheap/unexperienced replacements/outsource -> Quality suffers and costs explode -> Repeat. Also not paying/delaying payments drives more suppliers out of business.

You also better promise the impossible because the cheapest offer wins. One time I got a PowerPoint as the technical drawings for electric charger test station. Just some black boxes, lines and names. That was the documentation. I should help the project management with documentation of the current state, but had to provide quite a bit of engineering in addition. Also had to talk to the Chinese supplier directly (nobody in the team spoke Mandarin). What a joy.

They apparently optimized for cost and molecularity, most notably by removing the infotainment system, which apparently is the biggest warranty / "feature" cost center.

I think in 17 years of motoring I've spent around £5,500 in total on cars.

It's a tough market that OEMs don't want to be in, so they cede it almost entirely to foreign OEMs that haven't moved upmarket yet. Foreign OEMs are structurally incapable of selling cars at those prices (by design), so the bottom end of the market gets hollowed out to nothing but a few "loss leader" vehicles.

I don't want all the damn gadgets, those things inevitably break and then cost thousands to fix.

This is why nobody sells small pickup trucks here. It is a lot easier for Ford to produce F150s that get 25-30ish mpg then it is to produce small trucks that get 40-50.

The Maverick is the only exception and it isn't really that small and it is also a hybrid.

Essentially the Federal government made selling small cheap cars infeasible in this country.

Also because vehicles last a lot longer thrifty Americans avoid buying new vehicles. They would rather buy a used one and let somebody else absorb the depreciation hit.

And when buying a used car most people are going to want a used mid-ranger or higher end car then buying a used economy car.

Look at something like the Dolphin from China - it’s going for $8K–$9K USD over there. Ship a whole fleet of them and you’re still well under $25K. And we’re not talking junkers either - these are electric, decent build quality, ~300km range. Like... what exactly are we protecting here?

Feels like we’re pricing affordability out of the market on purpose.

I have a small horse farm and drive a 2010 F-150. I haul horses, 900lb. hay bales, feed, lumber for repairing fences and building shelters, etc.

If my truck breaks down I am going to have to scrape through used inventory to find something that fits my needs. I don’t need leather, 16 cameras, seat warmers, and a high end sound system. I need a truck that can get done everything I need around the farm, and I need it to be cheap enough that I’m not worried about it getting scratched.

All cars seem to be luxury vehicles now, I don’t know what folks are doing the just need something more utilitarian.

I don't care about the prestige of owning a car, it is a utility for me that will never be worth 60000$. You can pay me 500000$ yearly and I would reconsider.

Govt is intentionally trying to cause at least 2% inflation. If you assume only 2% average over 50 years. A $25,000 car then is only about $9000 today; an untenable proposition. Lets be realistic, do you genuinely think no government in 50 years will exceed 2%?

The $25k car is extinct.

But there is also a Greed side to this story. Automakers have hiked prices, customers have kept buying and we finally (i hope) reached a breaking point. Jeep prices were apparently too high and sales plunged.

All of this makes me actually quite happy for the arrival of Chinese manufacturers. The price/quality ratio is extremely good and when i see the price i finally feel that it's a good deal. It makes me want to buy that car, while with most European manufacturers i'm just thinking of being scammed!

With last year's lowest (by state) average annual income being Mississippi at $45k, there is little reason for any car manufacturer to produce a $25k MSRP vehicle.

The last car I bought cost just less than $12k USD new ( on the road including all taxes and fees) around 5 years ago.

I know inflation's been high, but not it's not been that high.

That makes some sense to me, but if the goal is to always have a nice car, doesn't it makes much more sense to lease? The monthly payments will be a few hundred bucks less and you can upgrade every 2-3 years. And from what I understand, leasing agents like to give incentives after your first lease to keep you in the cycle.

Personally, if I were aiming for the most economical option, I'd lease a Nissan Leaf for ~$300/mo.

It wasn't always like this. It used to be that price hikes were met with consumer backlash, media attention, and people simply not buying that thing which forced companies to correct their pricing.

The fact that most people will happily pay any price they can afford (on credit, when) seems to be the main thing contributing to high food, car, and housing prices, which negatively impacts the poor and those who bust their ass to be frugal.

But hey, I guess it's a great time to be a VC.

But this created a problem for Apple: it was too cheap. About a decade ago, the cult of thinness took over. The Air was replaced by the 12" Macbook that was too underpowered. It only had 1 port, which doubled as a power connector. We got the (awful) butterfly keyboard. And of course we got the Touch Bar. Rumor has it that this all happened because Johnny Ive no longer had Steve Jobs pushing back against him.

All of these things only existed to increase the ASP (average selling price) of Macbooks. There's no other reason.

My point here is that companies don't want to produce cheap, quality, commoditized goods. They want high prices (because that means high profits). Apple didn't want cheap Macbooks. Car manufacturers don't want cheap cars. This is how capitalism works.

Worse though is that these high prices are used as a weapon to drive down wages. These auto makers will say "our labor costs are too high" and try and reduce wages and/or remove benefits, often under the threat of moving jobs overseas. Then you dig a little deeper and find out that about 5% of a car's sticker price is labor costs.

The chase for ever-increasing profits ultimately means cutting costs and increasing prices. Always.

All new cars were crap and expensive. People wanted me to buy a Hyundai HB20 with a crappy engine that couldn't climb the hill where my house was located.

I ended buying a used Mitsubishi Lancer GT, the thing had same engine as Evo (minus the turbo), leather seats, roof window, rear camera and so on. For half of the price of the HB20.

Sadly Mitsubishi discontinued those and went on to join the SUVmania where your cheapest car is a big as a SUV externally, but that has cramped interior and none of SUV features.

Why do you speak about EU/Europe as a whole? There is no such thing. I thought it is, but, now, when I moved to "Europe", I see that ti was illusion.

Prices are different across countries. Do you think Poland, Portugal and the Netherlands have same prices? HA! Compare prices in the Netherlands and its neighbor Belgium. I didn't compare prices for (new) cars, but I did for new motorcycles. Difference can be up to 20%. And it is two of three countries which are known as "Benelux", not two countries on different edges of EU.

Choice is difference between countries too, there are models which are present in one country and not in the orthers. Heck, even selection of a food is drastically different in two Lidls (two supermarkets of same chain) on different sides of Netherlands/Germany border in 10km vicinity!

Many people say that they see that almost all new cars they see are BYD & others — there is no BYD in Netherlands, for example. There is Lynk & Co (which is Volvo / Geely / Zeekr), and it's all of Chinese brands.

There is no such single entity as "Europe" or "EU". Different countries are very different in available goods, prices, taxes and regulations. Yes, there are global things, like GDPR or emission regulations (Euro 5/Euro 6), but still there are a plenty room for difference.

And even "single economic area" is illusion: you cannot simply register car or motorcycle bought in Portugal or Belgium in the Netherlands, you need to pay local VAT, local ecological taxes, etc. So no, there is no "lifehack to buy car or motorcycle in Belgium and save 20%.

The crappy experience I had with my last vehicle (~8 years ago):

1. Shop for rates on auto loans

2. Shop for particular brand/model of vehicle (online)

3. Once decided on brand/model, go to local "{{ random entity }} of {{ manufacture }}" dealership

4. Test drive the model you are interested in

5. Once decided you will continue with purchase, then you "start talking numbers"

6. Initial sales guy will always say something like "oh, this is the lowest we can go" (it was something like $5000 over MSRP for the model + options)

7. Then counter with some offer ("$500 + MSRP")

8. Sales guy does some pitch and tries to get you to budge. If you stand your ground here, he/she will "begrudgingly" go back to their manager to get approval

9. You may get approved, or not. But occasionally they will counter. Repeat 6-8 until settled on sales price (including tax, title fees). Known as the "out the door" price. One time I did have to "walk out" when sales person wouldn’t agree on price. Also they will employ as many high pressure sales tactics here as possible. Also best to keep your cards close to your chest, they will try to get you to use their in-house finance (big kickbacks for them). Have had success getting near MSRP by leading them on to thinking I would use their in-house financing.

10. They will now refer you to their finance guy to finish and finalize the paperwork. But it doesn’t stop there. That finance guy will try to load you up on as many unneeded services to pump the sales price. I’m talking extended warranty, gap insurance, paint protectors at significant dealership markup. Usually the GAP insurance isn’t too bad but have to go through process of hearing the pitch and declining each service. Then there is the junk fees such as "document fees" that range from $100-300.

11. Finally, after declining and accepting additional services. You come to the actual payment decision : in house or external financing? Usually, the sales guy would have already run your information through their financing backend to determine creditworthiness prior to financing guy so they have an idea where they can lose out on initial purchase price and recoup on kickback. Occasionally, the rates are better than what you can secure from your bank or credit union. But it’s very rare. It’s in their interest to get you to agree to an higher APR than what you really deserve. At this point, pop out the preapproval letter and compare the offers.

12. On rare occasion, they will try to pull back the deal but at this point it’s better to close and increase sales for month rather than dwell about one barely profitable transaction. Finally, the paperwork is signed.

All of this unnecessary back and forth when it can just be boiled down to a few steps at most.

1. Go to showroom (or online)

2. Browse basic models

3. Decide on options and put downpayment on car

4. (In 3-4 weeks) Deliver vehicle to home or preferred destination. Have it quickly inspected for any defects in transportation. Then deliver final payment and get your new car

Add electrics with thousand lbs of batteries, and you've got today's 4000-6000 lb SUVs, all costing an arm and a leg.

Its HubSpot Marketing that is the winner here.