My electrician drives an electric F-150, it's impressive how useful it is for him. The frunk carries a big box of tools, there's tons of outlets to charge his power tool batteries, he can even run a small welder
I justified the lightning purchase to my partner by pointing out having an equivalent whole house battery backup in Tesla power walls would be more expensive than the truck
We've not hooked up the transfer switch yet but we have ran a lot of extension cords during an ice storm last year and kept all our aquariums going, all 700 gallons of them
If you’ve had it for that long without installing the crucial part of what you described above as a major selling point, I think that would have been useful to volunteer in the original comment lol.
The extension cord thing was interesting too, but “I sold my partner on a feature that turned out to be more trouble than it was worth to set up” is super relevant to discussion!
We haven't needed to yet. Our primary concern are those aquariums and it worked wonderfully for them when we needed it. Much better than running through over a hundred dollars a day in propane to keep them running, and the truck parks in an insulated garage so no cords to a generator through a window letting the cold in
Have you seen the prices of pre-owned Honda/Toyota sedans that are less than 5 years old? There are absolutely cars out there where trading in your new car after 3-4 years can make sense depending on the cost of the car, the depreciation curve, and whether you want to always be driving a relatively new car. Of course it's almost always going to be a better value proposition to drive the car for 10 years if you can, but that can still depend on depreciation.
Low mileage used cars don't come with a warranty, or probably have a more limited warranty if they're CPO.
Leases can be better, but again they are usually better choices in high depreciation scenarios (like luxury vehicles or EVs, as you point out), not low depreciation scenarios.
> Also electric cars get killed on the depreciation curve.
I have heard this a couple of times now, and I believe it. Is the cause battery wear or pure demand (buyers don't want used EVs for various non technical reasons)?
In California, at one point, you could get a few thousand rebate, if you were in the Central Valley, and additional few thousand rebate. Some local cities gave rebates on top of that, and the federal tax rebate on that. Buy a $45k Model 3 and get back $13k-$15k just for buying it. Rebates like that are going to play havoc with resale values. On top of that, new Tesla's went down in price over the past several years. I think as these incentives taper off we'll see more of a stable drop off.
A local couple runs a hot food stall at outdoor markets all over the city by backing theirs up to the stall and plugging in all the kitchen things they need into the outlets in the bed.
I have the powerboost hybrid F-150. It does all this, can power a house with the generator, AND I can drive it through the mountain west with zero EV infrastructure at insanely high MPG for a truck. Plopped a Tune camper on the back and couldn’t ask for more.
Same. In a Powerboost, pulling my 5000 pound boat 500 miles to north Idaho is super easy, with a single refuel. In a Lightning that would be a nightmare, recharging 4-5 times. In truth, I’m excited about Ford’s pivot. I think electric motors with a range extender would be fantastic. Like the Chevy Volt for pickups.
That’s pretty cool, and I just checked the prices and it only starts at 11k dearer than the standard f150, which is less than I expected. Interesting.
What’s more insane to me as an Australian is its 50k USD starting price in America, but in Australia it starts at $149k USD as they’re only sold by third parties that do right hand drive conversions (at imo a way too high premium, 100k for that service + shipping???)
I don't think so, not like it was once upon a time. I had a manual 6-cylinder I bought in about 2002 for around $14000, no leather, 2wd extended cab. That's like $25k in today's dollars according to Google. If they made a basic truck for even $40k as EV it might sell a lot better, but I am pretty sure they are all about selling 60k+ trucks for profit.
There's a 100% tariff on top of all the regulatory and political hurdles that prevent BYD from selling in the US, but it shows that a very nice truck can be built for $40k.
Americans are not allowed to have better quality, lower priced Chinese vehicles because they have to suffer the incompetence, failure, abuse, and plunder by their ruling class due to … the decades of incompetence, failure, abuse, and plunder of their parasitic and alien ruling class.
It is easy to understand what the tariffs are attempting and why, but what supporters don’t get is that at the very least it’s all wrong in sequence and timing, not to mention poorly executed due to the schizophrenic and manic nature of American politics that is dominated by the president’s supposed term limits and warfare of memes people believe. “A day late and a dollar short” has probably never been more appropriate.
The inherent problem with empire and reserve currency is that it supplies a drug to a ruling class that is already inherently prone to excess.
“ The first archetype, Euro premiums, has an average labor cost of $2,232 per vehicle and includes premium brands such as Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Jaguar Land Rover, and Audi. This group is characterized by high production costs, complex design and advanced manufacturing processes, and strong labor unions.
Within the category, German manufacturers face among the highest labor costs of $3,307 due to stringent regulations and high wage rates.
The second archetype, electric vehicle-only manufacturers, includes startups as well as more established players like Tesla, which do not operate under organized labor contracts. Their average labor costs range from $1,502 to $13,291, and they face high per vehicle production costs due to low manufacturing volumes. EV-only manufacturers also have been heavily reliant on government subsidies, which are now being cut back by the new administration.
The third archetype, mainstream model manufacturers, has an average labor cost of $880 per vehicle and includes traditional high-volume automakers from various countries. Japanese manufacturers enjoy lower labor costs per vehicle, with an average of $769, compared with manufacturers in the United States, where the average is $1,341 — a labor cost per vehicle that reflects recent historic union gains.
The fourth archetype, Chinese car manufacturers, has an average labor cost of $585 per vehicle, characterized by low wages and high efficiency. The group maintains the lowest overall conversion costs in the industry by leveraging its newer factories, efficient supply chains, and high production volumes” - https://www.oliverwyman.com/our-expertise/insights/2025/apr/...
The F-150 Lightning Pro trim is the closest thing to this, and aside from the first year generally has only sold to fleets.
Theres also the Chevy Silverado EV WT trim which is a similar base model trim, but with the huge heavy battery its paired with it's still an expensive truck.
You can only get the Lightning from the factory as a super crew with a center console, but some people have converted theirs to a front bench and column shifter for a total of six seats.
