Bubba wrote: I live less than a mile from my office and drive an average of less than 5K miles per year.
Ditto on that being a good reason not to get an EV. My EV works in the math only because my wife and I drive it over 10,000 miles per year. That means the yearly gas savings (vs. cost to charge it, which increases your power bill if you don't have lots of solar) makes it worth considering. Other factors would be if you're about to be in the market to replace a car anyway (I was about to replace my wife's old used van with another used gas car for $10K anyway, so my cost to purchase the EV is not relative to $0 but relative to $10K). Bottom line, if you're not driving it at least 10K miles annually don't even think that gas savings will make up for the cost difference.
--- Side note: I anticipate a 3% inflation rate on the cost of gas and all other energy rates. But that's after gas drops to about $3.50/gallon here in Alabama, the Dims teach the masses we should be grateful for it, then gas costs resume going up. To me a 3% inflation rate is reasonable. Once I realized that the gas savings wasn't just at this year's cost but at future year's costs too, I started to lean harder towards the EV.
Bubba wrote: Most of those out of town trips are 300 miles or more through rural Texas.
Ding! Ding! Another reason to not get an EV, especially if you're not going to keep an ICE car for long trips. My wife and I need 2 cars anyway, so one is an ICE. Plus, my wife and I can take the EV on most long trips because most long trips go in one of the directions where there are plenty of fast chargers on the road (and my wife likes to stop every 200 miles anyway). If we go in the one direction that has few chargers we'll take the ICE. So before getting an EV, figure out the directions you usually drive toward and see if there are plenty of chargers. If not (or if you drive way past 200 miles before taking breaks), then don't count the EV as good for trips.
Bubba wrote: Most EV batteries only last 5 years before they have to be replaced and the cost of replacing an EV battery (if you can find one) is more than the EV is worth.
Well, the battery replacement cost is worth considering, but the numbers need to be adjusted. Any EV you get made in the past couple of years has a battery that should last 10 years, not 5 years. If it doesn't have the brand name Too Expensive Still Liberals Adore, it'll probably cost $10K to replace it. Now, as for whether or not it's more than the EV is worth IMHO is immaterial. It's not how much you can sell the 10-year old EV at that point, it's how much it'd take to get another car (whether ICE or EV, whether new or used) to replace it. IMHO, $10K is worth another hopeful 10 years of gas savings to give you 20 years of life from the EV.
One of my kids is at the other end of the driving spectrum. He is a sales director for a company in West Texas and regularly drives 500 miles or more each week. He has a big territory, most of it consisting of miles and miles of nothing but miles and miles. He would not make it from one charging station to another.
I have not purchased a new vehicle in over 20 years. I am always on the lookout for older model used cars with low mileage.
I am currently driving a 10-year-old truck that I bought 4 years ago when it had only 25K miles on it. My wife is driving a 20-year-old Lincoln that currently has under 30K miles on it. One of my kids is driving a 15-year-old SUV that I bought 3 years ago when it had less than 30K miles on it. Another one of my kids is driving a 4-year-old Hyundai that I bought 2 years ago when it had less than 10K miles on it. All were from estates. None of them cost me more than $15K.
I don't come across them often, but I buy them whenever I find one, whether I need a car or not.