Family EVs are too expensive & too impractical! How many sacrifices should we make?

Very similar boat to us, though 2 kids for me so we'll be have more options available. We've cut our driving down to around 6000 miles a year - we walk/cycle a lot, take local buses/trains a lot. Use national rail network at every opportunity as well (which is affordable as we're not spending £500/month on car finance. That said... our 2012 estate is showing its age and 2nd hand EVs are starting to look tempting. The next 12-24 months should be really interesting to watch!

I went from driving an old Transit Custom (full of surfboards, long ago) to leasing a Peugeot eRifter as a more practical family car. Lovely to drive and super practical but the winter range on older models is poor, you're looking at 100 miles of motorway driving if it's sub-zero out. That said the chargers are good enough it's still manageable for a trip to Cornwall. I believe the recent model update has a heat pump so that should improve matters. But yep, large family EVs are few and far between right now!

Family of four in an ionic 5 here, has plenty of boot space, bigger than some other models you mention. All rear seats slide to add more boot. Second hand prices seem to be very competitive. HDA on the motorway is life changing!

you can get a 3 year old MG5 for around 9-10k on autotrader. It has plenty of space in the back and a spacious boot. Ive had one for almost 3 years and my dad has as well, it is the best car Ive ever had and has really solid build quality, much better than my old focus diesel. The ev James and Kate channel has one that's done 120,000 miles and still is in great working order. It is relatively efficient with low insurance costs. I would recommend taking one for a test drive as a lot of people are surprised at how good it is.

We have an i3s for most stuff and similar(ish) to you a VW Touran for long trips and/or with 5 in the car. Out of budget (for me too at the moment) but I fancy a BMW iX when depreciation has done its thing some more. Until then the 105,000 mile Touran can soldier on.

E Niro (2019-2022) is a no brainer for most 2 adults, 2 kids (sorry this isnt your situation I'm afraid!). But for other's benefit I just got a second hand 2021 64kwh 4+ (top spec) and its an absolute dream - I am regularly getting 5mi/kwh and yet its super fast and enjoyable to drive. So much space for a smallish car (I hate SUVs but this one actually feels like a small estate (albeit raised a tad)), and it looks fine against other much bigger cars.

I'd say a Model Y, thats the car I want next. Whilst you might need to finance a portion of a used one (just getting close to dipping under £30k) you could offset that cost by getting onto Intelligent Octopus Go and once you have that home storage battery you can sell all the solar @ 15p whilst running the house during the day at 7.5p. You then add in the fuel/tax savings (insurance is likely to be higher so that might be the tax cancelled out) but you might find you are no worse off with some finance than you are now after a bit of man-maths 😉 It's not the "greenest" way to use your solar (i.e. self consumption) but still offsets your usage. I have the Fogstar 15.5kWh on order and am waiting for the G99 app to come back but once I have it up and running I'll happily share my thoughts on it. With a discount it's £2250 and I'm guessing can be self installed to an existing system so the cheapest way I can see to adding a decent amount of storage.

The Skoda Enyaq is a wonderful car! Will be sorry to see it go when we change ours, but if you can get yourself one with the 82 kWh battery I think that would be good for your case. High-ish mile ones are around £20k on autotrader. Good luck!

The 5+ person family on a budget isn't well served by current UK options. Interesting to see the suggestions and interested in any eventual conclusion from you.

Jaguar I-Pace is a great performance vehicle with performance insurance. Loadsa space, but as a premium brand you may want to extend the warranty (not due to HV pack, more in case you need to replace a headlight). Dealers are hit n miss, many are exceptional, many more are terrible. A good example of the vehicle is terrific, a bad example will make you cry. Bad press has made this vehicle very affordable, but you'll need to be charging for 7.5p as the 90kwh battery is inefficient and you'll get between 220-270 miles depending on driving style and outside influences (ala putting BMWs and Lotus' to bed when they want to race).... 😮

Had a similar issue recently, expanding the family to 4 children, was driving two cars for a while to one destination! Settled on a 6 seater EV9, older kiddies in the back and still room for two more rear facers! I guess not your cup of tea I guess, but with the amount solar I have it can at least be driven all day for as near as £zero as I can get!

I really understand your rear seat width issue. My son has a 'rather capacious' wife and our granddaughter needs a car seat. When we moved from a BMW 5 touring to looking for an EV I struggled with this very issue. We ended up with a Tesla Model S. It has more hip and shoulder width in the back than the BMW, is a hatchback with over 700 ltrs of bootspace that can become a 1800 plus ltrs with the back seats down. To help our daughter-in-law strap in we have a 10 inch seat belt extension. I am sure the Model X will have more options with their many rear seating configurations and no doubt your sons would fall in love with the gull wing doors, but Model S is more plentiful and cheaper. You are quite right about the Model 3, the rear is small and the boot not great. The Model Y has the same width limitation in the rear cabion and wouldn't be sufficient for 3 child seats. The 3 and Y are significantly narrower cars than the S and X. We regularly do 360 mile day trips to visit my aged parents, one in a home and one at her home, and the Model S 75D we have makes this a breeze. Buying an EV without access to the full Tesla charging network must be a daunting proposition. Charging points share car parks, but most charge 69-85p per kWh while Tesla charge 26-55p, depending on time of day. With a full charge from home our 360 mile round trip yesterday, including filling up again afterwards, cost us £25. The 360 miles itself cost just £20.

Most people buy second hand right? So we need all the rich people\corporates to buy big EVs and then sell them on. But I suspect the bigger issue is the lack of busses. Too many cars needed for solo journeys. Think some people get the Nissan van thing for families. Suspect mini vans/SUVs are taking over the role of people carriers.

Who isn't an advocate of EV's in principle? 2 x diesel owner. Both paid off. Each (currently) £20 & £30pa road tax, both 50-55mpg The main family car Nissan Qashqai (2016 1.5tdci) is ULEZ exempt. Historically most expensive car I've been willing (not able) to purchase was the above Nissan. 15k with a Ford Focus trade-in. Now even with a 2nd hand EV, my insurance would increase 1.5-2 times. Come 2025 I'll be paying more roadtax than both diesels combined?! Oh, let's not forget the £600-750 for a charger and install. Annual mileage COMBINED for both cars is around 3000pa. I work 3.5 miles from home, and Wifie 100% wfh. I have Solar and Battery, but not important as I'd home charge at 7.5p kwh I guess. Still, trying to find an equivalently spec'd EV for the sort of money I'm willing to spend, WITHOUT it having 100k on the clock (or battery) is next to impossible. Decided to sweat the diesels and we've recently done the timing belt and aux + water pump proactively on the Ford diesel, and in 10k miles we'll be doing the same for the Nissan. Hoping the market pricing and offerings are more mature in 5 years, and in the meanwhile the money I'm not spending on alternative cars (EV's) im using to over pay on the mortgage. I find few cases where EV's genuinely save ppl money in the UK or EU

I had this exact problem when we had two in car seats and an older child. I thought the 4x4’s would work and tried a Nissan X-Trail but no joy. In the end I got a Vito Dualiner which was a fantastic choice I’m amazed that the manufacturers don’t make a genuine attempt to cater for this market segment in a meaningful way with their ordinary family cars. I think the Skoda Yeti did split the back seats evenly 🤔 If you’re in the trade can you get a car at auction? An ID Buzz might suit you. I see a massive spread on asking prices on Autotrader at the moment, I’ve no idea what the dealers are paying for these ex-lease vehicles of course

We've had much the same disappointing search. I think a Nissan eNV2000 might work but they're pretty rare. A VW ID Buzz would be lovely, but is still way out of our price range. Like you, we've kept the big diesel for (fairly rare) long trips with the whole family and have a Leaf for commuting/shopping/everything else. I think we've just got to recognise that it's only the start of the electric transition, and car makers will do the niches last. Eventually that niche will be electrified, and a few years later they will be available at a price we can afford. (By then our kids will probably have all left home and it won't matter) Don't beat yourself up over it, you're already doing a lot more than most people! Maybe film your chats in front of your heat pump, rather than in the car? I get the impression that there's a group of small-minded trolls just looking to nitpick.

Kids are expensive, especially odd numbers! Clearly too many romantic nights in ... :-) We figured it's only a problem (needing a big car) for a few years, so went to leasing. Has it's pros and cons, but super easy and low hassle. Always deals around, especially when car companies need to dump stock. If you're not too fussy, just follow the lease sites and wait.

Berlingo maybe

I feel you. We have 3 kids and two are teens. Plus we like to take our golden retriever sometimes. E-berlingo is spacious but is basically a van and the range is poor. I’m looking at MG5 estates but the rear bench is a bit of a squeeze maybe. I’m keen to hear ideas on this as we really would love a sub £14k used EV which is efficient and comfortable for 5.

I’m a little surprised multiple kids aren’t catered to as a market with dual/triple car/booster seats - you could probably fit 3 in the back if they were combos and didn’t need to have the doubled up bolsters between individual units. once they’re not in boosters anymore they can cram in and just tell them to shut up honestly :P - we always managed in my dad’s company car which was nearly always a regular saloon