Why not? We bought our first leaf, a 2011 model, for $4,900 last year.
the range is down "2 bars", so it's legit only a ~70 mile car, but it absorbed a ton of our city trips and did great.
Then Oregon passed a $2,500 incentive on used cars, so we sold it for $7,500 and moved up to an i3.
Our local EV used car dealer, Platt Auto in Portland, has a few 2016+ leafs for $8900, so I bet his two older ones listed at $Call could be had sub-8K.
If it's not your main car it would rarely be a problem for me. I have a Prius Prime with 29 miles of electric range. I've only out gas in it once since Covid started. With 70 I would not have needed gas this year.
how often do you drive more than 50 miles in a day? If it's rare enough there's a point where it's financially worth driving electric daily and then renting an SUV or whatever for your camping trips.
The cost of renting a small car (SUVs are double the cost) with more range (including the ability to refuel quickly anywhere) is more than expensive enough to make buying a gas car/SUV for everything if you do it even once a month.
A second electric car makes sense if you normally travel 50-100 miles a day. In this case you are leaving the other car/suv home while you go to work. Of course with this range it is starting to become reasonable to just use the electric car for everything. (When I did the math several years ago Tesla was taking about how great superchargers would be once they rolled them out)
Yes, the original leaf has 110hp, does 0-60 in 9.9 and tops out at 93mph. It is similar in performance to other entry-level cars in the US, like a Yaris, Fit, etc.
They are cheap because they are similar in performance to other entry level economy cars, and the warranty for the battery is up. If the battery fails you’re in the ballpark of 6 or 7 thousand dollar repair.
Dunno about the Leaf but at least with the Prius the battery is composed of individual cells that fit on a rail, so a lot of failures can be corrected by testing cell voltages and figuring out which one has failed and only replacing that one single one, which is usually substantially cheaper than a full rebuild.
From what I've read, it's harder to fix the Li-ion packs, and in an electric car that relies entirely on the pack, degradation affects the driving experience more than a hybrid where you'd see it manifest itself as an MPG decrease.
The combination of information and parts available to fix Toyota NiMH packs is a big factor in why I own a vehicle with one :)
But your comments in this thread indicate that you'll just find another objection to keep that narrative supported. Fact is, you actually can buy a Leaf that doesn't have "major problems" for < $8K.
Not true (source: I recently did a bunch of car buying research and a used Leaf was my number 2 choice; ended up not getting it).
These are electric drivetrains (simpler transmission, etc.) so there are fewer things that can go wrong relative to an ICE car. Obv range is limited with a used Leaf but that's not a problem for most city trips.
