Dear Steemers,

I stopped working in 2016 and in that year our car was 4 years old. Normally we changed our car after 3 - 4 years but as I did not want to spend a large amount immediately- I pay half of the amount required - we gave it another few years. The Toyota RAV4 X style we have is still doing great by the way.

But now , two years later we decided it is time to get us a new one in some time.

So what are the options and what has changed ?

TAXATION :
The tax on cars (called BPM) can be huge where I live and now depends on the CO2 emission only. Tax used to be based on the weight of the car but now it is emission. I noticed already that the RAV4 I now have will be more expensive partly caused by the tax. The motor is two liters which gives more CO2 emission I guess.

So it is clear our governments want all of us to either drive small gasoline cars - which I agree with - OR hybrid cars OR fully electric cars.

Our clever lefty politicians caused/underestimated the following misuse of hybrids (good for the richer people !)

People that wanna drive a large car here now buy/lease a hybrid car (like the Lexus, BMW 5 serie or my RAV4 hybrid). Tax - thus relative low price - is calculated asuming very low emission i.e. the driver uses the battery for short drives. In practice however many only use the gasoline as before and do not charge up the battery at all or do not even buy a charger which also costs you 500 EUR or more.

The lease companies did see this immediately and it got some press coverage. Of course lease prices are also calculated with a certain type of car use in mind.

So what do we buy?

We could buy the same RAV4 but in Hybrid version which - due to the batteries - is still an expensive car and - unlike others - use the batteries and the charger. The alternative would be a small car. I am not sure if I want this already. I do what I can but with my length I "deserve "a bigger car.

Bye for now
Goldrooster