adam.jones
Member
- First Name
- Adam
- Joined
- Sep 27, 2022
- Threads
- 1
- Messages
- 12
- Reaction score
- 1
- Location
- Indiana
- Vehicles
- '21 VW ID.4 AWD Pro S
- Occupation
- Software Engineer
- Thread starter
- #1
tl;dr; I have a '21 AWD VW ID.4 Pro S w/ Gradient that I've been driving since February and I love it. My order for a '22 RWD MME Select w/ Comfort & Tech is scheduled to be delivered in about a month. Should I trade the ID.4 for the MME or keep it?
The day is nearly here where I must make the hard decision to either keep the ID.4 I've been driving since February or trade it in on the Mach E I ordered that same month. Late January of this year I started car shopping and I knew I wanted to get an EV, but it was just a question of which one. I wanted to look at the EV6, Mach E, ID.4, and Model 3. I quickly ruled out the Model 3 due to price and not qualifying for the federal tax credit. A dealer near me had just received a Mach E GT which I took for a test drive and absolutely loved, but the sticker ($74k) was well outside my max budget ($50k). I used the Ford configurator and submitted an order for a Select, but the next week the dealership called to let me know that Ford had closed the order book and they could not process my order. So I went to test drive the EV6 and was left unimpressed both by the car and the dealership. I visited a VW dealer that had ID.4 to test drive, but couldn't sell. I was really impressed. It wasn't exciting, but it was very comfortable, inviting, drove well, and seemed to offer a lot of value. I still really liked the MME but the ID.4 wasn't bad. Feb. 15th my Ford dealer called to let me know the order book had re-opened and so I went in and placed my order: Select w/ Comfort & Tech in Rapid Red. I signed a purchase agreement for MSRP ($48,690) and resigned myself to the 6+ month wait the dealer warned me I had ahead of me. I kept thinking about that ID.4 though, and when things heated up in the Ukraine I knew gas prices were going to skyrocket, so my search for an EV was suddenly a lot more urgent. As luck would have it, my local VW dealer had an AWD '21 Pro S w/ Gradient in moonstone grey that the buyer had backed out of and I could have at MSRP ($50,870). It was just over my max budget, but with gas prices going up I told myself I'd pay myself back through the savings on fuel, plus I could always trade it on the MME when it arrived and have the extra tax credit as buffer against value loss. I closed on the ID.4 on Feb. 25.
Over the last 7 months I've really fallen in love with my ID.4. I drive 25 miles to and from work each day on rural highways and it makes those trips comfortable and quiet. My kids are in sports that have me traveling all over and the range is sufficient to get me to all of my destinations on a single charge. Plus our very tall family all fit comfortably. My wife is a big fan of the massaging seats, which I had originally taken as a gimmick. I live in a relatively flat area with very little elevation change, but we do get winters with ice and snow. I'm not sure if the AWD has had a chance to really shine on my drives, but it has always felt confident on the road. That said my ID.4 does have some frustrating issues. I love that I can sit and the car is ready to drive, but the infotainment system is painfully slow to boot up. I can be out the driveway and well down the road before it is ready for me to set my destination in the nav, and that's regardless of whether I choose the native nav or android auto. Although not frequent, it has also had a series of worrying warnings come up. For instance, the entire infotainment system rebooted mid drive. Sometimes I get yellow warnings of "electrical system malfunction" that go away after a restart. I once had the tail lights stay on all night for no reason. I've had a cascade of errors during the drive letting me know that all of the driver assist systems had failed. These don't happen often, but they are enough to damage my confidence in the car. VW has long promised "quarterly OTA updates" but has yet to deliver even one to their customers in North America.
Last week I received the email that my Mach E order had completed production and was expected to arrive at my dealership between 10/26 and 11/01. I checked with a few online car sites to see what sort of trade-in value I could expect for my ID.4 and it seems like $50k is the average. The only change in my MME order is the Park Assist Prep kit (-$325). That gives me the idea that I could potentially go to my dealer and do a straight trade from my ID.4 to the MME with nothing out of pocket, or possibly even a little cash back (my state cancels out tax on trade-ins). What's more in the spring that would mean another $7,500 of tax credit which my tax liability would allow me to take advantage of.
My hesitation on this trade is that I'll be giving up a lot of features. I'll be moving from AWD to RWD. I'll actually be losing acceleration (the AWD ID.4 is slightly faster than the RWD MME Select). I'll lose that gorgeous panoramic roof. I'll lose the adaptive projector headlights for the Mach E's fixed reflectors. I'll be losing the interior ambient lighting and massaging seats. My passenger seat will go from power memory to manual adjustment. On the other hand, an extra $7,500 in my pocket would be really useful right now with one child in college and another that I need to get a car for. I don't really need the AWD in my area, and I think the exterior of the MME is better looking than the ID.4. I have no idea what the infotainment software is like for the MME, but I'm not holding my breath that VW is going to update my ID.4 anytime soon, so I have that frustration to look forward to if I keep the ID.4.
For you Select owners out there, what would you do in my shoes?
The day is nearly here where I must make the hard decision to either keep the ID.4 I've been driving since February or trade it in on the Mach E I ordered that same month. Late January of this year I started car shopping and I knew I wanted to get an EV, but it was just a question of which one. I wanted to look at the EV6, Mach E, ID.4, and Model 3. I quickly ruled out the Model 3 due to price and not qualifying for the federal tax credit. A dealer near me had just received a Mach E GT which I took for a test drive and absolutely loved, but the sticker ($74k) was well outside my max budget ($50k). I used the Ford configurator and submitted an order for a Select, but the next week the dealership called to let me know that Ford had closed the order book and they could not process my order. So I went to test drive the EV6 and was left unimpressed both by the car and the dealership. I visited a VW dealer that had ID.4 to test drive, but couldn't sell. I was really impressed. It wasn't exciting, but it was very comfortable, inviting, drove well, and seemed to offer a lot of value. I still really liked the MME but the ID.4 wasn't bad. Feb. 15th my Ford dealer called to let me know the order book had re-opened and so I went in and placed my order: Select w/ Comfort & Tech in Rapid Red. I signed a purchase agreement for MSRP ($48,690) and resigned myself to the 6+ month wait the dealer warned me I had ahead of me. I kept thinking about that ID.4 though, and when things heated up in the Ukraine I knew gas prices were going to skyrocket, so my search for an EV was suddenly a lot more urgent. As luck would have it, my local VW dealer had an AWD '21 Pro S w/ Gradient in moonstone grey that the buyer had backed out of and I could have at MSRP ($50,870). It was just over my max budget, but with gas prices going up I told myself I'd pay myself back through the savings on fuel, plus I could always trade it on the MME when it arrived and have the extra tax credit as buffer against value loss. I closed on the ID.4 on Feb. 25.
Over the last 7 months I've really fallen in love with my ID.4. I drive 25 miles to and from work each day on rural highways and it makes those trips comfortable and quiet. My kids are in sports that have me traveling all over and the range is sufficient to get me to all of my destinations on a single charge. Plus our very tall family all fit comfortably. My wife is a big fan of the massaging seats, which I had originally taken as a gimmick. I live in a relatively flat area with very little elevation change, but we do get winters with ice and snow. I'm not sure if the AWD has had a chance to really shine on my drives, but it has always felt confident on the road. That said my ID.4 does have some frustrating issues. I love that I can sit and the car is ready to drive, but the infotainment system is painfully slow to boot up. I can be out the driveway and well down the road before it is ready for me to set my destination in the nav, and that's regardless of whether I choose the native nav or android auto. Although not frequent, it has also had a series of worrying warnings come up. For instance, the entire infotainment system rebooted mid drive. Sometimes I get yellow warnings of "electrical system malfunction" that go away after a restart. I once had the tail lights stay on all night for no reason. I've had a cascade of errors during the drive letting me know that all of the driver assist systems had failed. These don't happen often, but they are enough to damage my confidence in the car. VW has long promised "quarterly OTA updates" but has yet to deliver even one to their customers in North America.
Last week I received the email that my Mach E order had completed production and was expected to arrive at my dealership between 10/26 and 11/01. I checked with a few online car sites to see what sort of trade-in value I could expect for my ID.4 and it seems like $50k is the average. The only change in my MME order is the Park Assist Prep kit (-$325). That gives me the idea that I could potentially go to my dealer and do a straight trade from my ID.4 to the MME with nothing out of pocket, or possibly even a little cash back (my state cancels out tax on trade-ins). What's more in the spring that would mean another $7,500 of tax credit which my tax liability would allow me to take advantage of.
My hesitation on this trade is that I'll be giving up a lot of features. I'll be moving from AWD to RWD. I'll actually be losing acceleration (the AWD ID.4 is slightly faster than the RWD MME Select). I'll lose that gorgeous panoramic roof. I'll lose the adaptive projector headlights for the Mach E's fixed reflectors. I'll be losing the interior ambient lighting and massaging seats. My passenger seat will go from power memory to manual adjustment. On the other hand, an extra $7,500 in my pocket would be really useful right now with one child in college and another that I need to get a car for. I don't really need the AWD in my area, and I think the exterior of the MME is better looking than the ID.4. I have no idea what the infotainment software is like for the MME, but I'm not holding my breath that VW is going to update my ID.4 anytime soon, so I have that frustration to look forward to if I keep the ID.4.
For you Select owners out there, what would you do in my shoes?
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