Pricing announced

[SimonR 0]

Porsche wold no doubt view the 2+0 as a premium and charge more for it.

Simon

[yztop 0]

To buy an early evora -

[yztop 0]

Typically options are optional for cars which haven't been built. But not in this case.

So this is really the Lotus Evora LE (Launch Edition)

[Tuna 0]

yztop - I would have put good money on you cancelling.

From day one it was made clear that the launch cars were full spec and would be around the 58K mark - it's absolutely not news. If that wasn't what you wanted, or what you could afford, then why even bother putting down a deposit?

Optimists hoping that lotus would magically discount the car by 30% from the predicted price, or that the economy would be hot enough to make a killing selling the car on will be disappointed.

[TomE 165]

It depends what you count as "day one" Tuna When I put my deposit down in Jan 2008 the Launch Edition approach wasn't known - think it first surfaced at the London Show - and pricing was mooted as target

[Tuna 0]

Some difficult decisions to be made.

Very fair points.

I suppose having been here before with launch models (I looked at the first Elise and the M250), I didn't go into this expecting a specific car at a specific spec - which is why I am happy to wait for test reviews and early cars to hit the road. It helps my decision that we're in the middle of building a house, so money is welcome elsewhere right now - and we don't have a garage to put any of our cars in either!

Whatever Lotus' intentions, it seemed fair to me to assume that any early deposit would be a gamble - the car might not even have reached production. Price, specification and performance would be likely to change right up to the point when it's sitting on a dealer's forecourt. If you're confident enough to put down a deposit in those circumstances, it seems to me you're buying something other than outright performance - the Evora is interesting because it has Lotus pedigree.

The Elise was an easy sell because it found a previously unoccupied niche in the market. To do that again with a new model, either the Evora or Esprit would be a miracle - so it seemed clear to me that the car would have to compete against some serious alternatives when it arrived. Lotus' style of drivers' cars appeal to me, so I hope that the Evora can deliver that in spades, but it will take the reviews and impressions of the early cars before we can tell for sure if their approach is sufficiently different to mark their product out against the competition.

I very much doubt the car will be a disappointment, but do recognise that when you're spending that sort of money upwards, you don't tend to buy blind in the hope that you get something that suits you.

[yztop 0]

yztop - I would have put good money on you cancelling.

From day one it was made clear that the launch cars were full spec and would be around the 58K mark - it's absolutely not news. If that wasn't what you wanted, or what you could afford, then why even bother putting down a deposit?

Optimists hoping that lotus would magically discount the car by 30% from the predicted price, or that the economy would be hot enough to make a killing selling the car on will be disappointed.

1. Ordered before the motor show. Guide price was late 30's to 45k.

2. Affordability= Price, Depreciation, Personal income, Car finance Interest rates (they are up), Availability of money, Contract Hire Price, Economy, Competition and residual value of existing vehicle. Honestly. I could have afforded two.

And even the magic price drop isnt so unbelievable.

45% of Lotus Evora market is US according to Evora project leader (lovely chap but forgot his name). At the time the prices were announced $ was 50p. Now $ is 70p. So if Lotus stick to the same prices in the USA they are going to get 40% more per unit !!!!! 40%. Perhaps realism with the extras would help. Rear Camera Price

[Tuna 0]

Sorry, I didn't mean to offend you - I didn't mean that you couldn't afford to buy, just that your posts on here went through an arc where you were pretty much bound to be disappointed by the end result. Your comments read that you were expecting something different. For that sort of money the car has got to be something you desire deeply, and from my point of view it didn't look like the Evora was about to deliver for you.

Edited March 6, 2009 by Tuna

[TomE 165]

To try and help my decision making, I thought I'd spec up a Cayman S and a 911 Carrerra. I've driven both and, although I don't intend buying either, figured the comparisons being made by press, forum folks and Lotus made them obvious benchmarks.

You can't quite do an identical spec but aiming to get close to the Evora Launch Edition, I loaded as much of the tech, premium and sports pack stuff onto the Porsches. Including sports seats, leather interior, standard wheels, enhanced audio, cruise control, sat nav, xenons etc, with metallic paint on all of them and on MY09 base prices:

Cayman S: about

[yztop 0]

Sorry If I have duplicated. Contract Hire.

Its been discussed before that Lotus were serious within the market about this.

Anybody know how much and when the prices will be available.

[SimonR 0]

In the times where there was money to be made from speculation I can understand the factory wanting to price up the initial models. Why should speculators make money out of putting down a small deposit? It's effectively the factory playing the same game.

Simon

[Mike Kimberley 34]

Tom,

Would you be more comfortable to be able to "spec up" the car yourself from a 2+2 base, which is our manufacturer launch build this year?

Obviously some of these would have packages of options as there is considerable integration of electronics with some of the highly sophisticated systems.

I have been reading the forum and some outrageously inflated pricing has been quoted, quite incorrectly. Maybe the potential customer who quoted

[Senior 30]

Well Mike it had better be, I confirmed my colours yesterday and will hunt you down if it turns out to be a wrong'un.

Ohhh just remembered I don't know where you live, PM me... or invite me round for dinner when I pick it up from the factory.

P.S. any chance you could bump me up the list a bit, i'll keep stum if you do.

Whilst I'm at it, check out my website Mike and keep me in mind when you get round to doing up your boardroom, it looks a bit dated

Edited March 15, 2009 by Senior

[[email protected] 0]

massive thumbs-up for the man at the wheel to post here !

I think, the "Launch edition" is what it is: the very first Evoras. Why should they be priced bargain-ish, I would have expected the very opposite as some manufacturers do over here in Germany and ask for a premium to get one of the first examples of a newly presented model. So fair move to price them identically.

and yes, there have been outrageous quotes - by dealers at the time of the unveiling when nobody knew anything about prices. I have seen various of well-known UK and continental EU dealers fishing for speculators with (compared to what we know now) ridiculous offers. Would be interesting to know what would have happened if somebody had ordered a car with them for let say 75.000 GBP...

@Mike Kimberley: very nice move re the Hammond blog ! Getting the TopGear squad behind the wheel asap and making them love the car will boost the Evora image and hopefully sales wildly.

PS: Can I swap the LotusLada for a solar yellow Evora pls ?

[Dave 0]

Greetings from a friend across the pond. Would anyone by chance have heard any pricing or further info on the USA spec model?

[TomE 165]

Thanks for joining us on the forum Mike!

Yes, I guess I am leaning towards the customer spec route. Just slightly galling that doing so would mean dropping down the build list by at least 3 months or so. Unless you're re-thinking and maybe going to mix building of customer spec cars in with the Launch Edition cars?

There's possibly

[Kimbers 1,401]

Tom and others.

Watch this space. You never know!

[[email protected] 0]

do I hear a forums discount coming up ? Or a special supercharged evoraforum-edition around the corner ?

[TomE 165]

I read it as "watch this space about it being

[[email protected] 0]

I've just checked the local Porsche dealer - out of interest. They have some amazing deals going.

Cayman S: AU$140k (the last before the face lift)

Evora LE: about AU$200k

911 Carrera: AU$ 200k (again last before the face lift, but that's about $45k off)

Admttedly the 911 is a pretty standard base spec and you'd need to add about $15k to get it close to the Evora LE Spec. I still want the Evora, but it is getting into some serious territory with these Porsche oversupply problems. The dealer did mention that Porsche dont want to oversupply and only make 90,000 of them a year. This makes the 2,000 Evora, of which only 50 are coming into AU, all the more attractive...