Taking advantage of the tax rebate to buy a new Clarity every year

We did the trade and it went reasonably well. The Honda dealer experience in Elk Grove CA was actually good, but still we were there for two hours.
I am so glad to be rid of the Crimson Clarity with a battery range drop of about 9 miles and no hope that Honda would do anything about it. I don't mind turning it over to the Honda dealer, after all Honda says the battery is inside specifications. But I just couldn't sell the car on the open market knowing the buyer would not have the best battery performance.

Coincidently the car developed a second problem. Many others have had wheel bearings fail and so did we. I would say about two weeks ago I did hear a faint noise. I thought it was an air leak around the window so I opened and closed the windows but nothing changed. Wednesday of this week I clearly heard the noise which had gotten louder. Yesterday even louder. Today on the way to trade in the car it could not be ignored. I did tell the salesman about it but he just shrugged it off. They can fix it under warranty.

As we traded in a Crimson Touring for a White Touring we didn't expect anything new or different. Honda hasn't done anything to upgrade the car over these couple of years. But there were just a few subtitle things. The wood accents were a bit darker and they feel a bit smoother. The steering wheel material also feels a bit smoother. The small change that I really appreciated was they moved the Main button on the steering wheel to the position to the left. That was a good move because I would mistake the Main button for the Down button and shut off all of the driving assists.

 

That's the most significant modification to the Clarity PHEV I've heard about. Good luck with your Platinum White Pearl Clarity. Now please excuse me; it's time to wash my dark, Moonlit Forest Pearl Clarity again.

 

Today I heard the new slow speed sound which is different than our 2018 model. Putting it in reverse the sound is quite loud. It is quieter in Drive mode and seems to have volume changes depending on the car speed.

Another thing I noticed, or it's my imagination, is the 2020 car accelerator pedal detent seems to be further toward the floor. In other words I don't encounter the resistance until the pedal is pushed further down. I'm sure if it is changed it doesn't alter the behavior of the pedal, it just is a longer way from no pedal to the point where the detent I encountered. I'm curious if anyone else thinks the same or not.

 

Here's a HondaLink question. I've reported that we upgraded from a 2018 to a 2020 model yesterday. I now have the phone app HondaLink all set up and working with the new car, but can't figure out how to remove the 2018 car from the app. Does anyone know how to do that?

 

Open HondaLink and then click on the little person icon on top left. That opens Account Settings. You should see you car(s) under Manage Subscriptions. Click on the 2018 and select Deactivate. There might be more, but I stopped there so I didn't deactivate mine.

 

Thanks but I did get that far before but the 2018 is still there.

 

I still have my old car in my HondaLink app, just to see what's happening to it. The car is still sitting at the auction lot

 

For those who sold their cars on Vroom or similar online services, how did the "condition" aspect go? Do they reserve the right to inspect the car post pickup and arbitrarily reduce the price, or is that handled earlier in the process?

I've, um, never gotten rid of a car that wasn't in "poor" to maybe "average" condition due to age/dents/scratches/mechanical issues, so have no idea what selling a nice recent car in good condition worth more than a couple thousand is like

 

Technically, they could reduce the price if "any of the information you provided about the Vehicle is not accurate". Here's the section dealing with this in Vroom's selling disclosures:

Leasehackr has a couple of threads in their forums about people selling to Vroom or Carvana . I did not see anyone's offer reduced after pickup.

 

I’ve sold a car to Shift, they will come to your house to do the inspection and give you the final price on the spot. Only a few hundred dollars in deductions for some wear and tear. I felt it was fair.

I’m in the process of selling another car to Vroom. Will report back what ends up happening.


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Maybe call Carvana rep? Or email them?

I bought my Clarity 2020 Base last year May. Just under 4K miles driven. Before I pay registration fee for next year, I wanted to see if I can swap with a 2021.

But I need to first get my 7500$ refund from IRS xD


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I’m running into the same issue.

Carvana is offering more for the 2019 model than CarMax / Vroom / AutoNation are offering for the 2020 model. I’m tempted to just start the Carvana process pretending the car is a 2019, and then hope they’ll adjust upwards once they get the paperwork.


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Ended up trading in my 2020 base to AutoNation for $22,500 a few weeks ago. They flipped it for $26,500.

I paid $23,500 OTD 9 months earlier so I thought I got a reasonable deal.


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What will replace your Clarity?

 

Upgraded to a Volvo XC90 Recharge


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With 400 hp and 472 lb-ft of torque, the Recharge is certainly an upgrade in power. However, the XC90 Recharge is two or three times the price of a Clarity PHEV, offers 18 EPA miles of EV range, and gets 27 combined mpg, so you're swapping affordability, EV range and fuel economy for speed and luxury. I like Volvos, but for that money I expected double the EV range.

 

I am also disappointed by the lack of EV range in the XC90. However for my particular use case the range is sufficient to cover 90% of my daily commute.


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