Where are the 2019's

Using Cars.com, the closest I could find a 2019 to NC (27006 zip) was about 265 miles away in Marrietta GA.

https://www.cars.com/for-sale/searchresults.action/?mdId=36363973&mkId=20017&page=1&perPage=50&rd=500&searchSource=SORT&showMore=false&sort=distance-nearest&stkTypId=28880&yrId=36362520&zc=27006

 

I just saw a Green 2019 Touring at Ed Voyles Honda, Marietta Georgia today. I was told it was the display model for the Atlanta Auto Show from about a month ago. I was there picking up my Silver 2018, which I will write about later tonight.

 

To takes some of the mystery out of it, there is something called ZEV, which you may or may not have heard of, it stands for the Zero-Emission Vehicles program first started in California and now adopted in several other states including Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island and Vermont. It's a complicated program, a very oversimplified explanation is that each car manufacturer is required to sell a certain percentage of plug-in cars compared to their total sales volume in that state. The method used is actually "credits" of varying amounts which are earned for each car sold, but for simplicity just think of it as a percentage of cars sold. The states allow a portion of the plug-in cars sold to be PHEV vehicles like the Clarity to be counted towards the requirement. If the car maker falls short they pay a huge penalty, so they make sure they sell enough in those states to meet the minimum requirement.

In addition the car makers usually offer big cash incentives to buyers in those states, and the states themselves often have tax breaks in addition to the federal one, so that tends to keep cars flowing off the lots and makes it take even longer before they have enough of a surplus to start shipping cars in any appreciable quantity to the non-ZEV states. The unconfirmed assumption is that the car manufacturers don't make a big profit on these cars and they only sell as many as they have to to meet the requirement, which is presumed to be one reason for the lower quantities and lack of advertising.

Recently in Georgia and NC they started really dropping the prices on 2018's, probably this indicates that they will start getting a larger quantity of 2019's soon. So if someone really wants a 2019 they probably just need to wait a couple more months or so, although it will probably be hard to get a discount while the 2018's are still on the lots.

 

There is not much incentive for dealers who have unsold, discounted 2018s on their lots to order undiscounted 2019s. Other dealers who have decided they don't want to stock Clarity PHEVs at all aren't going to be ordering 2019s unless a customer special-orders one. A special-ordered Clarity would take a few months to get through Honda's ordering queue.

 

Yes customer demand which essentially is what you are referring to is also a factor in how many cars are available in a particular region. But most car buyers want the newest model and I think it would be unusual for a dealer to avoid ordering the new model just because they still have a few of last year's model in stock. The clear trends the past couple of years for Prius Prime and Clarity (I'm not as familiar with Volt) goes well beyond being explained just by customer demand or lack of dealer interest. We keep seeing boatloads of these type of cars shipped to the ZEV states and big factory incentives only to buyers in those states. And it's not like car buyers in those states are more PHEV savvy (except maybe California) it's just that people walk onto the lot and there is this highly discounted brand new car that they have maybe vaguely heard about and then they find out from the salesperson that besides the big factory incentive there is also a big federal and maybe even state tax credit, and so they become intrigued and wind up purchasing. Quite a lot of Prius Primes sold that way in those states, enough anyway to apparently meet the quotas.

Of course EV and PHEV advocates will also be seeking out the cars, but in non-ZEV states they run into a lot of dead-ends with none on the lots, dealers saying they can order one but it will take months, or if they have one they will only sell it at MSRP or maybe $1,000 off and with a bunch of dealer add-ons. And often they only have the top trim level which further discourages people who are already dealing with lack of factory incentive, lukewarm dealer discount, and no state tax credit.

Then about midway through the model year the logjam to the non-ZEV states starts to lighten up and cars become more available, although still without big discounts (except maybe at year end). Then as the new model year is rolled out the cycle begins again. If you haven't looked at Cars.com or similar sites recently, search for 2019 Clarity and you have to sort through pages and pages of NJ, NY, CT, RI, CA, MD etc. cars trying to find any 2019's in non-ZEV states, they are almost non-existent. Yes part of that may be because there are still some 2018's on the lot in those states but I think the much bigger hidden picture has to do with ZEV.

 

Many of the discounted 2018 Claritys in dealer lots have been there a long time. We forum members know that some idiot dealers don't follow Honda's guidelines about maintaining a charge in the HV battery. Many dealers are so clueless that they deliver Claritys with no EV miles to make the customer's drive home more enjoyable.

The knowledge that some dealers can damage the HV batteries through neglect certainly makes a 2019 Clarity a safer purchase, but if the dealer has followed Honda's charging guidelines, a 2018 Clarity, which is identical to a 2019 Clarity, is a better buy. A dealer who is unable to move the 2018s off their lot is more likely to increase the discount on a 2018 than to order a 2019 that may sell in place of one of their aging 2018s.

It will be interesting to see if climbing gas prices have any effect on Clarity sales. BTW, I realized another benefit of driving a Clarity yesterday when a friend told me her credit card had been "skimmed" when she inserted it in the pump at her local gas station.

 

It's an unusual car so I don't disagree that some dealers might in theory hold off on ordering 2019 Clarities if they haven't gotten rid of the two or three 2018's that have been sitting on their lot for six months, but I don't think it's how dealers normally operate unless they just don't plan to order any more unless it's a special order. I really think they can't get them now in some states even if they wanted them or we would see more out there in the middle of the U.S.

About the battery prior to purchase I had read comments similar to yours (maybe even one of your comments) and considered it good advice, and anyway wanted to get as new of a 2018 as possible so I searched my area by VIN number and only went for the newest ones, mine was built in Nov 2018 and based on the VIN I suspect late November, so I figure it arrived at the dealer sometime in December. It had 16 miles on it indicating at least one test drive, which I suppose helps the battery unless they just ran the EV farther down. But it was almost fully charged when I drove it which is a hopeful sign, unless they charged it up the night before because they knew that was the one I was looking for, but then it would have more likely been fully charged so I tend to think it was already charged for awhile. But I think it becomes even more critical if it is even older car sitting on the lot since August and when you test drive it there is no charge.

 

That is exactly how I ended up with my Clarity. I tried to get the Ioniq, but the dealer did not have a plugin, said they were hard to get, and when they found one it was the top trim line with almost no price give. The Clarity, with the bigger tax credit and bigger dealer discount ended up being cheaper than the Ioniq dinky mobile. Which is how I ended up with such a big, fancy car.