Checking in from the Pacific Northwest (USA)

[Concept24]

Welcome to the forum Jonny. Park Place Lotus in Bellevue Washington is close to you, and they should have a drivable demo car sometime in the next few months. To place a deposit with them, they require a $5,000 deposit which is refundable, and if you decide to turn that into an actual order, when you do that they want an additional $10,000 which is added to the 5, and that total amount is not refundable. They do not add an ADM, they sell at MSRP. Alan Grana is the salesman I placed my order with there, and he's been great. If you happen to meet him at the dealership, he's a good guy to deal with.

The First Edition (FE) was the launch spec that included virtually all the options you could get on the car. It was a special price. As others have stated, those were all sold almost immediately. You had to place your order within the first week of the car's debut to get an FE allocation, and even then that depended on which dealer you placed your deposit with.

Lotus originally had allocated 700 FE's to North America, with approximately 500 of those being for the U.S. Those could be with either the V6 or the i4. Those were divided up among the 40 dealers in the country. Park Place is the 2nd biggest dealer in the country, and they were originally allocated 45 cars, although now some are saying 40 for some reason. I'm not sure which is more accurate, but either way all their cars are already accounted for. Last year Lotus met with the dealers from North America and announced they were increasing the allocation for North America to 1,900 cars for the next production run (the FE is the first production run). That will however, depend on their ability to get early manufacturing issues sorted out, and start producing cars at the rate they originally said they would.

The FE is simply the base model with all the options at a special bundle price. You should be able to order a base model and add all the options yourself, but it will be more than the FE, so for the U.S. I would expect a do-it-yourself bundle to be over $100k. The FE is about $94k, but that was with the original pricing before inflation had hit. We're expecting a price bump of some kind for new orders, but Lotus hasn't said anything about that yet.

That was an excellent writeup. I am surprised that your dealership is requesting $5000 when dealerships in CA are asking for far less (like my $3000 deposit). Perhaps that has something to do with the number of orders?

 

[MPD]

That was an excellent writeup. I am surprised that your dealership is requesting $5000 when dealerships in CA are asking for far less (like my $3000 deposit). Perhaps that has something to do with the number of orders?

It just depends on how dealers want to manage their clients/orders. Gator initially required $2500 and then upped to $5k. For another limited car I ordered, the dealer did a verbal handshake and no deposit and then my C8, the dealer required $2k.

I suspect that higher deposits help weed out people that might not be super serious to hold a place in line.

 

[Magma]

Park Place (Bellevue) was also originally $2500 but increased it to $5k to help weed out non-serious buyers, I believe, since there was such high demand..

 

[JonnyD72]

Welcome to the forum Jonny. Park Place Lotus in Bellevue Washington is close to you, and they should have a drivable demo car sometime in the next few months. To place a deposit with them, they require a $5,000 deposit which is refundable, and if you decide to turn that into an actual order, when you do that they want an additional $10,000 which is added to the 5, and that total amount is not refundable. They do not add an ADM, they sell at MSRP. Alan Grana is the salesman I placed my order with there, and he's been great. If you happen to meet him at the dealership, he's a good guy to deal with.

Thanks for recommending Alan. Just got home from the dealership and I "might" have slipped Alan my credit card for the $5,000 deposit. Ok, I did! He seemed VERY optimistic in regard to order and arrival timing, so I guess we'll just have to wait an see. September/October order with a December '23 arrival seems aggressive.....

Let the wait begin!

 

[MPD]

Congrats and welcome to the dog pound. Given that FE v6 are now being delivered July-Oct, seems very optimistic to order and receive a base in '23. I hope it happens for you though

 

[ltullos]

I placed my refundable $2,500 deposit for a Base V6 with Lotus of Dallas (Earth MotorCars) on 1/26/23. I had to give them my target configuration for FE; but knowing that it would be a Base. Pricing was not committed other than it will be MSRP + destination charges from port of entry. My order confirmation is that I'm #120 at this dealer, where approximately 20% of orders are local and 80% from all over US. I don't think they are taking Canadian orders. They are expecting their first FE deliveries to take place in April or May, and I will have a chance to briefly drive one by July. My salesman said my delivery might occur 2Q-2024

Now my real expectations are:

• that the earliest Base deliveries won't occur before late 4Q-23 and 1Q-24
• There will likely be 25-35% of orders canceled ahead of me (everyone moves up one spot)
• My delivery will be 3Q-2024 to 1Q-2025
• Price by that time will be $100-115K and possibly even higher if USD weakens as I'm expecting. (I did confirm with him that price was dependent upon currency exchange rate)​

My configuration is Sports / Manual / Magma Red / Full Black Pack /Red Calipers / Black Alcantara w/ Red Stitch / Black Alcantara Steering Wheel / No Privacy Glass

• 

 

[Magma]

I placed my refundable $2,500 deposit for a Base V6 with Lotus of Dallas (Earth MotorCars) on 1/26/23. I had to give them my target configuration for FE; but knowing that it would be a Base. Pricing was not committed other than it will be MSRP + destination charges from port of entry. My order confirmation is that I'm #120 at this dealer, where approximately 20% of orders are local and 80% from all over US. I don't think they are taking Canadian orders. They are expecting their first FE deliveries to take place in April or May, and I will have a chance to briefly drive one by July. My salesman said my delivery might occur 2Q-2024

Now my real expectations are:

• that the earliest Base deliveries won't occur before late 4Q-23 and 1Q-24
• There will likely be 25-35% of orders canceled ahead of me (everyone moves up one spot)
• My delivery will be 3Q-2024 to 1Q-2025
• Price by that time will be $100-115K and possibly even higher if USD weakens as I'm expecting. (I did confirm with him that price was dependent upon currency exchange rate)​

My configuration is Sports / Manual / Magma Red / Full Black Pack /Red Calipers / Black Alcantara w/ Red Stitch / Black Alcantara Steering Wheel / No Privacy Glass

• View attachment 23205​

If base price goes to anything over $105k with no options added, I'm definitely out. Too many other better cars out there at that price. I couldn't justify it. I'd wait for a used one...

 

[dgrace]

If base price goes to anything over $105k with no options added, I'm definitely out. Too many other better cars out there at that price. I couldn't justify it. I'd wait for a used one...

I agree, that would definitely put it into the "Evora gulch" where it's priced like a top-performing sportscar, but doesn't quite match up to the competition by the numbers and you have to take a big leap of faith with service/support. (I think we all live in mortal fear of needing a clutch replacement!)

 

[Magma]

I agree, that would definitely put it into the "Evora gulch" where it's priced like a top-performing sportscar, but doesn't quite match up to the competition by the numbers and you have to take a big leap of faith with service/support. (I think we all live in mortal fear of needing a clutch replacement!)

Totally agree. Interestingly, I read an older Doug Demuro Jalopnik article yesterday about Lotus leaving the US and would anyone care? He touched on those points as well.

 

[MPD]

If base price goes to anything over $105k with no options added, I'm definitely out. Too many other better cars out there at that price. I couldn't justify it. I'd wait for a used one...

100% agree. I'm fortunate to get an FE that isn't going to price increase ... otherwise I would move on to something else if the BE was going to be that expensive

 

[Magma]

100% agree. I'm fortunate to get an FE that isn't going to price increase ... otherwise I would move on to something else if the BE was going to be that expensive

Lol...I've bought 2 cars (sold 1) since I put my deposit in July 2021. So I already have a "waiting for an Emira" car but ya...it's gonna be interesting to see where BE prices fall. Looks are the only thing keeping me in at this point.. Every time I think about cancelling, I see a new video and decide to hang in there a bit longer

 

[981KMAN]

One additional positive for the Base Cars that I did not see mentioned is the availability of Advanced Driver Assistance System (ADAS) options that are not on the First Edition models:

Lane Change Assist;
Anti-collision system;
Fatigue alert;
Road sign information;
Lane departure warning;
Rear cross traffic alert.