{"id":27673,"date":"2025-05-13T15:22:43","date_gmt":"2025-05-13T15:22:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=27673"},"modified":"2025-05-13T15:25:51","modified_gmt":"2025-05-13T15:25:51","slug":"is-slate-autos-electric-truck-the-answer-to-expensive-cars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=27673","title":{"rendered":"Is Slate Auto\u2019s Electric Truck the Answer to Expensive Cars?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Slate Auto, a start-up backed by Jeff Bezos, plans to sell a small, spartan electric truck that comes with no paint, stereo or touch-screens.<\/p>\n

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When Slate Auto, a start-up, unveiled a roughly $25,000 electric pickup truck last month, social media lit up with comments. Many people saw the no-frills vehicle, with an easy-to-repair body and nostalgic hand crank windows, as a refreshing antidote to today\u2019s overstuffed and increasingly unaffordable cars.<\/p>\n

How unaffordable? Average monthly payments on new cars have soared to $739 in March from $537 in January 2019, according to Cox Automotive. The average new car costs $47,400, with electric models around $59,200. High interest rates, now around 9.4 percent for a 72-month loan, have made cars even more of a financial stretch.<\/p>\n

\u201cPrices and interest rates are both high and stuck,\u201d said Mark Schirmer, director of industry insights for Cox Automotive. \u201cIf you haven\u2019t been in the market since 2018, it\u2019s got to be shocking what a car costs.\u201d<\/p>\n

President Trump\u2019s tariffs of 25 percent on imported cars and parts have consumers scrambling to buy before prices rise even more. Cars that cost less than $30,000 are especially vulnerable \u2014 nearly 80 percent of those are subject to tariffs. They include consumer staples like the American-made Honda Civic and Toyota Corolla, which rely on imported parts. Supplies of budget models are expected to shrink, and automakers may stop importing certain models entirely.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Enter Slate, a company based in the Detroit suburbs backed by venture capital firms and Jeff Bezos, the Amazon founder.<\/p>\n

Chris Barman, a former Fiat Chrysler engineer and Slate\u2019s chief executive, said the Slate Truck was expressly designed to ease sticker shock, although it won\u2019t be available until late 2026. The company plans to produce the pint-size truck at a retrofitted printing plant in Indiana, with a capacity for 150,000 a year.<\/p>\n

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Slate Auto, a start-up backed by Jeff Bezos, plans to sell a small, spartan electric truck that comes with no paint, stereo or touch-screens.When Slate Auto, a start-up, unveiled a roughly $25,000 electric pickup truck last month, social media lit up with comments. Many people saw the no-frills vehicle, with an easy-to-repair body and nostalgic hand crank windows, as a refreshing antidote to today\u2019s overstuffed and increasingly unaffordable cars.How unaffordable? Average monthly payments on new cars have soared to $739 in March from $537 in January 2019, according to Cox Automotive. The average new car costs $47,400, with electric models around $59,200. High interest rates, now around 9.4 percent for a 72-month loan, have made cars even more of a financial stretch.\u201cPrices and interest rates are both high and stuck,\u201d said Mark Schirmer, director of industry insights for Cox Automotive. \u201cIf you haven\u2019t been in the market since 2018, it\u2019s got to be shocking what a car costs.\u201dPresident Trump\u2019s tariffs of 25 percent on imported cars and parts have consumers scrambling to buy before prices rise even more. Cars that cost less than $30,000 are especially vulnerable \u2014 nearly 80 percent of those are subject to tariffs. They include consumer staples like the American-made Honda Civic and Toyota Corolla, which rely on imported parts. Supplies of budget models are expected to shrink, and automakers may stop importing certain models entirely.Enter Slate, a company based in the Detroit suburbs backed by venture capital firms and Jeff Bezos, the Amazon founder.Chris Barman, a former Fiat Chrysler engineer and Slate\u2019s chief executive, said the Slate Truck was expressly designed to ease sticker shock, although it won\u2019t be available until late 2026. The company plans to produce the pint-size truck at a retrofitted printing plant in Indiana, with a capacity for 150,000 a year.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and\u00a0log into\u00a0your Times account, or\u00a0subscribe\u00a0for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?\u00a0Log in.Want all of The Times?\u00a0Subscribe.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27675,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27673","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27673","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27673"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27673\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27676,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27673\/revisions\/27676"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/27675"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27673"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27673"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27673"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}