Why is the price so much higher than when it was initially announced. It was supposed to be around $25k, not $40k. That is a big difference. Forget that the car itself is totally different than originally shown. I bet that if the design would've been the same as when it was announced, inventory would not be able to keep up. Did the government help GM so that the consumer can get screwed with this ridiculous price. I route for cars made in America, yet I can't afford the one thta I want.

Here's why. Pricing talk, prior to now and regardless of its source, was always (to some extent or another) little more than speculation. It was not announced, and couldn't be. You can't announce what is not known.

Let's travel back in time a year at a time, starting with this month. Now, I didn't go back and research months when events happened or anything like that, this is just an illustration.

Today: $41,000 starting MSRP. This is based on actual procurement costs, known labor-cost factors, market studies, intended profit margin, expected warranty claims, etc.

2009. The production design mostly established, but some things are adjusted as engineering and testing continue. Suppliers are starting to be lined up, but not necessarily selected for every component. Pricing/quantities not negotiated, therefore costs unknown. Bean counters just starting to sharpen their pencils...

2008. Volt is green-lighted for production around mid-year. Production vehicle design starts picking up steam. Battery supplier candidates being identified, but costs unknown. Everything else is still pretty much still a guess. No way a real price could be nailed down at this point.

2007. It's just a concept! EVERYTHING related to money is, at best, a guess.

There has been talk of $40k for a while, some from GM.

Another recent factor is that it would be bad politics for GM to be losing money on sales of the car. A lot of the pricing speculation in the past assumed that GM would be willing to take a loss on these early sales.

I been waiting to see what GM would do with volt since they dump the EV 1 back 1999. My Dad had this car it was awesome, the only reason GM killed that car , it was starting to get more popular than the gas cars and GM thought they were in trouble with selling gas guzzlers.
Big mistake that could of been the Toyota Prius of the 90's. Of course they said it had problems to justify getting rid of it. I was driving it with my Dad and it was perfect.
Any way can't do anything about that now. Now the Volt at $40 k price tag is a ridiculous price, here we go again the price is out most people's range.
Wake up and smell the coffee, were in a terrible economy hardly any one can effort this carat $40,000. And that's not with tax options and loan added on. Figure paying $50 to $60 when done with the loan, how are you going to recouped you cost. $40 k can buy a lot of Gas most people for the rest of their life. Suck arrogance once again. Gm is run by idiots that don't know anything about the real world.

Just like anything. If you can't afford it or don't want to pay the asking price, don't buy it. The MSRP is set to temper demand to be on par with supply. Since they are only making 10,000 vehicles for the entire world, $41,000 is about right. Before you get mad at GM for making the Volt cost so much, why don't you try to build your own and see if you can do it for less than $40,000 each. Right now the only company who is making electric cars is Tesla and they cost about 3 times that for a car with less seating and cargo room, granted they have longer range and go faster, but most people don't need more than 40 miles a day anyway and GM is standing behind these cars for 100,000 miles, that's a long time. Literally everything in the Volt is cutting edge technology from the tires, to the power train to the stereo, 5 years of OnStar included...

Besides the warranty, remember these cars have taken GM billions of dollars of R&D to get to where they are. They are the main thrust in funding an entire new industry of battery production in Michigan - LG Chem is building a cell production factory, GM built their battery pack facility, A123 is building a production facility there, there is an entire new program at the University of Michigan surrounding this, GM has built the biggest battery testing facility in the world, and now they are branching out funding start up companies to work on EV tech, they are also building electric motor production facilities, and remember, those federal tax credits wont be around forever, soon the price will be the price and if the Volt can't be sold at a profit at that point, it might not be around for very long. If you're in some of the first Volt markets, included in that price, you also get access to a free installation of a 220V charger in your garage courtesy of the DOE, and in California they are putting up 5,000 charging points. There's a lot resting on those 10,000 vehicles. From what I hear, they are taking a loss on the first year models and hope to have the price down in 2012 and 2013 so that they'll break even selling them at $41,000 eventually.

I am actually happy they are charging so much for the first gen, that means that they can recoup the initial engineering costs that much quick which means that gen 2 and 3 might actually be affordable for a lowly soon to be college graduate like myself.

Interesting response you sound like a politician , you totally ignored the most important points of what i wrote . " GM made a Ev before it worked beautiful " I guess you work for the factory typical salesman.

Sigh. Chevyman, welcome to the forum, but rather than marching in and making insulting declarations (GM is run by idiots, another poster is a shill for GM), read up a little more and see if your opinions evolve a little.

Just a few ideas to get you going:
- lease terms mean GM is encouraging leasing. why?
- can you think of reasons why low production numbers in the first year would actually be prudent?
- if GM could see that demand would likely sell out the first year, why NOT price it the high?
- if market forces (i.e. dealer markup) would lead to people willingly paying $40K and up anyway, why NOT price it that high?

Be more civil and your arguments will get more traction.

The ev1 was much more expensive than the volt and sat half as many with no range extender and even Toyota discontinued their rav4 ev as soon as they could citing that they were too expensive. Yes they could've sold a few thousand a year but GM and Toyota are major auto makers not interested in that kind of headache to build a car for sale in one state when they need vehicles that they can sell to entire continents if not the world for them to be able to make a profit when parts suppliers can ramp up to mass production and they can precisely estimate demand levels and spread burden costs etc. Even vehicles that sell by the millions and share engines and platforms and other common parts with other vehicles and even other auto makers often are money losers.

Sorry for my comments if they seem faulty. Question with the production of only 10,000 should I sign up to be one a waiting list or is it first come basic thank you

Question with the production of only 10,000 should I sign up to be one a waiting list or is it first come basic thank you

A little of both ... On July 27th when GM announced the pricing, they said we could start talking to dealers and placing orders with them. Indeed this is pretty much the opposite of what Nissan did, with their centrally controlled system. Check the articles on the front page of this site (going back to July 27th) for more info about what's going on with that.

The rumors going around a couple days ago were that the 2011 model run is basically sold out and dealers have started taking names for 2012. So you're probably too late to get a 2011 car. This is why there's so much attention to pricing and dealers here for the last two weeks, because many thousands of people have been hurriedly making their orders, placing deposits, color decisions, etc.

There's HUGE demand for this car, even with the high price and dealer markup. Some people want to be early adopters, and are willing to pay.