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What's happening
VW's long-awaited ID Buzz electric van finally has a price -- in Germany.
Why it matters
We can now start to make some educated guesses about where the EV will price out in the US.
What's next
More US-specific pricing is expected to arrive early next year before the ID Buzz goes on sale as a 2024 model.
Volkswagen has announced pricing for its long-awaited ID Buzz electric van in its home market, Germany. While we've got a while to wait until the retro-futuristic people-mover goes on sale in the US and Canada, the pricing helps us ballpark where a North American model is likely to end up.
In Germany, the VW ID Buzz Pro -- the passenger model -- starts at €64,581.30, or €56,606.30 after Germany's environmental incentives (Europe will also get ID Cargo, a slightly less-costly delivery vehicle). It's important to note that doing a straight currency conversion here, resulting in a starting price of $60,000 USD, would be misleading. That's partially because the pricing includes Germany's VAT -- Value Added Tax -- which adds around 19%. It's also because the ID Buzz's powertrain and standard equipment will likely have some variances between markets, and not just because we'll only get the longer-wheelbase version in our market.
So what does all this mean for ID Buzz intenders here in America? It -- and a CNET Cars' source -- suggests US pricing for the seven-seat, battery-powered van will start at around $55,000 before delivery fee and any applicable incentives like the IRS' $7,500 Qualified Plug-In Electric Drive Motor Vehicles federal tax credit. Just that one credit should bring the base MSRP down to around $47,500 plus freight -- slightly less-expensive than Volkswagen's five-seat Atlas SEL R-Line SUV, which is currently the brand's largest vehicle. That pricing would place VW's charismatically styled van into the same general ballpark as mid-to-high-end versions of many smaller electric crossover EVs such as the Kia EV6 and Ford Mustang Mach-E -- seemingly reasonable for a much more capacious vehicle.
Volkswagen's Retro ID Buzz Is Super Cute and Fully Electric
The only other electric van currently on the market in America, the 2022 Ford E-Transit, starts at $51,880 (including $1,695 for delivery) before incentives, but it's a very different vehicle, and not just because it's a two-seat, cargo-only commercial hauler.
Of course, we won't have US ID Buzz pricing and equipment levels for quite a while yet -- probably not until next year. That's because the automaker is staggering the global rollout of the vehicle, which means when it finally rolls off the docks and onto our shores, it'll carry a 2024 model-year designation. That means an already long wait is going to be even longer, however, so hopefully the uh... buzz won't wear off before VW's hotly awaited model arrives in dealers.