After Fisker filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2024, resale values on the brand’s Ocean electric crossovers plummeted. Although owners banded together in an effort to sustain parts availability, service, and software support for their electric crossovers, not every owner is thrilled with their EV. For those who want out, a settlement has been reached, and although it’s not ideal, it seems substantially more attractive than trying to do a traditional trade-in.
It’s worth noting that some people love their Fisker Oceans and plan on keeping them, and that’s dope. The ongoing history of the automobile needs people to preserve these EVs because of the story behind them, and while they probably won’t appreciate in the future, I could see them becoming niche collector items. However, there are also people who don’t want to daily drive a car with extremely limited factory support, and with parts scarcity having the potential to total out Ocean crossovers for relatively minor hits, it’s understandable why some people might want out with as little negative equity as possible.
These days, gently used Fisker Ocean crossovers list for retail sale in the neighborhood of $20,000, and considering the Fisker Ocean started at $41,437 and rose to nearly $64,000, simply trading in your electric crossover could leave you with a crushing amount of negative equity. If Carmax was only offering $13,500 for examples of the electric crossover in 2024, I’d hate to think how low wholesale offers must be today. While a settlement reached between class action law firm Hagens Berman, JPMorgan Chase, and Rivian might not wipe out all that negative equity, it certainly seems like the most competitive offer Ocean owners are going to get.
According to a letter from Hagens Berman, it seems that Ocean owners will actually be receiving several options. As per the law firm:
These offers will provide three different options: 1) you may sell your vehicle to Rivian for a fixed price; 2) you may trade in your vehicle to Rivian for the same price and receive incentives for the purchase or lease of a Rivian vehicle; or 3) if your vehicle is inoperable or “bricked,” and cannot be repaired, Chase will purchase your vehicle from you at a fixed price. In each case, the fixed price will be an amount equal to the purchase price minus an amount for usage of the vehicle since your purchase.
Of course, there’s no standard mileage and use deduction stated, but the early results of this settlement structure seem promising.
One Ocean owner posted an offer letter on Reddit, and it states a value of $36,454.68 as a trade-in toward a new Rivian. I don’t know about you, but that seems a whole lot better than a retail value of around $20,000, or a standard wholesale value that’s sure to be a whole lot lower than that. Another Ocean owner commented on the same thread stating that they received an offer for $54,242.47 on their top-spec Ocean Extreme.
Now, if you do want to replace a car and are carrying negative equity, there’s a good argument to be had for leasing. Sure, you don’t build any equity in a new vehicle by leasing as you’re simply paying for depreciation, but leasing often offers smaller payments over a shorter term than financing, and that may let you wipe out that negative equity in a quicker timespan than financing a new vehicle, resulting in a blank slate.
For instance, Rivian has a lease offer on specific R1T trucks for $599 per month with a $7,000 downpayment and an $895 acquisition fee. It’s a 36-month lease with 10,000 allotted miles per year, meaning that if you can afford to package the negative equity in your Fisker on top of this lease deal, it could all be paid off in three years. Oh, and that’s before we get into additional discounts Rivian may throw in on certain models to sweeten things.
While this settlement won’t be to everyone’s liking, it’s a way better scenario than truly being up the creek without a paddle. Less negative equity is better than a catastrophic amount of negative equity that may result in unapprovable loan-to-value ratios on a replacement vehicle, and it’s possible that some Ocean owners might actually come out ahead here.
Top graphic credit: Fisker
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What does rivian have to do with fisker?
I feel like swooping in as a savior is a pretty good way to build brand equity.
I guess it is a way to access a market that is known to be open to EV SUV’s, and move some metal
Saw one of these for the very first time a coupe of days ago on my morning commute. Honestly, it was very striking for what it is. I felt a pretty solid mix of excitement for seeing such an elusive car, and sadness for the owner now stuck with it.
What’s even funnier is that I STILL have not seen a single new Z on the road, and I live in a fairly high income area that is crawling with lots of other sports cars in that price range.
Strangely I also saw one for the first time this week, twice, on the roads of northern Sweden. A fairly unreliable EV from a defunct manufacturer with no service infrastructure is a very strange choice, especially in a cold climate.
Very bold choice indeed! I found it to be a pretty attractive car, but I certainly wouldn’t want to deal with one unless it was given to me. I see an old Fisker Karma on the roads near me every so often however, so maybe some of these will make it a few years.
Surely the same folks who made/marketed/sold the Flux Capacitor Kit for the DeLorean will come up w/something to make the Fisker frisky for many years.
There’s an Ocean Extreme on BaT this week, current bid is $10K
Still a better value (and vehicle) than the Cybertruck.
Man, I guess I’m just getting old or boring but when you factor all the costs on that Rivian lease together, you’re basically in it for $1/mile BEFORE tax, insurance, and electricity IF you hit the 10k miles a year.
I mean, probably a better deal than keeping the Fiskar (which is a shame as I kinda like it) but still doesn’t seem like a screaming deal to me.
Man… talk about “Fisker Karma”. Ooooofff.
Make it pretty on the outside and build it shitty on the inside and you will have people throwing money at you.
If by shitty on the inside you mean the mechanicals then you just described the Land Rover business model.
Where’s my offer from Chase re: the piece of shit house we bought 20 years ago that no one wants, except lowballers?
I know what I got. YMMV.
Is it rust free?
Any mods?
How many miles?
LOL! No miles but several rough hurricanes.
Taking offers, no ballers though.
it’s a shame Fisker didn’t make it, they are a nice looking suv. Even my husband commented when we saw a Fisker taxi running around nyc lol
Every week or so, I go on Auto Trader just to see how cheap the Oceans might get down to, if it would ever be low enough to take a flyer on. This week there were a couple in the high $16K range. Given this news, yesterday would have been the perfect time to buy one off Auto Trader.
Even more interested in what happens to them after Rivian buys them.
Haha I do the same thing! I might be able to put up with it for a while
Honestly I just assumed everyone who bought one got hosed when Fisker closed up shop. This seems like a pretty good way to get out of that situation. And of course, a great way for Rivian to drum up some sales.
They got hosed off. So e came cleaner than others but mud was left on every one.
I dispute the suggestion that any private owner without their own EV/Software support infrastructure keeping these is a good idea. These are essentially Blackberry phones of the automotive world. They won’t work on an existing network, won’t run your apps, and if you break something on them won’t be able to get parts.
This is not like keeping a little Yugo still going that’s all analog and simple, this is a giant power electronic device that the company didn’t exist long enough for the aftermarket to ramp up parts for, and also no longer exists. It’s not even like my 2000 Ford Ranger Electric that is still fairly analog and replacement parts for the non-ev things are readily available for.
Unless they’re going to put it in a private collection and just have it on display, there’s no point in hanging onto it, and they should totally swap it for an R1S as soon as possible.
Some enterprising fanatic might take up the challenge and LS swap the thing. There’s also the drivetrain, electronics, fuel, and god knows what else. Maybe not such a good idea.
Remove the unsupported stuff and replace it. The body frame etc is workable do an LS SWAP.
My ex-wife needed an EV a few months ago and was looking for the absolute cheapest AWD EV she could find.
I begged her not to buy an Ocean and for once she listened to me. Owning one of these out of warranty is something I wouldn’t even wish on … well … my ex wife.
I don’t see why the owners would take this offer. A defunct marque with terrible resale value, little to no support, and rapidly diminishing parts availability is typically the point at which a vehicle becomes interesting.
Hey where can I get whatever you are on?
Mostly it’s just two-stroke exhaust.
I can imagine the phones at Rivian are ringing off the hook from all the Fisker Ocean drivers trying to get rid of their cars.
Odd that Rivian would make such a generous offer, I can’t see what benefit they stand to gain, aside from selling a bunch of new vehicles this quarter to boost stock price.
It’s more of a Chase offer and Rivian is joining by stacking up a nice discount towards a new vehicle
That’s a small bit of nice news. Better something than nothing.
Vinfast missed their chance!
I’m very curious about Rivian’s plans for the Oceans that they are acquiring . . .
Has to be tear down or engineering study? Maybe they want to see if they can throw in their controllers and fix the mess. Would be a selling point on their supplier side to legacy oems.
I would love to see them use their hardware and software to fix them. They could then sell retrofit kits or offer retrofit services to those who didn’t sell them back.
Hell yeah…”Ocean by Rivian” models that are given a new lease on life, plus Rivian retains some of the other models for parts…that’s a big gamble to build consumer goodwill, but it’s definitely interesting
Good way to gain credibility
It might be worth it to that leasing company that bought most of them to get that done.
Wouldn’t one suffice for tear down/backwards engineering?
If just looking at how it’s built. I don’t think anyone cares about that for fisker other then if there are common failure points. But failure from age and use could bring some insights on what not to do. Plus cheap mules for testing things for the upcoming smaller Rivians.
Dump them at auction
Dump the Oceans in the ocean.
Maybe they’ll create a new Ocean racing series!
New technicals in some austere location.
Probably to dump them at auction and write off their losses. Benefit being that they gain fairly wealthy customers who will hopefully stick with the brand.
I’m guessing I missed some big news or something. Can someone explain why Rivian is involved at all?
Rivian financial services are by chase. Chase gets rid of headache and sells and upsells Rivian.
I present to you the new Rivian R2S.
I can only speak from the banking side, but when we foreclose/liquidate, we usually want nothing to do with whatever it is the borrower did. So maybe they struck a “loss sharing deal” with Rivian where they share the pain. JPM comes out a little better off, and Rivian gets to tinker with something they’re at least familiar with (and can get a lot of publicity for it).
Just speculation, but I’ve seen this kind of thing before with strange inventory/equipment liquidations or esoteric real estate foreclosures.
I was wondering the same thing. Would have loved some exposition on this in the article. Maybe there’s a follow up to be written about Rivian’s involvement and motivation.