60-Month TCO Model — Real Market Data¶

Companion to upgrade-recommendation-2026-07-14.md. Compiled 2026-07-14. Every price below is sourced from mid-2026 transaction data (Reddit/Leasehackr/Edmunds prices-paid, CarsDirect/TrueCar market averages, CarGurus Seattle listings) — citations inline. Single anecdotes are labeled.

Market realities baked into every number¶

1. Seattle vehicle tax is 11.05% — 10.55% general rate + the statewide motor-vehicle tax that rose 0.3%→0.5% on 2026-01-01 (WA DOR, Avalara Seattle). (New 8% luxury surtax applies only above $102K — irrelevant here.)
2. The federal EV credit is dead (30D and the 45W lease passthrough ended 2025-09-30 under OBBBA — CNBC), and WA's EV sales-tax exemption expired 2025-07-31 (WA DOL) — an EV9/Ioniq 9 never qualified anyway ($45K cap). But Kia and Hyundai replaced the credit with their own cash: $10,000 on the EV9 and $10,000 on the Ioniq 9 (CarsDirect EV9, RealCarTips Ioniq 9).
3. The Telluride Hybrid transacts at/over MSRP (TrueCar: +0.8% nationally; $5K markups common in CA — CarsDirect, Leasehackr 50-dealer shop) — the only markup car left on the board.
4. There is no Telluride Hybrid "SX AWD" — SX is FWD-only; the AWD mid-trim is X-Line SX ($54,490 + $1,545 dest) (Kia Media pricing).

Shared assumptions¶

Formula: Net 60-mo = OTD − $25K trade proceeds − resale @60 mo + fuel/energy + insurance + maintenance; ÷60. (Credit basis — for ranking candidates against each other. The keep-vs-swap wealth basis is translated in §6.)

Funding the purchase — cash pay + trade-in (the baseline)¶

Locked 2026-07-15. Every number on this page assumes:

1. $25,000 Sportage trade-in (and its $2,763 WA trade-in tax offset) — baked into every OTD above and below.
2. Cash purchase, funded from the $109K US Bank Joint Savings (HYSA yielding ~4–5%). No loan is modeled unless a subvented APR is noted.
3. The opportunity cost of that cash is real: ~$200–250/mo of forgone HYSA yield per $60K pulled from savings. §5 now carries this as a uniform per-candidate line item, so the all-in monthly of a cash purchase is visible — the modeled $/mo alone understates it.
4. When financing beats cash: if a subvented APR promo beats the HYSA yield, take the loan and leave the cash earning — 0.99% (Volvo), 1.99% (Rivian), and 3.75% (Lexus) clearly qualify; Toyota's 4.99%/48 on the Grand Highlander Hybrid (buyatoyota WA) is right at the line and worth running against the quoted HYSA rate at signing. Rule of thumb: promo APR at or below the HYSA yield → finance; above it → cash.
5. Rejected: selling from brokerage to fund the purchase. Highest-cost funding path on the board — the same opportunity cost, plus capital-gains tax realized now. The HYSA is the funding source; the brokerage stays untouched.

1. Real-world OTD — what these actually sell for (July 2026)¶

"Sell" = realistic negotiated selling price incl. destination. OTD = sell + tax (after trade credit) + $1,100 fees. The $25,000 Sportage trade-in and its $2,763 WA trade-in tax credit are baked into every number on this page.

2. Seattle vs out-of-state — verdict: don't drive¶

• No tax play exists. Buying in Oregon saves nothing: WA collects use tax at your Seattle rate at registration (WA DOR). Doc-fee delta is ~$0–50 (WA caps $200, OR ~$250).
• No documented price pattern favors Portland/Spokane on any candidate in 2026. Historical Telluride threads actually show the reverse — Portland dealers marked up $5–7K while Seattle stayed $1–2K over (tellurideforum WA thread, 2021-era, labeled historical). Individual dealer variation dominates region everywhere we looked.
• The one exception worth email (not driving): the Telluride Hybrid. If Seattle Kia stores hold markups, the documented escape valves are Denver-area stores selling at MSRP + ~$800 with order waits (tellurideforum). Email quotes cost nothing; fly-and-drive only if the delta clears ~$2K after the trip. The Ioniq 9 is the opposite: PNW is already the best-discount region (RealCarTips).

3. Buy last year's model (1-yr CPO) — works for 3 of 12¶

Rule that falls out: CPO only works where depreciation is savage (CX-90 PHEV, XC90, EV-anything) — and on EVs the new-side discounts already capture most of it. On Toyotas, CPO is paying new-car money for a used car.

4. Leasing — July 2026 offers¶

Context: with 45W dead, lease economics run entirely on manufacturer subvention. Kia/Hyundai/Volvo are subventing; Toyota/Lexus are not (MF 6.2–7.4% APR-equivalent, zero lease cash — Edmunds Sienna thread, Edmunds TX thread). WA taxes lease payments (~11.05%), and the trade-in credit legally works on leases — but don't sink $25K of Sportage equity into a lease; sell it separately if leasing.

When leasing makes sense for Peter: exactly one scenario — the EV experiment. He's unsure about EV-vs-hybrid direction; 8K mi/yr fits any 10K cap; an EV9/Ioniq 9 lease at ~$592–610/mo all-in transfers the worst-in-set depreciation risk to the captive and leaves a 2029 exit when the tech and charging map look different. That optionality costs ~$180/mo over buying the same discounted EV9 and holding 60 mo. If the answer is a hybrid (Sienna/Telluride), leasing is strictly worse than buying — no subvention, strong residuals you'd be renting back.

Cash-pay wrinkle (added 2026-07-15): once the forgone HYSA yield on the purchase cash is counted (see Funding, above), the EV9 lease-vs-buy gap narrows from ~$180/mo to ~$60/mo — the lease leaves the ~$32K of net cash in savings earning ~$120/mo. And a 36-mo lease signed now ends in 2029, one year ahead of the anticipated 2028–2030 Sienna-redesign / improved-Carnival window, which is exactly when Peter plans to re-decide. Under that bridge lens the EV9 lease is the tightest strategic fit on the board.

5. The board — head-to-head (credit basis, $/mo over 60 mo)¶

¹ GH range reflects resale sensitivity (60–65% retention). ² At MSRP; each $1K of markup ≈ +$18/mo. ³ Range reflects unknown PHEV resale (52–55% retention assumed — no track record). ⁴ 4-yr-hold sensitivity (2030-bridge lens, added 2026-07-15) for the shortlist cars: operating costs pro-rated to 48 mo; capital consumed by month 48 assumed at 70% of the 60-mo total for Toyota hybrids (back-loaded curves — the Sienna loses only ~5% in 3 yrs per iSeeCars), 80% for the Kia/Hyundai hybrids (near-linear), 85% for the TX PHEV, 90% for EVs (front-loaded — iSeeCars EV9 curve). Direction is the point: front-loaded depreciators (EVs, the TX) get worse on a 4-yr hold; flat-curve hybrids and CPO buys don't. Derived sensitivity on the same inputs — not new pricing data. ⁵ Opportunity cost of paying cash: net cash out × ~4.5%/12 (US Bank joint HYSA at ~4–5%) — ~$200–250/mo per $60K pulled from savings. All-in cash-pay = buy-new $/mo + opp. cost. Leases leave the capital in savings (opp. cost ≈ $0), which is why the EV9 lease's premium over buying is ~$60/mo all-in, not ~$180.

Detail math for the top three:

• Sienna Platinum: net cash $38,857 − resale $35,900 (60% of MSRP) + fuel $5,333 (33 real MPG) + ins $12,970 ($2,394 baseline + $200 class delta) + maint $2,400 = $23,660 → $394/mo
• Telluride SX-P: net cash $37,896 − resale $29,000 (50%) + fuel $6,069 (29 real) + ins $13,250 ($2,394 + ~$250 class delta) + maint $2,400 = $30,615 → $510/mo
• EV9 Wind: net cash $31,689 − resale $24,250 (37% of MSRP — iSeeCars EV9 curve) + energy $2,000 + ins $14,500 ($2,394 + ~$500 class delta) + maint $1,800 = $25,739 → $429/mo. Resale is the swing: each ±$3K ≈ ±$50/mo. The lease exists to cap exactly this.

6. Peter's actual question — the swap delta, restated on the wealth basis¶

keep-vs-swap-2026-07-14.md basis (capital consumed + operating + tabs; keep-Sportage ≈ $630/mo):

So: the upgrade premium is ~$240 (Sienna), ~$290 (EV9), ~$355 (Telluride). The Telluride's HDA2 tiebreaker costs a real ~$1,380/yr over the Sienna, and the EV9 is the middle option on money, not the most expensive.

7. Sensitivities & gaps¶

• Every $1,000 of price movement ≈ $18/mo. Insurance deltas are class estimates — a Progressive quote on the target VIN is still the biggest single unknown.
• The 2030-bridge lens changes the hold assumption, not the math: Peter anticipates a Sienna 5th-gen redesign or a materially improved Kia Carnival (AWD hybrid or PHEV) in the 2028–2030 window, which makes this a 3–4-year purchase, not a 5-year one. The 4-yr column above is the sensitivity for that; the strategic ranking lives on the site homepage.
• The Sienna Woodland Edition ($51,600 MSRP, AWD standard, raised suspension, factory hitch + 1500W outlet — KBB) is not separately modeled; it lands between the XLE ($304/mo) and Platinum ($394/mo) figures. Worth a model run if it survives the test drive.
• EV9/Ioniq 9 resale assumptions are the least certain numbers in this file; the lease is the hedge.
• Telluride Hybrid markup risk is real and local — get OTD quotes from Chuck Olson, Puyallup, Lee Johnson in the same week; email Denver stores for leverage.
• Facebook groups not searched — FB anti-bot blocks prevented group-thread access this session; OTD data leans on Leasehackr/Edmunds/forums/CarsDirect-TrueCar instead. The NO MARK UP TOYOTA group is worth a manual scroll before the Sienna purchase.
• Lease offers expire ~8/3/26 (Toyota/Lexus) and ~7/31/26 (Kia/Volvo/Mazda/Rivian) — numbers reset monthly.