Being a fleet-owner I really liked your contribution here! Well done I'd say. One thing though: There are several different Car-Lease forms available here in The Netherlands and they really all are very different. Some indeed cover maintenance as well, some even the gas-bills. So please make sure you choose wisely which lease form suits you best. In fact the largest difference between lease forms are: Business lease or Private lease. They both come in New Car lease and Used car lease. Business lease usually goes from the firm you are working for. Ask Human resources of the firm you work for if the firm has a car lease arrangement available for you. And then there is the several forms of Full operational lease and financial lease. So just take your time to figure out which car lease form suits you best.
Most profession jobs are not in the downtown. Sadly, you will need a car anyway. I prefer 30 minutes of traffic than waiting for over an hour between buses. Cars may be nasty, expensive and "selfish"... but they are so damn comfortable and useful.
That was insightful as mist of it I didn't know myself. You don't need a car in cities, but in the country side it is handy if it is raining cats and dogs and a bus comes only once an hour at a stop you have to walk more than 500 meters to. It is nice to have options. It is not uncommon to have multiple cars in a household in the Netherlands as well as often a couple will work at different spots in a radius of 50 Km (~30 Miles) of where they live. I've never owned a car in my life, but was always glad some friend could help me move stuff with one when I needed to do that.
Oh I had no idea that it was common to have more than one vehicle, very interesting! I can definitely relate to living outside a major city - we live in a quite small village - and we have to bring my daughter to a neighboring village for daycare. It takes us about one hour in the morning and one hour in the evening by bike and it won't really be possible by other transport. Most days it is okay with proper planning but some days (when you have a long work day or the weather is not good), it can be challenging. That's the main reason why we started to research getting a car. And found lots of interesting information :)
I suppose towns like Hague and Amsterdam and that area are great for bikers/pedestrian commuters but pretty much everywhere else you need a car. If I need to get from Heerlen to Maastricht airport it's over an hour to commute, 20 minutes on a car, sometimes it's not even comparable! For me it's faster to use a regular bicycle and ride for an hour than commuting by public transport, yeah, it's that awful in Limburg.
Netherlands charges a motor vehicle tax based on the number of kilometers people drive. great way to make the hard working class the poor class lol!!! and why does the volvo xc40 cost 15,000 euros more than in the US?
You obviously missed the part about taxes. Catalog price is base price + 21% VAT (and if not electric add bpm (+21% tax over bpm)) Look up the price for a v8 mustang, you 'll be freaking out.
Taxes but also big companies sell it in the way that they have the same price but in different currencies depending on the country e.g. 45k USD in the US and 45k EUR in the Netherlands but it is not the same price AT ALL 😅
I don’t know where you got that idea from, motor vehicle tax (BPM) isn’t based on how many kilometers you drive, but on how much CO2-emission a car put in the air. That’s why an EV doesn’t pay BPM, only road tax. The road tax is based on the amount of CO2-emission, particulate matter emission and weight of the car.
And car culture is just a clever trick from big car and oil companies who want to get as much of your money into their already overfilled pockets...car culture is a well designed infrastructural flaw by people who want to get rich of your inconvenience of not being able to get a pack of sugar from the supermarket without using /needing a car.
