It's been a while since I started this project and I'm still far from done with everything I want to add to it, but I think it's currently "good-enough" to share with the community. It's a tough market out there and I hope this will help you level the playing field when working with dealers asking for ridiculous markups by giving you an idea of what is out there in terms of stock as well as what's coming soon. I had so many dealers assuring me that "this is the only one in the county/state/country/etc" when I was searching and it was almost never true, if ever.
Some background
I started this project back when I was looking for an EV6 of my own. As soon as EV6's started hitting the lots, I started collecting data on VINs around me up to a few states away so I could get an idea of what dealer had the exact configuration(s) I was interested in--we've all see the ridiculous markups so this info was essential for any attempt at negotiations. Although my early data set was pretty specific, eventually I transitioned to nationwide data as I tried to help others locate their own preferred configuration. At some point after I started collecting data, I came a cross a neat tool the Telluride folks put together; the mission seemed similar to what I was going for, but it was specific to Tellurides and we're looking for EV6's here. The EV Finder added EV6 support eventually as well and although it was similar to what I was working on, I still wanted more options to filter on (specifically... installed options), so I kept gathering data and continued to put the project off to when I had more time. While I putz around not doing anything more interesting than continuing to collect data, another website popped up that offered a peek at EV6 VINs that weren't in the Kia online inventory search yet, but kept the data behind a paywall--it was essentially the same data I had been tracking, but behind a paywall and it seemed like all you really got was a spreadsheet of VINs. Anywho, eventually I finally got to putting something together and here's what I came up with.
xisve.com (Search) (looks weird, but it's just "evsix" backwards, get it?
)
What it is
TODO (in no particular order of importance or priority)
Some background
I started this project back when I was looking for an EV6 of my own. As soon as EV6's started hitting the lots, I started collecting data on VINs around me up to a few states away so I could get an idea of what dealer had the exact configuration(s) I was interested in--we've all see the ridiculous markups so this info was essential for any attempt at negotiations. Although my early data set was pretty specific, eventually I transitioned to nationwide data as I tried to help others locate their own preferred configuration. At some point after I started collecting data, I came a cross a neat tool the Telluride folks put together; the mission seemed similar to what I was going for, but it was specific to Tellurides and we're looking for EV6's here. The EV Finder added EV6 support eventually as well and although it was similar to what I was working on, I still wanted more options to filter on (specifically... installed options), so I kept gathering data and continued to put the project off to when I had more time. While I putz around not doing anything more interesting than continuing to collect data, another website popped up that offered a peek at EV6 VINs that weren't in the Kia online inventory search yet, but kept the data behind a paywall--it was essentially the same data I had been tracking, but behind a paywall and it seemed like all you really got was a spreadsheet of VINs. Anywho, eventually I finally got to putting something together and here's what I came up with.
xisve.com (Search) (looks weird, but it's just "evsix" backwards, get it?
)What it is
- EV6 search tool - looking for an EV6? Put in some search criteria and see if and where your desired configuration exists (or will soon)
- VIN lookup tool (US only, for now) - enter an EV6 VIN, and get detailed info about it
- FREEEEEE
- Search by installed options
- See in stock, in transit, and even VINs that that haven't been loaded on a truck yet
- A "best effort" is made to not overwhelm you with results and return cars that have likely already been sold
- Did I mention it's free?
- Reliable! Remember, this tool is free so you get what you pay for! Things may break, it may even disappear entirely someday, no warranty, guarantees, of accuracy, availability or otherwise are implied
- On that note, an effort is made to provide accurate stock information, but this is all just data aggregated from different public sources so it's going to be as accurate as the sources--which I have found to often times not be that accurate
- A window sticker lookup tool -- I am not planning on hosting window stickers for several reasons, but an effort is made to give you any info you might want from one
- Data is refreshed a few times a day, at random
- Pre-transit means the VIN exists, but hasn't shown up as in-transit or in-stock yet. From looking at how long it takes for the average VIN to change to in-transit from this state, my best guess is that the car is at the port of entry by this point. I've seen some VINs go from this state to in-transit within a couple of days so there's a strong likelihood that it's several days after coming off of the production line.
- In-transit likely means the VIN is on a truck and headed to it's destination dealer; again anecdotally, I've noticed the amount of time a VIN spends in transit is usually relational to the distance between the destination dealer and port of arrival.
- In-stock doesn't always mean available for purchase... the car may already be sold or on hold well before arrival. Again, my best guess here is that in-stock means just means the dealer has received the car.
- This is still a work in progress, but it's basically just a hobby for me that I work on when time allows (which isn't often). It's free and I plan on keeping it that way, but at the end of the day it costs me time and money to put it out there (domain name, server resources, etc.) so I do accept tips, but I do not and will not ever require it. The data itself is public and I don't claim ownership to it, thus I have no right to sell it in my opinion.
- I will eventually open source this in a very generic form, but there's a lot of cleanup I have to do before I get there and working on my TODO list is a higher priority for me right now.
- Feedback is welcome. If you have ideas on how to make this better, please feel free to let me know!
TODO (in no particular order of importance or priority)
Option to narrow down search to specific dealerDone- Ability to add multiple vehicle options to search criteria
- Year support (2023 production hasn't begun yet, but once it does year will be included in results)
- Better mobile view/support
- Plot interesting statistics
- FAQ
- (Very) Basic support for non-US VIN decoding
- In-general polish here and there, for example you may see a random ugly "File not found page" error, once in a while. You'll probably still get the error after the polish, but it'll at least be prettier!
- Display average times for each state in detailed view
- Option to "subscribe"/be alerted to status changes for any particular VIN
