I bought my first EV.
Then came the $7,000 surprise.

I reached out to the first electrician I could find. He came out, looked around, and told me a permit wasn't necessary for the job. That felt off, so I looked it up myself and sure enough, a permit was required. Not a great start.

I moved on to a second electrician. This one was legitimate. But what I expected to be a straightforward charger installation turned into something much bigger. My home's electrical load was higher than the existing panel could handle. That meant adding a sub-panel, which I had never heard of and never would have guessed was coming. New circuits had to be run, conduit pulled into the garage, and by the time it was all said and done, I was looking at a bill for $7,053.

I had no idea that was even possible. I had zero context going in. No way to know what my panel situation would mean for the job, no way to know what a load calculation even was, and no way to benchmark whether the quote I was getting was fair. I just handed over my credit card.

Actual Invoice (Redacted)

And to top it off, when the job was done the charger ended up mounted directly next to my electrical panel. The shortest conduit run saved the installer money on materials, but it left me with a charger wedged right against the panel door. Every time I unplug, the cable catches on the panel. It works, but it's not what I would have chosen if anyone had asked me.

The Actual Install

I'm not here to complain. The electricians who did the work were professional, and the sub-panel genuinely needed to happen. But the experience made one thing obvious: homeowners going into an EV charger installation are flying blind.

Nobody tells you upfront that your electrical load might require a sub-panel. Nobody explains that the first contractor who says “no permit needed” might be wrong. And there's no easy way to know whether the quote you received is reasonable or not.