4 ms·

10k gallons costs you $18,000 or less right now "while gas is cheap" - for a TCO of $20,000 in 20 years (plus cheap-ish repairs) - and you are driving a Merc.

10k gallons costs you $18,000 or less right now "while gas is cheap" - for a TCO of $20,000 in 20 years (plus cheap-ish repairs) - and you are driving a Merc. The model 3 (once you can actually get hold of it) will cost you $35,000 up front, plus about $7,000 in electricity for 200k miles at prices of 13-15c/kWh, plus about two battery replacements - battery lifetime is 8 years or 125k miles - at $10,000ish a pop - for a TCO of $62,000 plus repairs.

qume 11y ago
And don't forget the 'cost of money'. Take the purchase price, $35k, minus an old car, say $5k, and you have $30k making money for you over the 20 years. Conservatively, even in a bank in some countries, the return from $30k in the bank is going to pay for your gas then you'll still have the principle left over at the end.
- jjawssd 11y ago
  Can you please clarify where your numbers are coming from and what they are referencing
  - qume 11y ago
    They come from my keyboard, just above the QWERTYUIOP keys. They are referencing currency.
    - nkurz 11y ago
      What 'jjawssd' was actually asking was an explanation of the math you used to come up with those particular numbers. He's doubting that you could pay for the gas using the interest on $30K. While you do have a point that one should pay attention to the 'cost of money', it also seems possible that you were neglecting to account for the withdrawals to purchase gas along the way. 10,000 gallons of gas in 20 years equates to about 40 gallons per month. At $2/gallon, this is $80 per month. If you plug these into a compound interest calculator (https://www.investor.gov/tools/calculators/compound-interest-calculator https://www.investor.gov/tools/calculators/compound-interest...) with -$80 for the monthly addition, you find that at a 3.25% APR you can pay for your gas and still have the principal remaining at the end. 3.25% is currently higher than you can find for any US bank account, but as you say, there are definitely places in the world where this is possible. At 1% (still high by US current standards), you'd have $15,000 of your principal left at the end --- a $5,000 difference from not receiving any interest. Worth considering, but not too likely to be a deciding factor.
      - qume 11y ago
        Thanks for doing the math, I didn't take the time. FWIW 3.25% happens to be exactly what a term deposit will pay here in mexico for 90 days+ I understand that banks in other countries wouldn't do that, however you don't have to take much more risk over a bank to get 3.25% in most of the world I would imagine
        nkurz 11y ago
        By the way, what's the price of gasoline currently in Mexico? My impression is that it's historically been a regulated price, but I read something a while ago that said it was moving toward deregulation. I wasn't clear if this meant the price was expected to go up or down.
      - IkmoIkmo 11y ago
        3.25% is definitely pretty feasible. Interest rates on bank accs right now aren't a great reflection of supply and demand. But if you look at average returns on the market, say by looking at a decent first proxy for the market like the S&P 500, well that's one which has a 7% inflation-adjusted (i.e. real return) return in its history. In recent years it's been a bit higher as the market is rebounding. In general I'd assume its on the high end (century of cheap oil and all), but 4% is still a realistic long-term return figure, and so 3.25% is therefore quite doable with a moderate level of risk in a diversified portfolio. (oh and the above is not just inflation-adjusted, but also excluding dividend payouts which aren't insignificant).
mikeash 11y ago
The battery warranty is 8 years. Lifetime is not certain at this point but is likely to be longer.
- JupiterMoon 11y ago
  If you read the article it points out that there a great many exemptions in the warranty. I wonder how many "owners" will be able to have their battery replaced under warranty?
  - mikeash 11y ago
    The battery warranty covers nearly everything. The only exclusion is intentional damage. Even accidental damage is covered. I see nothing in the article that says otherwise.
Retric 11y ago
I just filled up yesterday and gas was 2.89$ a gallon. Where exactly is it 1.80?
- danielvf 11y ago
  Gas is $1.34 per gallon today in my town here in South Carolina.
- jjawssd 11y ago
  I just filled up for $ 1.39/gallon in Houston, Texas
- nkurz 11y ago
  $2.89 seems particularly high. Would it be right to guess that you are a non-price conscious buyer in California? Here's a map for the US: http://www.gasbuddy.com/GasPriceMap?z=4 http://www.gasbuddy.com/GasPriceMap?z=4 Here's a map comparing average San Francisco, California gasoline prices (one of the highest in the US) to Tucson, AZ (one of the lowest): http://charts.gasbuddy.com/ch.gaschart?Country=USA&Crude=t&Period=18&Areas=USA%20Average%2CSanFran%2CTucson&Unit=US%20%24%2FG http://charts.gasbuddy.com/ch.gaschart?Country=USA&Crude=t&P...
- greenyoda 11y ago
  $1.89 last week in NYC, where we have the highest gas taxes in the country (42.4 cents/gal[1]). So gas is probably around $1.60 across the river in NJ. [1] http://www.newyorkgasprices.com/Tax_Info.aspx http://www.newyorkgasprices.com/Tax_Info.aspx
  - nkurz 11y ago
    Interesting, I hadn't realized that NYC gasoline taxes were higher than California. Looking into it, there is some reason to argue that California higher is higher if you apply a broader definition of "tax". Here's an article showing the breakdown for California: http://watchdog.org/232083/california-gas-taxes/ http://watchdog.org/232083/california-gas-taxes/ And here's for New York: http://legacy.wgrz.com/story/news/2015/01/07/new-york-gas-prices-taxes/21391947/ http://legacy.wgrz.com/story/news/2015/01/07/new-york-gas-pr... But since the articles are using a different base price per gallon, I'm not sure what the actual difference is.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

qume 11y ago

And don't forget the 'cost of money'. Take the purchase price, $35k, minus an old car, say $5k, and you have $30k making money for you over the 20 years. Conservatively, even in a bank in some countries, the return from $30k in the bank is going to pay for your gas then you'll still have the principle left over at the end.

jjawssd 11y ago
Can you please clarify where your numbers are coming from and what they are referencing
- qume 11y ago
  They come from my keyboard, just above the QWERTYUIOP keys. They are referencing currency.
  - nkurz 11y ago
    What 'jjawssd' was actually asking was an explanation of the math you used to come up with those particular numbers. He's doubting that you could pay for the gas using the interest on $30K. While you do have a point that one should pay attention to the 'cost of money', it also seems possible that you were neglecting to account for the withdrawals to purchase gas along the way. 10,000 gallons of gas in 20 years equates to about 40 gallons per month. At $2/gallon, this is $80 per month. If you plug these into a compound interest calculator (https://www.investor.gov/tools/calculators/compound-interest-calculator https://www.investor.gov/tools/calculators/compound-interest...) with -$80 for the monthly addition, you find that at a 3.25% APR you can pay for your gas and still have the principal remaining at the end. 3.25% is currently higher than you can find for any US bank account, but as you say, there are definitely places in the world where this is possible. At 1% (still high by US current standards), you'd have $15,000 of your principal left at the end --- a $5,000 difference from not receiving any interest. Worth considering, but not too likely to be a deciding factor.
    - qume 11y ago
      Thanks for doing the math, I didn't take the time. FWIW 3.25% happens to be exactly what a term deposit will pay here in mexico for 90 days+ I understand that banks in other countries wouldn't do that, however you don't have to take much more risk over a bank to get 3.25% in most of the world I would imagine
      - nkurz 11y ago
        By the way, what's the price of gasoline currently in Mexico? My impression is that it's historically been a regulated price, but I read something a while ago that said it was moving toward deregulation. I wasn't clear if this meant the price was expected to go up or down.
    - IkmoIkmo 11y ago
      3.25% is definitely pretty feasible. Interest rates on bank accs right now aren't a great reflection of supply and demand. But if you look at average returns on the market, say by looking at a decent first proxy for the market like the S&P 500, well that's one which has a 7% inflation-adjusted (i.e. real return) return in its history. In recent years it's been a bit higher as the market is rebounding. In general I'd assume its on the high end (century of cheap oil and all), but 4% is still a realistic long-term return figure, and so 3.25% is therefore quite doable with a moderate level of risk in a diversified portfolio. (oh and the above is not just inflation-adjusted, but also excluding dividend payouts which aren't insignificant).

mikeash 11y ago

The battery warranty is 8 years. Lifetime is not certain at this point but is likely to be longer.

JupiterMoon 11y ago
If you read the article it points out that there a great many exemptions in the warranty. I wonder how many "owners" will be able to have their battery replaced under warranty?
- mikeash 11y ago
  The battery warranty covers nearly everything. The only exclusion is intentional damage. Even accidental damage is covered. I see nothing in the article that says otherwise.

Retric 11y ago

I just filled up yesterday and gas was 2.89$ a gallon. Where exactly is it 1.80?

danielvf 11y ago
Gas is $1.34 per gallon today in my town here in South Carolina.
jjawssd 11y ago
I just filled up for $ 1.39/gallon in Houston, Texas
nkurz 11y ago
$2.89 seems particularly high. Would it be right to guess that you are a non-price conscious buyer in California? Here's a map for the US: http://www.gasbuddy.com/GasPriceMap?z=4 http://www.gasbuddy.com/GasPriceMap?z=4 Here's a map comparing average San Francisco, California gasoline prices (one of the highest in the US) to Tucson, AZ (one of the lowest): http://charts.gasbuddy.com/ch.gaschart?Country=USA&Crude=t&Period=18&Areas=USA%20Average%2CSanFran%2CTucson&Unit=US%20%24%2FG http://charts.gasbuddy.com/ch.gaschart?Country=USA&Crude=t&P...
greenyoda 11y ago
$1.89 last week in NYC, where we have the highest gas taxes in the country (42.4 cents/gal[1]). So gas is probably around $1.60 across the river in NJ. [1] http://www.newyorkgasprices.com/Tax_Info.aspx http://www.newyorkgasprices.com/Tax_Info.aspx
- nkurz 11y ago
  Interesting, I hadn't realized that NYC gasoline taxes were higher than California. Looking into it, there is some reason to argue that California higher is higher if you apply a broader definition of "tax". Here's an article showing the breakdown for California: http://watchdog.org/232083/california-gas-taxes/ http://watchdog.org/232083/california-gas-taxes/ And here's for New York: http://legacy.wgrz.com/story/news/2015/01/07/new-york-gas-prices-taxes/21391947/ http://legacy.wgrz.com/story/news/2015/01/07/new-york-gas-pr... But since the articles are using a different base price per gallon, I'm not sure what the actual difference is.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]