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Tesla Price Drop Angers Current Owners

33 points by spking 4y ago

metadat 4y ago
JS-free archive link: https://archive.today/eEBxn https://archive.today/eEBxn Note: This article is from 2 days ago (Friday, January 13th).
KennyBlanken 4y ago
> “I have solar scheduled to be installed soon. Really having a hard time giving Tesla any more of my money and can’t even look at the car this morning,” Checketts said in an email. He said he instead drove a Prius today. It never ceases to amaze me how wealthy people can be so incredibly immature. "I didn't get a discount on my expensive car, so I cannot look at it / drive it. I will drive another vehicle."
- dingusdew 4y ago
  [dead]
- caned 4y ago
  Wealth has curious ways of keeping you in arrested development.
- randomdata 4y ago
  I suppose the difference is that they can afford to be. If any of the rest of us stopped liking our car on an arbitrary whim, we'd have to suck it up and drive it anyway.
renewiltord 4y ago
Companies in commodity electronics and stuff try to fight this with a 30 d price protection guarantee and stuff. Ultimately, though, it's unlikely to move sales that much for Tesla. Anyway, I'll do the required stuff on this thread and mention Osborne Computers.
thebigspacefuck 4y ago
Hard to feel bad for someone complaining they paid too much for a $77K luxury car.
- phillipcarter 4y ago
  Hah, the person quoted: > Marianne Simmons, a self-professed “Tesla fan girl,” bought her second electric vehicle from the company in September Yeah, if someone can afford multiple Teslas I don't see why I should care about how they feel about prices.
  - europeanguy 4y ago
    These fanboy people are disturbing. I recently met an apple fanboy for the first time and it's unbelievable the mental gymnastics he used to explain how everything apple does is amazing. This is even though his his iphone, which is only 3 years old, is sluggish as shit. Thats not a problem according to him, because it's an intentional design decision by apple. Some people pick a brand and it becomes their identity.
    - njharman 4y ago
      Now realize people do that with politics, science (climate change), etc.
      - Kon5ole 4y ago
        I have also observed that the intensity of someone's opinion is often mirrored in the intensity of their opponents contrary opinion, and if they argue about it long enough both of them will soon drift towards irrational fanatism on either side of the topic.
    - azinman2 4y ago
      Yes instead everyone should be numb and cynical to everything /s I’m not a Tesla fanboy, but what’s wrong with being one? If someone is getting enjoyment from something in life, isn’t that a good thing? Is it rational to love the sports team that just happens to be where to live, regardless of circumstance? Most aesthetic decisions in life aren’t “scientific” and cold.
moistly 4y ago
Smart money says to wait a few more months before buying a Tesla — the price is likely to drop again. Especially likely if everyone waits a few months more…
- qudat 4y ago
  This price cut was done to be eligible for the US tax credit. Once March hits there will be battery requirements which will limit the amount a Tesla owner can receive as a tax credit. Feel free to wait, but I doubt the price is going to drop much more.
  - mertd 4y ago
    Or they would have to drop the price even more because the buyers cannot use the credit as a discount.
  - Dylan16807 4y ago
    > One half is based on the EV battery having at least 40 percent of its critical minerals sourced in the US or one of its free trade partners; the other half is based on the EV battery having at least 50 percent of its components manufactured or assembled in North America. Those percentages are meant to scale up in the coming years as well. This is because the IRA seeks to make certain that batteries are sourced and built in North America, not just the cars themselves. That feels like it might take a while to meet.
  - manmal 4y ago
    No, the price cuts were international.
dangerboysteve 4y ago
Doug DeMuro has a pretty good video of some other issues at play for drops in Telsa used car values. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GT-9_As6qq4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GT-9_As6qq4
jedberg 4y ago
The way luxury car brands usually do this is by slowly lowering the price, $1K-$2K a month, or offer incentives. Tesla couldn't do that here because they need to quickly come in under the cutoff for the new laws. But if they didn't want to take a huge PR hit, they could have sent checks to all the recent buyers. Say $13K to someone who bought in the last month, $10K if you bought 1-2 months, and so on. Then the new prices would fit the new laws and the recent buyers would actually be happy and do marketing for you instead of being angry and do anti-marketing, which will be more powerful since they just bought it. Going and telling their friends "I just bought a Tesla and you should not" will be way more costly to them than the checks.
- ourmandave 4y ago
  Unless they complain on Twitter.
- cinntaile 4y ago
  I don't know what specific laws you mean but they dropped the price worldwide, no?
  - jedberg 4y ago
    There are a bunch of new US tax credits that have income and vehicle price limits.
- kuboble 4y ago
  I'm not sure if "I just bought a Tesla and you should not" is a compelling argument if it's followed by "because it's a great car and I like it but now it's cheaper!"
  - jedberg 4y ago
    I think the argument would be "wait and see if they drop the prices again before buying".
    - 4y ago
sergiosgc 4y ago
Angers some current owners. You can always find people to complain about anything. It's just that bashing Tesla sells newspapers today, and that's where the news industry is going. I bought a Model 3 seven months ago. At the time it was a good car, at a fair price. Even with perfect hindsight, it was a good decision.
- bwanab 4y ago
  And as Musk pointed out, back in the days when Tesla raised prices, no customer who got the prior low price volunteered to send Tesla a check for the difference.
  - Dylan16807 4y ago
    That's not a good argument. The general expectation is that customers should know when lowered prices start and end, and be able to take advantage of them. Not that they want the newest price.
    - bwanab 4y ago
      I know it's not. I was being tongue-in-cheek.
- sshine 4y ago
  I got a Model Y three months ago. Je ne regrette rien.
- limitedsupply 4y ago
  Usually the fairness that people seek in these situations is just the desire to dump the unfairness on someone else. E.g. the demand to extend the discount to 3-month old purchases ignores the fact that the people who bought a car 3 months and 1 day ago will feel more upset and wronged.
  - Dylan16807 4y ago
    More wronged? Maybe a couple very unreasonable people. In general I doubt it. Also you can handle that with a staggered discount.
sshine 4y ago
It could have gone the other way: With EV sales doubling every year, battery production might hit a price surge like chips have.
davesque 4y ago
This article is kinda dumb. Looks like they managed to track down a handful of people who were bothered by the price cuts. Wouldn't it be more surprising if they couldn't find anyone that was bothered by them? If they had cited some kind of survey where a significant portion of respondents had expressed frustration, then I think we'd have a story. The title suggests that many more owners are upset than just a few. And no I don't own a Tesla nor do I plan to.
ww520 4y ago
Tesla can offer the recent buyers some credit toward their next purchases of Tesla products on a sliding scale, with more credits for more recent purchases. The credits can be time limited, like within 2 or 3 years. This addresses the complaints and ropes in their next purchases.
throwaway4good 4y ago
Around here they had to do something; cars like the MG4 are just silly value compared to Tesla at the old prices.
bhouston 4y ago
This is an interesting price drop. One of the key value proposition of Tesla is unique among car companies in terms of the premium it can charge. This has kept $TLSA so high. This is why it has been so highly valued in comparison to say Toyota. If for some reason they need to start discounting their cars in order to move them, it means that they may be losing this premium, which could permanently affect their long-term stock price. The question is why would that premium now be dissipating? Why is Tesla just becoming another car company? Because of competition finally catching up? Because of the macro-economic factors? Because of Elon Musk's reputation hit because of the twitter mess? How much can we attribute to each factor?
- ajross 4y ago
  I think that's all needlessly complicated. This is just market economics 101. There was a huge boom in demand over the past two years (used Teslas were literally selling for more than new ones because they had "stock"!) and the price rose to catch up. Now the economy is cooling and inventories are rising, so the price is dropping. FWIW: the same Model Y configuration that I purchased in early 2021 is still $1000 more than the price I paid (actually quite a bit more if you buy FSD, which is $5k more than it was on mine). It's not like these are fire sale prices. They got very expensive very fast, and that's being unwound just as fast.
  - bhouston 4y ago
    > Now the economy is cooling and inventories are rising, so the price is dropping. US car sales are not dropping across the board, it is specific to Tesla. New car sales volume in $ has been consistent since September 2021. https://ycharts.com/indicators/us_total_vehicle_sales https://ycharts.com/indicators/us_total_vehicle_sales > the same Model Y configuration that I purchased in early 2021 is still $1000 more than the price I paid That is lower than inflation for the car industry in general, which is somewhere around 7%. So Tesla prices are dropping relative to the car industry in general. This is interesting and reinforcing that something is going on.
    - 4y ago
lnsru 4y ago
I am really happy about cheap model Y Europe in Germany. Even with that crippled range and acceleration. I ordered Kia EV6 10 months ago and have no idea when it arrives. No communication from Kia at all. List price increased by 3200€ since I signed contract. Makes me sad and willing to cancel my order. I hate being treated like shit for years by a car company. After cancellation I will seriously consider purchasing model Y. It’s big enough for small family and should cover my driving needs for a week on a single charge.
- manmal 4y ago
  I can almost guarantee you that the EV6 would be a low-maintenance car. Hyundai/Kia EVs are well-built and very reliable. With Tesla, it’s quite the mixed bag, some people are regulars at their repair shop. I value my time highly and will not take that risk.
  - dgfitz 4y ago
    Hyundai sends out more recall notices than I’ve ever seen before. We got 11 in 6 years for our Elantra.
adamqureshi 4y ago
This is not a price DROP. Tesla JACKED up prices on ALL models last year and people forgot about it and now TESLA just went back to the original prices. I been following them since 2016 and they have done this in 2018 with the MODEL S / X P100DL. Exact same shit happened with the first tax credit around 2017 with the release of the MODEL 3. I been scraping their inventory and you can plot the price changes and their used inventory prices are UPSIDE DOWN. Nothing new tesla normal behavior its just that a LOT of news outlets forget this that do not FOLLOW the price volatility. I am now thinking to do a youtube channel to lay it out. -2cents
- ajross 4y ago
  Not the original prices, actually. They're back to where they were in mid-pandemic. And "JACKED" is a bit spun. It was the market for used Teslas that drove the price increases. They got way above the retail prices; people were actually scalping Teslas. Someone was going to make that money, it might as well be the manufacturer.
- maximus-decimus 4y ago
  I think the price of a base model 3 went from 40k to 60k during covid. I don't understand why people are surprised it's going down now that the car shortage is coming to an end.
  - dlivingston 4y ago
    I bought a Model Y in 2020 and, during the peak of used car price inflation, I could have sold it used for a good bit more than I paid for it new.
- mertd 4y ago
  Indeed if you hibernated in early 2021 and just woke up, the prices would look kind of same. But the other side of the coin is also interesting. Up to six months ago, they couldn't make them fast enough when they were selling the cars for $15-20k more. Now the inventory is piling even with incentives and discounts.
- 4y ago
pensatoio 4y ago
I bought one four months ago. I wouldn't have pulled the trigger if I didn't think I was getting my money's worth. Would be nice to have 10k extra, but such is life.
danans 4y ago
I lost the previous $7500 EV tax credit thanks to the IRA kicking in before my ordered (and overseas manufactured) EV arrived. If my household is successful enough financially the next few years I won't qualify for the new credit due to income limitations, but only by a few ten thousands in gross income over the limit. Sure, it kind of sucks to miss out on thier, but I'm still glad that the IRA passed and that the benefits are targeted at people making half what my household makes. It's time for mass EV adoption, not just EV adoption for the upper middle class and above.
- saddd 4y ago
  I barely qualified for a previous state credit within $1000 of the cutoff, right before more than doubling my income during the pandemic industry craziness. I think cutoffs that don't scale or prorate somehow are so ridiculous. There's no reason to make things all-or-nothing. The criteria should still give you something if you're rich, even if it's $1, so everyone else in the band doesn't get screwed.

33 points by spking 4y ago

JS-free archive link: https://archive.today/eEBxn https://archive.today/eEBxn Note: This article is from 2 days ago (Friday, January 13th).

KennyBlanken 4y ago

> “I have solar scheduled to be installed soon. Really having a hard time giving Tesla any more of my money and can’t even look at the car this morning,” Checketts said in an email. He said he instead drove a Prius today. It never ceases to amaze me how wealthy people can be so incredibly immature. "I didn't get a discount on my expensive car, so I cannot look at it / drive it. I will drive another vehicle."

dingusdew 4y ago
[dead]
caned 4y ago
Wealth has curious ways of keeping you in arrested development.
randomdata 4y ago
I suppose the difference is that they can afford to be. If any of the rest of us stopped liking our car on an arbitrary whim, we'd have to suck it up and drive it anyway.

renewiltord 4y ago

Companies in commodity electronics and stuff try to fight this with a 30 d price protection guarantee and stuff. Ultimately, though, it's unlikely to move sales that much for Tesla. Anyway, I'll do the required stuff on this thread and mention Osborne Computers.

thebigspacefuck 4y ago

Hard to feel bad for someone complaining they paid too much for a $77K luxury car.

phillipcarter 4y ago
Hah, the person quoted: > Marianne Simmons, a self-professed “Tesla fan girl,” bought her second electric vehicle from the company in September Yeah, if someone can afford multiple Teslas I don't see why I should care about how they feel about prices.
- europeanguy 4y ago
  These fanboy people are disturbing. I recently met an apple fanboy for the first time and it's unbelievable the mental gymnastics he used to explain how everything apple does is amazing. This is even though his his iphone, which is only 3 years old, is sluggish as shit. Thats not a problem according to him, because it's an intentional design decision by apple. Some people pick a brand and it becomes their identity.
  - njharman 4y ago
    Now realize people do that with politics, science (climate change), etc.
    - Kon5ole 4y ago
      I have also observed that the intensity of someone's opinion is often mirrored in the intensity of their opponents contrary opinion, and if they argue about it long enough both of them will soon drift towards irrational fanatism on either side of the topic.
  - azinman2 4y ago
    Yes instead everyone should be numb and cynical to everything /s I’m not a Tesla fanboy, but what’s wrong with being one? If someone is getting enjoyment from something in life, isn’t that a good thing? Is it rational to love the sports team that just happens to be where to live, regardless of circumstance? Most aesthetic decisions in life aren’t “scientific” and cold.

moistly 4y ago

Smart money says to wait a few more months before buying a Tesla — the price is likely to drop again. Especially likely if everyone waits a few months more…

qudat 4y ago
This price cut was done to be eligible for the US tax credit. Once March hits there will be battery requirements which will limit the amount a Tesla owner can receive as a tax credit. Feel free to wait, but I doubt the price is going to drop much more.
- mertd 4y ago
  Or they would have to drop the price even more because the buyers cannot use the credit as a discount.
- Dylan16807 4y ago
  > One half is based on the EV battery having at least 40 percent of its critical minerals sourced in the US or one of its free trade partners; the other half is based on the EV battery having at least 50 percent of its components manufactured or assembled in North America. Those percentages are meant to scale up in the coming years as well. This is because the IRA seeks to make certain that batteries are sourced and built in North America, not just the cars themselves. That feels like it might take a while to meet.
- manmal 4y ago
  No, the price cuts were international.

dangerboysteve 4y ago

Doug DeMuro has a pretty good video of some other issues at play for drops in Telsa used car values. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GT-9_As6qq4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GT-9_As6qq4

jedberg 4y ago

The way luxury car brands usually do this is by slowly lowering the price, $1K-$2K a month, or offer incentives. Tesla couldn't do that here because they need to quickly come in under the cutoff for the new laws. But if they didn't want to take a huge PR hit, they could have sent checks to all the recent buyers. Say $13K to someone who bought in the last month, $10K if you bought 1-2 months, and so on. Then the new prices would fit the new laws and the recent buyers would actually be happy and do marketing for you instead of being angry and do anti-marketing, which will be more powerful since they just bought it. Going and telling their friends "I just bought a Tesla and you should not" will be way more costly to them than the checks.

ourmandave 4y ago
Unless they complain on Twitter.
cinntaile 4y ago
I don't know what specific laws you mean but they dropped the price worldwide, no?
- jedberg 4y ago
  There are a bunch of new US tax credits that have income and vehicle price limits.
kuboble 4y ago
I'm not sure if "I just bought a Tesla and you should not" is a compelling argument if it's followed by "because it's a great car and I like it but now it's cheaper!"
- jedberg 4y ago
  I think the argument would be "wait and see if they drop the prices again before buying".
  - 4y ago

sergiosgc 4y ago

Angers some current owners. You can always find people to complain about anything. It's just that bashing Tesla sells newspapers today, and that's where the news industry is going. I bought a Model 3 seven months ago. At the time it was a good car, at a fair price. Even with perfect hindsight, it was a good decision.

bwanab 4y ago
And as Musk pointed out, back in the days when Tesla raised prices, no customer who got the prior low price volunteered to send Tesla a check for the difference.
- Dylan16807 4y ago
  That's not a good argument. The general expectation is that customers should know when lowered prices start and end, and be able to take advantage of them. Not that they want the newest price.
  - bwanab 4y ago
    I know it's not. I was being tongue-in-cheek.
sshine 4y ago
I got a Model Y three months ago. Je ne regrette rien.
limitedsupply 4y ago
Usually the fairness that people seek in these situations is just the desire to dump the unfairness on someone else. E.g. the demand to extend the discount to 3-month old purchases ignores the fact that the people who bought a car 3 months and 1 day ago will feel more upset and wronged.
- Dylan16807 4y ago
  More wronged? Maybe a couple very unreasonable people. In general I doubt it. Also you can handle that with a staggered discount.

sshine 4y ago

It could have gone the other way: With EV sales doubling every year, battery production might hit a price surge like chips have.

davesque 4y ago

This article is kinda dumb. Looks like they managed to track down a handful of people who were bothered by the price cuts. Wouldn't it be more surprising if they couldn't find anyone that was bothered by them? If they had cited some kind of survey where a significant portion of respondents had expressed frustration, then I think we'd have a story. The title suggests that many more owners are upset than just a few. And no I don't own a Tesla nor do I plan to.

ww520 4y ago

Tesla can offer the recent buyers some credit toward their next purchases of Tesla products on a sliding scale, with more credits for more recent purchases. The credits can be time limited, like within 2 or 3 years. This addresses the complaints and ropes in their next purchases.

throwaway4good 4y ago

Around here they had to do something; cars like the MG4 are just silly value compared to Tesla at the old prices.

bhouston 4y ago

This is an interesting price drop. One of the key value proposition of Tesla is unique among car companies in terms of the premium it can charge. This has kept $TLSA so high. This is why it has been so highly valued in comparison to say Toyota. If for some reason they need to start discounting their cars in order to move them, it means that they may be losing this premium, which could permanently affect their long-term stock price. The question is why would that premium now be dissipating? Why is Tesla just becoming another car company? Because of competition finally catching up? Because of the macro-economic factors? Because of Elon Musk's reputation hit because of the twitter mess? How much can we attribute to each factor?

ajross 4y ago
I think that's all needlessly complicated. This is just market economics 101. There was a huge boom in demand over the past two years (used Teslas were literally selling for more than new ones because they had "stock"!) and the price rose to catch up. Now the economy is cooling and inventories are rising, so the price is dropping. FWIW: the same Model Y configuration that I purchased in early 2021 is still $1000 more than the price I paid (actually quite a bit more if you buy FSD, which is $5k more than it was on mine). It's not like these are fire sale prices. They got very expensive very fast, and that's being unwound just as fast.
- bhouston 4y ago
  > Now the economy is cooling and inventories are rising, so the price is dropping. US car sales are not dropping across the board, it is specific to Tesla. New car sales volume in $ has been consistent since September 2021. https://ycharts.com/indicators/us_total_vehicle_sales https://ycharts.com/indicators/us_total_vehicle_sales > the same Model Y configuration that I purchased in early 2021 is still $1000 more than the price I paid That is lower than inflation for the car industry in general, which is somewhere around 7%. So Tesla prices are dropping relative to the car industry in general. This is interesting and reinforcing that something is going on.
  - 4y ago

lnsru 4y ago

I am really happy about cheap model Y Europe in Germany. Even with that crippled range and acceleration. I ordered Kia EV6 10 months ago and have no idea when it arrives. No communication from Kia at all. List price increased by 3200€ since I signed contract. Makes me sad and willing to cancel my order. I hate being treated like shit for years by a car company. After cancellation I will seriously consider purchasing model Y. It’s big enough for small family and should cover my driving needs for a week on a single charge.

manmal 4y ago
I can almost guarantee you that the EV6 would be a low-maintenance car. Hyundai/Kia EVs are well-built and very reliable. With Tesla, it’s quite the mixed bag, some people are regulars at their repair shop. I value my time highly and will not take that risk.
- dgfitz 4y ago
  Hyundai sends out more recall notices than I’ve ever seen before. We got 11 in 6 years for our Elantra.

adamqureshi 4y ago

This is not a price DROP. Tesla JACKED up prices on ALL models last year and people forgot about it and now TESLA just went back to the original prices. I been following them since 2016 and they have done this in 2018 with the MODEL S / X P100DL. Exact same shit happened with the first tax credit around 2017 with the release of the MODEL 3. I been scraping their inventory and you can plot the price changes and their used inventory prices are UPSIDE DOWN. Nothing new tesla normal behavior its just that a LOT of news outlets forget this that do not FOLLOW the price volatility. I am now thinking to do a youtube channel to lay it out. -2cents

ajross 4y ago
Not the original prices, actually. They're back to where they were in mid-pandemic. And "JACKED" is a bit spun. It was the market for used Teslas that drove the price increases. They got way above the retail prices; people were actually scalping Teslas. Someone was going to make that money, it might as well be the manufacturer.
maximus-decimus 4y ago
I think the price of a base model 3 went from 40k to 60k during covid. I don't understand why people are surprised it's going down now that the car shortage is coming to an end.
- dlivingston 4y ago
  I bought a Model Y in 2020 and, during the peak of used car price inflation, I could have sold it used for a good bit more than I paid for it new.
mertd 4y ago
Indeed if you hibernated in early 2021 and just woke up, the prices would look kind of same. But the other side of the coin is also interesting. Up to six months ago, they couldn't make them fast enough when they were selling the cars for $15-20k more. Now the inventory is piling even with incentives and discounts.
4y ago

pensatoio 4y ago

I bought one four months ago. I wouldn't have pulled the trigger if I didn't think I was getting my money's worth. Would be nice to have 10k extra, but such is life.

danans 4y ago

I lost the previous $7500 EV tax credit thanks to the IRA kicking in before my ordered (and overseas manufactured) EV arrived. If my household is successful enough financially the next few years I won't qualify for the new credit due to income limitations, but only by a few ten thousands in gross income over the limit. Sure, it kind of sucks to miss out on thier, but I'm still glad that the IRA passed and that the benefits are targeted at people making half what my household makes. It's time for mass EV adoption, not just EV adoption for the upper middle class and above.

saddd 4y ago
I barely qualified for a previous state credit within $1000 of the cutoff, right before more than doubling my income during the pandemic industry craziness. I think cutoffs that don't scale or prorate somehow are so ridiculous. There's no reason to make things all-or-nothing. The criteria should still give you something if you're rich, even if it's $1, so everyone else in the band doesn't get screwed.