Generally car sales are counted at delivery, or when the manufacturer gets paid for the car. A Tesla order is a $250 deposit. They don't get paid for the car un

Generally car sales are counted at delivery, or when the manufacturer gets paid for the car. A Tesla order is a $250 deposit. They don't get paid for the car until it gets delivered, and the order can be cancelled at any point before that. Tesla has been fairly consistent on this and as far as I know it matches how most auto companies account for sales. The difference is that some companies count cars sold to dealerships, even if they aren't sold to an end customer yet, but Tesla does not have franchised dealerships.