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Buying a 2017 Model 3, Several Questions

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I'm looking at purchasing a 2017 Model 3 LR but have several questions so any insight would be greatly appreciated!

1. Are there any major changes between 2017 and newer model years that you'd consider to be a deal breaker? My only experience with Tesla so far has been a 21 Model Y LR with enhanced auto pilot via Turo.

2. It supposedly has FSD per this screenshot. I assume that it either came with it from the factory or the previous owner paid for an upgrade? Would this require a monthly subscription?

Model 3.jpg


3. Supercharging - The dealership is about 600 miles away from me but i'd be looking to pick it up and drive it back home. Would it just be a matter of registering it via the app with a payment method? Can I use it right away after that?

4. Ownership Transfer - Is it possible for the previous owner to have just removed themselves from the account so that it's open to register to the next owner? How long does this usually take? I can't imagine that they transferred ownership to the dealer unless i'm wrong. Is there a way for me to check?

5. Warranty - I assume that this is all transferrable to the next owner. Is there anything i'd need to do other than register it to my name? Anything major I should be concerned about since the "General Coverage" is now expired?

warranty.png


6. Anything else I should look out for? There's about 20k miles on it.

I've owned several vehicles over my lifetime but never a Tesla so it feels a bit intimidating especially when buying it used and not from Tesla themselves.
 
1. Are there any major changes between 2017 and newer model years...

For the purpose of used car: No. The 12V is still lead acid and not today's Lithium. The glass is standard and not today's double pane...

The FSD computer is version 2.5 so you need to upgrade to version 3 for free (version 4 coming soon by the time CyberTruck will come out).
 
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There is no way I personally would buy a 2017 Model 3, since they were launched in the end of 2017 and that would be one of the very first ones released. There are too many incremental changes,

I realize this is a car, but this is basically the same thing as saying "I am thinking about buying an 2017 model iPhone, are there any changes between that and now that I need to be aware of?
 
I'm looking at purchasing a 2017 Model 3 LR but have several questions so any insight would be greatly appreciated!

1. Are there any major changes between 2017 and newer model years that you'd consider to be a deal breaker? My only experience with Tesla so far has been a 21 Model Y LR with enhanced auto pilot via Turo.

2. It supposedly has FSD per this screenshot. I assume that it either came with it from the factory or the previous owner paid for an upgrade? Would this require a monthly subscription?

View attachment 783554

3. Supercharging - The dealership is about 600 miles away...

That is a major concern. Normally, you can't Supercharge at all until someone has a credit card to pay for that VIN. To do that you need to transfer the ownership into your Tesla account. And it is not fast.
 
What's the price? FSD isn't worth it, IMO. It's "beta" software and no one can guarantee that it will ever materialize.

If this is anywhere near the price of a new M3 (and I'm guessing it is), run away. Used cars are incredibly overvalued right now.

Also worth noting - those warranty dates are also subject to mileage caps... and for my driving I'll hit the miles *way* before the dates.

Battery improvements, auto trunk, heated wheel, heat pump, matrix headlights, quite a few enhancements have happened between then and now.
 
My son is driving an early 2018 M3 LR RWD; I’ve got a late 2018 version of the same. Main difference: rear seat is a lot more uncomfortable for any distance in his. They added more padding later.
That year M3 came with the Series 2 or 2.5 computer; when I ponied up for FSD part of the deal was getting the car retrofitted with. a 3.0 version. Having said that: There were a bunch of different nomenclature terms for various named hw/sw features that changed over time: EAP and so on. So, if that display is saying FSD, make durn sure that the SW release on the car is a current variant (I looked just now, seems to be the case) so it’s reporting the correct option, and that the G3 upgrade has actually happened.
Finally, private sales from a used car dealership or individual are fully supported by Tesla’s platform. So, whoever’s got the car now should have an account on Tesla’s site (just like all of us owners do), and, under “manage car” there’s a button to transfer the car to someone else, like you. You’ll have to set up an account with Tesla first, so the car can be transferred, of course, and so after the transfer Tesla knows whose credit card to charge for Supercharging.
20k miles isn’t a lot, so there’s a reasonably good chance the battery’s in decent shape, but make the current owner give you the displayed miles range at a known %charge.
Oh, yeah: you’ll find doomsayers saying that FSD isn’t worth it, won’t work, and all that jazz. Some of that is Not Believing Musk, which is a a stance, I guess. But would you bet against a guy with reusable rockets?
The other part is sour grapes. FSD is currently 12k; at one time one could snag it for 2k. So, if you’re interested in a nearly self driving car, this one’ll do that. Just like mine; makes blasting across the landscape between NYC and Boston a lot more restful.
Good luck!
 
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My son is driving an early 2018 M3 LR RWD; I’ve got a late 2018 version of the same. Main difference: rear seat is a lot more uncomfortable for any distance in his. They added more padding later.
That year M3 came with the Series 2 or 2.5 computer; when I ponied up for FSD part of the deal was getting the car retrofitted with. a 3.0 version. Having said that: There were a bunch of different nomenclature terms for various named hw/sw features that changed over time: EAP and so on. So, if that display is saying FSD, make durn sure that the SW release on the car is a current variant (I looked just now, seems to be the case) so it’s reporting the correct option, and that the G3 upgrade has actually happened.
Finally, private sales from a used car dealership or individual are fully supported by Tesla’s platform. So, whoever’s got the car now should have an account on Tesla’s site (just like all of us owners do), and, under “manage car” there’s a button to transfer the car to someone else, like you. You’ll have to set up an account with Tesla first, so the car can be transferred, of course, and so after the transfer Tesla knows whose credit card to charge for Supercharging.
20k miles isn’t a lot, so there’s a reasonably good chance the battery’s in decent shape, but make the current owner give you the displayed miles range at a known %charge.
Oh, yeah: you’ll find doomsayers saying that FSD isn’t worth it, won’t work, and all that jazz. Some of that is Not Believing Musk, which is a a stance, I guess. But would you bet against a guy with reusable rockets?
The other part is sour grapes. FSD is currently 12k; at one time one could snag it for 2k. So, if you’re interested in a nearly self driving car, this one’ll do that. Just like mine; makes blasting across the landscape between NYC and Boston a lot more restful.
Good luck!

I agree with most of this (and really enjoy the info in most of your posts, btw), but I am on a mini crusade to stop people from saying "FSD was only 2k previously".

To get that price, the prerequisite was purchasing enhanced autopilot for 5k. Once you purchased enhanced autopilot for 5k, then you got to buy FSD for an additional 3k. There was a short period of time, March / April of 2019, where they reduced the price of that add on to 2k (so 5K +2k instead of 5k+3k).

I am fairly sure you are aware of all this (especially given the amount of factual data in your other posts), but newer members will see that "it was only 2k before" price and not know that:

1. That required a 5k purchase of EAP first before you could buy FSD (which at the time had NO features additional over EAP) and
2. It was normally 3k additional, but there was a fire sale that lasted about 3 weeks when you could get it for 2k.

So, us older model 3 owners paid either 8k (5K+3k) or 7k (5k +2k) but in no circumstance did we pay only 2k for what is now 12k.
 
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I agree with most of this (and really enjoy the info in most of your posts, btw), but I am on a mini crusade to stop people from saying "FSD was only 2k previously".

To get that price, the prerequisite was purchasing enhanced autopilot for 5k. Once you purchased enhanced autopilot for 5k, then you got to buy FSD for an additional 3k. There was a short period of time, March / April of 2019, where they reduced the price of that add on to 2k (so 5K +2k instead of 5k+3k).

I am fairly sure you are aware of all this (especially given the amount of factual data in your other posts), but newer members will see that "it was only 2k before" price and not know that:

1. That required a 5k purchase of EAP first before you could buy FSD (which at the time had NO features additional over EAP) and
2. It was normally 3k additional, but there was a fire sale that lasted about 3 weeks when you could get it for 2k.

So, us older model 3 owners paid either 8k (5K+3k) or 7k (5k +2k) but in no circumstance did we pay only 2k for what is now 12k.
Absolutely right about the crusade. But my spouse and I have kinda broken the rule about, “how much”.
The M3 was the SO’s car, originally, to make up for all those years of driving minivans around. She didn’t believe in paying extra for for anything, so we didn't (on this LR RWD with "Premium" interior) order anything beyond the car itself.
So, there we were on a September afternoon at the SC in New Jersey. We had both watched the videos and all and, during a vacation out West, had driven our son's car around. The SC person got us set up and our keys/cell phones working, asked if we had seen the videos and, since we had, went over to handle another bunch of newbies.
After a bit of trouble getting the steering wheel and mirrors adjusted (doesn't help if the steering wheel is upside down when one starts), we started going through all the software menus. And we saw some stuff about "auto lane changes" or some such, but weren't sure what we were looking at.
The guy came back, we asked some innocuous questions about this and that, and then I said, "I'm not sure - I'm pretty sure we didn't order EAP, but there's menu items?"
The guy stood up, stated, "Sometimes, Tesla makes a mistake." Took a step to the right and hit the Open Door for the garage door and chased us out of there.
We then left immediately on vacation. When we got back and started fiddling with the car.. yep, we had EAP, and hadn't paid for it.
Expected it to Disappear Any Minute.. and it didn't. Near as we could figure, the car got rejected by somebody; it showed some signs of a little body work. And, rather than remove EAP, it got delivered to us as the Right Color Car of the Right Range During a Delivery Push.
We've since heard serious rumors that this wasn't an unknown occurrence.
Sometime later, after the $2000 offer went away and the price for FSD got up to 7 or 8 grand, there was a sale at $4k. It showed up as Available in the account, so we splurged.. and got it. Note: We wouldn't have been eligible for FSD at that sale price unless we had EAP, so.. somehow.. EAP got in there.
A little while later asked for the G3 CPU upgrade.. and got that.
And there we are. In for cheapsies.
 
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Absolutely right about the crusade. But my spouse and I have kinda broken the rule about, “how much”.
The M3 was the SO’s car, originally, to make up for all those years of driving minivans around. She didn’t believe in paying extra for for anything, so we didn't (on this LR RWD with "Premium" interior) order anything beyond the car itself.
So, there we were on a September afternoon at the SC in New Jersey. We had both watched the videos and all and, during a vacation out West, had driven our son's car around. The SC person got us set up and our keys/cell phones working, asked if we had seen the videos and, since we had, went over to handle another bunch of newbies.
After a bit of trouble getting the steering wheel and mirrors adjusted (doesn't help if the steering wheel is upside down when one starts), we started going through all the software menus. And we say some stuff about "auto lane changes" or some such, but weren't sure what we were looking at.
The guy came back, we asked some innocuous questions about this and that, and then I said, "I'm not sure - I'm pretty sure we didn't order EAP, but there's menu items?"
The guy stood up, stated, "Sometimes, Tesla makes a mistake." Took a step to the right and hit the Open Door for the garage door and chased us out of there.
We then left immediately on vacation. When we got back and started fiddling with the car.. yep, we had EAP, and hadn't paid for it.
Expected it to Disappear Any Minute.. and it didn't. Near as we could figure, the car got rejected by somebody; it showed some signs of a little body work. And, rather than remove EAP, it got delivered to us as the Right Color Car of the Right Range During a Delivery Push.
We've since heard serious rumors that this wasn't an unknown occurrence.
Sometime later, after the $2000 offer went away and the price got up to 7 or 8 grand, there was a sale at $4k. It showed up as Available in the account, so we splurged.. and got it.
A little while later asked for the G3 CPU upgrade.. and got that.
And there we are. In for cheapsies.

You definitely are not the only person who I have read about / heard of who got eap (or even FSD) "for free" as a mistake by tesla, so yeah you got a great deal.

Some of those "WTF why did tesla take FSD away from my used car!" posts are cars in this situation ( meaning, if / when you sold that car, its entirely possible that during an audit they found it wasnt supposed to have either EAP or FSD and removed it). Not all of them are that way, but a few are.
 
You definitely are not the only person who I have read about / heard of who got eap (or even FSD) "for free" as a mistake by tesla, so yeah you got a great deal.

Some of those "WTF why did tesla take FSD away from my used car!" posts are cars in this situation ( meaning, if / when you sold that car, its entirely possible that during an audit they found it wasnt supposed to have either EAP or FSD and removed it). Not all of them are that way, but a few are.
There's been some back and forth with Tesla on this. My understanding is if a Tesla goes through Tesla's hands (i.e., it's traded into Tesla so they officially own it), they've been known to remove FSD and sell it without. Well, it's their car, it's their option (since they can do that), so, why not?
However, there was a bit of confusion over a few month period where Tesla goofed on this approach:
  • There was a private sale (i.e., not through Tesla), the car had FSD, and Tesla, during the transfer of ownership, Reached Down From On High and Removed the FSD. Screams, yells, rocks being thrown, mention in more newletters than one can shake a stick at, etc.. And, in that case, Tesla went, "Oops - my bad!" and gave the punter his paid-for FSD back. (The punter paid for the used car knowing it had FSD on it. Removing it like that was asking for a lawsuit, since it instantly reduced the value of the car.) Since then, well, I haven't personally heard of something like this, although I could be surprised.
  • During that same time period some cars went through Tesla's hands and into a new buyer's possession. And the buyer discovered the car had FSD! But Tesla had planned to remove the FSD, was backlogged, had sold the car (there was some confusion about whether the car did or did not have FSD advertised), then removed FSD.. after the new buyer had the car. Similar screams, yells, etc. etc. In this case, not sure what had happened afterwards. I think Tesla gave the parties FSD, but am not sure. I think a lot would have depended upon how the car(s) were described on the bill of sale.
But I haven't heard any screaming like this for the past couple of years, so I think Tesla got its act together and stopped dicking, inadvertently or otherwise, with owners of newly-bought used Tesla vehicles.
 
Wow tons of insight, thank you for all of the replies! The M3 LR in question is $45k which is just $5k shy of a new one. I'm not particularly keen on having FSD but given the price of it today I thought maybe it was a good deal. I found enhanced autopilot to be very sufficient in the 21 MY LR I test drove so I may just end up shooting for a new one as the longer warranty would be nice.
 
To offer a counter viewpoint, 20k miles isn't much so it would be more interesting to know about the battery condition / degradation , how often supercharging that sort of thing. The main warranty is done and some Model 3s had issue with front suspension bits, learn about that and add to considerations.

I have a July 2018 build where general coverage ends Aug 3 this year, battery 2026. Since I know the car's history, no worries for me on that but you'd want some good assurances to the condition of various items (has the 12v been replaced as example?)

You'll need to put me in the camp of not caring about nor willing to pay for FSD as I don't assign any value to it personally; my car has what is known as EAP which basically means it mostly works well with traffic aware cruise control but is not perfect (I'm also running firmware from last year by choice which may be related). I can also summon the car in/out of the garage, woo! :). Anyway, based on the screen you displayed the car does have FSD and seems to have the updated computer to go along. Won't matter to you in the short term as you have to be invited to the beta and maybe won't matter in the life of the car (outside resale) because regardless of supporters I don't think it's gonna be here soon due to some ignored technically issues (my car has annoyingly frequent warnings about cameras blocked due to sun as example) and then there are regulatory issues as well.

Used car prices are nuts right now, but if you want to get a new Model 3 it will be a long wait. Tesla has always had delivery delays on orders and recently are prioritizing those orders with the 12k FSD added so used vs new (in a timely manner) is not 5k

Regardless all that, if you can get a competent PPI (pre purchase inspection) and the car is solid, the original Model 3 LR is one of the most efficient EVs you can get and perhaps even at today's prices, could be a good deal. But that PPI would be my blocker first step in, then price.

Good luck!
 
It's code for "it could do it if it can be done only with cameras AND Tesla is capable of writing the software sometime in the future".

I do believe it actually means that FSD was purchased for this vehicle. Otherwise it says something like "Full Self Driving Computer Hardware" or something to that effect.
 
It's code for "it could do it if it can be done only with cameras AND Tesla is capable of writing the software sometime in the future".

I do believe it actually means that FSD was purchased for this vehicle. Otherwise it says something like "Full Self Driving Computer Hardware" or something to that effect.
I would check that thoroughly before buying as I believe that is what Tesla had on their used vehicles site for cars that didn't have FSD.
 
Scratch that. 2 accidents. Wish I would've jumped on a new one before the price hike.
Just so you know: Very roughly, and not at all accurately, the Max Range = Range/(% Charged). So, with that car, it was at 80% and had 224 miles, so range is roughly 224/0.8 = 280 miles.
Now, one would have a few possibilities. A 2018 Standard Range was, I think, around 250 miles of range. But with AC charging those cars had only 32A, max, and your picture shows 48A, so it's not one of them. M3 Performance and Long Range also did 48A, so, a little checking.. a P was good for 299 miles and an L for 310 miles. So, it's either a M3 LR or a M3 P. 20 miles of degradation (if that) isn't bad, really. My M3 LR shows 265 miles at 90%, with a vague max range of 265/0.9 = 294; that's not much of a drop from the advertised range of 310 miles 40,000 miles ago. If one goes around running the battery down to (say) 5%, then up to 90% a few times the range tends to get bigger as the battery controllers get recalibrated. +-10% variations are typical.
This place seems to have a list of all the various Tesla types and their ranges, which have definitely gotten longer over the years.