Considering used S 90D, but battery concerns

[abasile]

We purchased our LEAF in April 2011 and are not at all pleased with how Nissan treated their early adopters. Our LEAF's battery pack lost about 30% of its original capacity after 4-5 years, yet this wasn't enough to qualify for a warranty replacement and the functionality of the car is quite compromised. It's not worth much on the used market, so we just drive it around locally as our "beater" car.

By contrast, Tesla has always tried to do right by us. Tesla battery degradation has generally been minimal. I don't know about the "90" packs, but they can't be anywhere near as bad as many of Nissan's batteries. If I could go back to 2011, I would have skipped the LEAF and would have instead saved the money for a Tesla (we later bought our 2012 Model S used, from Tesla) and/or put it into TSLA stock.

Yes, the LEAF was comparatively inexpensive, but I wouldn't have called it cheap. After incentives, our 2011 LEAF cost about the same as a new Prius. The smart buyers are those who purchased their LEAFs used, for a song.

Hello, my name is Dane, this message is mainly for Canuck, while I largely agree with the analysis
regarding the Leaf, having owned both a Leaf and now a CPO 2015 85D. The Leaf is a fine car, less
so on the 2011/2012's mainly due to battery degradation, I would disagree that it was a
"major fail" of Nissan. Keep in mind the Leaf was built to a certain price point (i.e. lack of a thermal
management system) with a different design mission for the vehicle i.e- shorter city type
commutes/errands for which the Leaf does quite well. To Nissan's credit they did replace some of older
(faster degrading traction packs), and did revise the battery chemistry/technology after mid 2013
to slow the rate of degradation. The low entry level price point of the Leaf (used for me) allowed me to
try an electric car to help me decide if I wanted to persue a Model S. I'm happy to say it did.

 

[PhilDavid]

Thanks to this thread, my other research, and the dealer's willingness to drop the price by
a bit, my family is now joined by a gorgeous red Model S 90D. As you all suggested, the
battery charged up just fine. Very pleased. Thanks for your help!

Would you mind sharing with us how much you paid?

 

[Dylan McNamee]

Would you mind sharing with us how much you paid?

2015 90D with one owner, 20K miles, air suspension, advanced electronics & subzero package, and super-clean interior & exterior. We paid 53K, from a local Audi dealer who got it on trade-in. We would have preferred a grey exterior, but hey, can't argue that the red is gorgeous - just a bit too attention-getting.

 

[Dylan McNamee]

We purchased our LEAF in April 2011 and are not at all pleased with how Nissan treated their early adopters. Our LEAF's battery pack lost about 30% of its original capacity after 4-5 years, yet this wasn't enough to qualify for a warranty replacement and the functionality of the car is quite compromised. It's not worth much on the used market, so we just drive it around locally as our "beater" car...

"Our other car is a Leaf" - we got a 2011 Leaf a couple years ago, after the VW TDI debacle, and had been renting cars for trips of > 80 miles. It worked pretty well (yay, Enterprise 5 blocks away!) but finally decided we'd had enough carbon emissions, and for winter driving, you can't put chains on rental cars, so decided to look for a Tesla. So far, so good - it's pretty much blown us away. We'll be using the Leaf for most of our city trips, but now have no constraints on when / where we can drive. Sweet.