Depreciation / resale value

[David_Cary]

i drive a leaf every day and the wife the S. the reason why we are not holding out for any type of leaf with 120 or even 240 mile range is because the leaf is not a very good car. it is a very good first try, but there's such a long list of deficiencies and bad engineering and design that turned me off to the the nissan (or infiniti) brand. the model s is a tremendous bargain compared to my 2012 $35k OTD leaf. no car i've owned depreciated faster or more as a percentage than the leaf.

That just doesn't make sense. Very good first try but you wouldn't think the next one would be better? You bought right before a almost $6k price drop in early 2013. Also the addition of a heat pump, faster charging and various other tweaks. You paid $35k and 3 (?6) months later the net on a new one is $21k (adding in the tax credit) so if you look at depreciation expense without adequately figuring in the TC, then 50% in the first year is perfectly reasonable.

I have a 2013 and the list of deficiencies is quite small. Sure - I'd like a slider to adjust SOC. Sure carwings can be a little buggy.

The Model S could have a similar price drop and feature gain 2-3 years after introduction. Even the Gen III may plummet resale values. 25% margin also means Tesla could drop the price 10% instantly if needed to move product.

 

[Hybris]

As Im into performance cars like M4, M5, Alpina, AMG, Porsche etc... One thought on my side was "who the heck will want to buy an ICE performance car in a couple of years??" Imagine the lost value of those alternative cars... I mean what do they have vs model S? ;-)