How many miles are realistic to expect?

[Manzacoty]

I got close with a 2013 P85 CPO from Tesla for $58k. I figure it was north of 100k new based in the options. I have seen P85s on their site for $54k since then.

I paid close to a 1/3 of new for my 4 year old S85

 

[sorka]

I paid close to a 1/3 of new for my 4 year old S85

Show me where I can buy a 4 year old s85 with 48k miles for 1/3 of new and I'll get it now as a second tesla.

 

[Manzacoty]

Show me where I can buy a 4 year old s85 with 48k miles for 1/3 of new and I'll get it now as a second tesla.

Mine had 85k miles.

 

[wdolson]

If there is an issue like this on a car past it's 8 year warranty I see the most value in stripping the car for parts and use it's battery for solar storage applications than anything else.

Who really believes that there are no drive unit issues after 8 years. Right now Tesla keeps replacing them under warranty. But once the warranty is gone who in their right mind would replace one of them for 10k-20k ?

I am saying it again - I don't want to paint it all black here. But be realistic. The few components that this car has come with such a hefty price tag plus only a few shops that can actually work on them that it's very unrealistic that you will be able to or want to fix it past the drive train warranty.

To be fair, the drive unit issue appears to be pretty much resolved on newer cars. Most of the 2015 fleet is past the point where the early cars started getting new drive units and very few have needed new drive units. And when they do get them, it tends to be for different issues than the original cars.

The newer the car, the more reliable its systems are, on average. Because they have been ramping up production year to year there are a lot more newer cars on the road than the older cars. A lot of people here reported a lot of problems with their early cars, but they are now a rather small minority of the entire fleet.

Older cars do have more problems and I'm sure Teslas will not be an exception. In its last year before I sold it my Buick had issues with the automatic trunk release and the rear speakers. I found replacements and the replacement trunk release decided to seize up the day I sold it. I had to remove it and sell the car as is without it. The speakers were a standard size, but I needed to find a specialty place that made speakers for classic cars because most car speakers made today are 4 ohm and these were 8 ohm. It's tough to find new 8 ohm speakers for cars.

Teslas are going to have these sorts of problems too. 5 years from now how much is a door handle motor going to cost? And because Tesla was constantly tweaking the design, which door motor will your car need and how tough will it be to find the compatible part?

On the newer cars, the drive systems might last 400,000 miles, but it will be very annoying if the door handles are stuck and parts cost a fortune. These are things we just don't know at this point. It may be someone will make after market parts that are a lot cheaper, or Tesla will get better about making spare parts.

These little things could make ownership of older Teslas a pain, or they may make it cheap and affordable by the average person. We just don't know at this point.

 

[Jashev]

Im not sure I understand what you are saying? Why would the $7500 not mean something, regardless of cash or credit?

The way I see it, if I order a new Tesla for say $100,000, and I am getting $7500 back, that takes the price down to $92,250. If a CPO is at $72,000, that makes the difference about $20k instead of $27,750, no?

I am not saying $20k is not a lot, it is, but your also getting a 2 year old car that is older technology. IMO, its not so straight forward.

If you don't owe the Fed any income tax, then the $7500 makes no difference. If I don't care about stuff like AP (which at this time I don't), the differences in technology are minimal. So I end up getting a car with 23k miles on it that was about $100k new for $55k with a 4 year 50k warranty. $45k is a big difference to pay for AP. As a bonus, I could pay cash for the car and not worry about interest charges.

 

[cwerdna]

That is a tesloop car that is driving all day every day so I don't think it can be used as a real representation. Also it had it's battery replaced and several drive units as well.

Out of curiosity, do you have a source for several drive units and at what approximate mileages?

I know their DU got replaced at around 35K miles per The Tesla Warranty is Ludicrous.

Tesla Model S Hits 300,000 Miles with less than $11,000 maintenance costs claims to a have a service records link but you can't see it w/o submitting your personal info, which I haven't done.