Just venting ...

[David99]

I honestly have little hope about future battery upgrades. Tesla has been pretty discouraging about it by asking a very high price and requiring the old battery to be returned as well which would have a great value on the free market.

 

[Shorty]

Love the MS I got my wife (2015, AP1, S60 - non-upgradeable).
Getting AP1 was a considered risk, knowing AP2 was out and would eclipse it at some point. No problem there.
Knew AP2 would get all the love, so was not expecting much in the way of software updates - though a useful nav would be good.

But totally did not expect the resale value of my S60 to get devastated long before M3 was released.

First S60 is cancelled.
Then S75 price is dropped to S60 levels.
Then the S60 - S75 upgrade price is dropped to a few $K.
Now Supercharging is retro-actively re-applied to MS, and people going forward will be able to get it by referral. The last holdout add-value my S60 had ...

All of this is good for MS in general, good for S sales prior to M3 I hope.

But boy it's frustrating to be at the bottom of the pile

Still wife loves the car, looks great, drives great and no gas.

I know, get over yourself - but hey, seems like the 'continuously upgradeable' car got some real downgrades on it's value this year through well intentioned actions for those committing to new purchases.

What are you complaining about? You bought the S60 for far less than the S75 at the time and now you can upgrade for a fraction of the original differential. Even if you choose not to upgrade, everyone has figured out by now that you can charge your S60 to 100% (since it is a 75 battery anyways) and get nearly the range of the S75 at 90% for free.

 

[azred]

Love the MS I got my wife (2015, AP1, S60 - non-upgradeable).
Getting AP1 was a considered risk, knowing AP2 was out and would eclipse it at some point. No problem there.
Knew AP2 would get all the love, so was not expecting much in the way of software updates - though a useful nav would be good.

But totally did not expect the resale value of my S60 to get devastated long before M3 was released.

First S60 is cancelled.
Then S75 price is dropped to S60 levels.
Then the S60 - S75 upgrade price is dropped to a few $K.
Now Supercharging is retro-actively re-applied to MS, and people going forward will be able to get it by referral. The last holdout add-value my S60 had ...

All of this is good for MS in general, good for S sales prior to M3 I hope.

But boy it's frustrating to be at the bottom of the pile

Still wife loves the car, looks great, drives great and no gas.

I know, get over yourself - but hey, seems like the 'continuously upgradeable' car got some real downgrades on it's value this year through well intentioned actions for those committing to new purchases.

. Time to rethink car buying/selling. When you buy a high end new/newer car like an S, plan to keep it for at least 8 to 10 years. Of course that means forget leasing.

It's not like you bought a cheap "starter" car expecting to upgrade in a couple years so any projections of resale value should be irrelevant for several years. If resale is your thing and you want to sell in a couple years, buy something like a 993(911) Porsche that is in the midst of appreciation. Of course, repairs might eat into some of that appreciation.

 

[azred]

Shame on Tesla for making improvements to cars as time goes on, devaluing every other owner's cars. In other news im mad at Tim Cook for making my iPhone 6S useless by introducing the iPhone 7.

Sarcasm aside, yes it is frustrating. But with all consumer goods, its an inevitability. I too bought the Model S 60 1 month before it was discontinued and for what i paid for a 60, i could've gotten a 75. But bygones be bygones, i sucked up $2k to upgrade and now its a 75 and i'm fine with it. My cabin interior is the same basically as a 100D and the range is more than adequate for me.

Sucked up $2k? Wow, some people are hard to please. Five months ago the upgrade cost was $9000+tax and a month later dropped to $7000+tax. At purchase until 2 months ago the price was $6500+tax. You stole the upgrade and so did I. Could it get cheaper? Sure, free would be cheaper.

 

[RayW]

Shame on Tesla for making improvements to cars as time goes on, devaluing every other owner's cars. In other news im mad at Tim Cook for making my iPhone 6S useless by introducing the iPhone 7.

Blame it on Henry Ford, he started it

 

[Saghost]

What are you complaining about? You bought the S60 for far less than the S75 at the time and now you can upgrade for a fraction of the original differential. Even if you choose not to upgrade, everyone has figured out by now that you can charge your S60 to 100% (since it is a 75 battery anyways) and get nearly the range of the S75 at 90% for free.

He can't upgrade because its one of the original S60s. It doesn't have a 75 kWh pack, and can't be safely charged to 100%.

However, from the context he must have gotten it used/CPO, presumably at an even cheaper price than you were thinking. He doesn't face as much depreciation as new buyers - likely less than he'd pay for pretty much any other "comparable" car he could have bought.

 

[xyeahtony]

I honestly have little hope about future battery upgrades. Tesla has been pretty discouraging about it by asking a very high price and requiring the old battery to be returned as well which would have a great value on the free market.

i dont think Tesla believes battery upgrades are necessary, and im inclined to believe. i think under normal use the batteries will go over 500k+ miles before you see any meaningful degradation.

 

[David99]

i dont think Tesla believes battery upgrades are necessary, and im inclined to believe. i think under normal use the batteries will go over 500k+ miles before you see any meaningful degradation.

The big urge to upgrade comes as batteries get better and offer more range. Upgrading from my old 85 (never was true 85 kWh in the first place) that now has lost 20 miles of range to the new 100 would give me 83 more miles. That is a significant difference on road trips (I do a lot of those) and it charges faster on Superchargers as well. In 2 years there will most probably be an even larger one and then many with an old degraded 60 or 85 battery wants to have a decent battery upgrade.

Tesla does not want to sell batteries for cheap, they want to sell an entire new car. That's why they make upgrading so expensive and unreasonable.

 

[Snowstorm]

Maybe there is a market for taking the old degraded battery and turning it into a home or utility battery. Even a 50% degraded 85 battery is like 3 powerwall units and be great for a house.

 

[TIppy]

i think under normal use the batteries will go over 500k+ miles before you see any meaningful degradation.

It will be interesting to see what happens when the first batteries start falling off their eight year warranties. I just had to send in my three year old p85+ battery with 23,000 miles on it for repairs. It's been gone three months now while I have a loaner battery. Will Tesla provide loaner batteries for out of warranty repairs? How much will a replacement battery cost for an 8 yr old car? Will the car be totaled because of the expensive battery replacement?

 

[EarlyAdopter]

I know, get over yourself - but hey, seems like the 'continuously upgradeable' car got some real downgrades on it's value this year through well intentioned actions for those committing to new purchases.

Better to be ev-now than ev-later.