Tesla Model S CPO Website - Now Live

[MsElectric]

Putting the lower-priced CPO cars into the loaner/demo pool and keeping the new cars for-sale raises the market price of the remaining CPO and private-sale market. It also tries to drive more new-unit sales rather than seeing people choose CPOs which do not really "count" for the cars sold number which the stock market is closely watching.

This assumes someone looking to pay a certain fixed maximum amount will then increase their budget due to the lower priced CPO cars being removed from the CPO inventory.

What may end up happening instead is that customers may just delay the purchase until prices are allowed to return to what the market is willing to pay. I don't believe artificial price or inventory controls will work beyond what the market is willing to pay. The good news is that many Ds are being added to the inventory.

 

[taurusking]

What happened to Tesla strategy of having high priced fully loaded demo/inventory cars for loaner purposes. I thought they wanted existing owners to upgrade.

 

[MsElectric]

I think with current pricing for non D vehicles, potentially buyers might be better off just waiting for the D prices to come down some and just buy a D model.

A bunch of Ds added today:

https://www.teslainventory.com/

 

[Drucifer]

What happened to Tesla strategy of having high priced fully loaded demo/inventory cars for loaner purposes. I thought they wanted existing owners to upgrade.

Pretty sure it's "out with the old strategy and in with the new".

They probably figured out that owners who want a P90DL, will ask for the test drive and order without randomly getting one as a service loaner.

 

[cab]

This assumes someone looking to pay a certain fixed maximum amount will then increase their budget due to the lower priced CPO cars being removed from the CPO inventory.

What may end up happening instead is that customers may just delay the purchase until prices are allowed to return to what the market is willing to pay. I don't believe artificial price or inventory controls will work beyond what the market is willing to pay. The good news is that many Ds are being added to the inventory.

This is exactly where I am at of course. In reality, Tesla no longer has a real CPO program. 298 of the 345 cars are INVENTORY cars, which are really just NEW cars that they may use as loaners. They sell as new, have never been titled, are eligible for rebates and get a little discount for the few miles on them. Really no different than when we bought my wife's 'New' "Manager demo" Volvo in 2012.

Now for a "normal" car, none of this would have generally mattered since I do my own auto repairs for the most part and don't care about warranties, but for the Model S, that's not an option, so then you end up with this "what if the dang thing breaks" $$$ worry (hence the desire for CPO).

If they suddenly reverse course, we may be in the market again for a Tesla, but the current model won't push us up...it will likely push us to a different automaker altogether. Again though, if I were them, I would make this exact same play - it just makes good business sense for them at this point in their evolution.

 

[mmd]

Tesla can control the used car prices only to some extent short term. Ultimately it will be dictated by market conditions, and the prices will reflect what people are willing to pay.

So there is nothing unfortunate about what they are doing now, and adding dealership into the equation will only move the slim profits to the dealers instead of Tesla. And why would you want that?

Sorry, this may make sense for Tesla, but not for the consumers. Just look at the chaotic pricing above. Some guy waits for a reasonable price. Then, one day Tesla drops the price on some Canadian CPO by $50K CAD, and some other guy scoops the deal Or one day out of blue, the whole CPO inventory disappears with no notice or official reason whatsoever! At the very least, it causes inconvenience and unpredictability for the buyers.

Or just look at cab's comment above. Every other car has the repair manual published, so any independent authorized repair shop can do the repairs. Or a savvy owner can do that by herself/himself too. I think, there have been some complaints about that already. In fact, I rarely go to a dealer after the warranty expires as their charges seem higher to me. And warranty remains valid, no matter who does the maintenance. Again, this service monopoly likely helps Tesla, but not the consumers.

 

[Wshowell]

It looks like the last time a CPO car was added was 12/17. I'm totally guessing but let's say that 5-10 used cars a day come in through: trade in, lease return, and maybe even the buy back program (if that has begun). Tesla would be sitting on anywhere from 500 to 1000 cars plus the ones they pulled off their site. That's growing each day. So, my story... 15 years ago when our daughter was just a baby she hadn't filled her diaper for a few days. We were new parents and nervous as anything so we called our Doctor. He told us "relax, she's fine,she can only hold back so long. It'll happen and when it does, there will be one stinky mess to deal with!" I think that's what we will see here in time. Unless Tesla is recycling the cars, shipping them off to China or creating artificial reefs with them, they can only hold them back so long and when it does happen, it'll be one stinky mess to deal with. We will see S60s in the mid to high $30K range and S85 sub $45 and P85 sub $50k.

 

[goodbyebmw]

Hmm I wonder if I should sell my classic Model S without Autopilot now (VIN 11XXX), or later with this weird CPO thing they have going on. Got an offer for ~$45K, ~52K miles. Your guys' wisdom on how that offer looks? I was kinda banking on a dual-motor car, but I can do without.

 

[Electroman]

...

 

[mmd]

Hmm I wonder if I should sell my classic Model S without Autopilot now (VIN 11XXX), or later with this weird CPO thing they have going on. Got an offer for ~$45K, ~52K miles. Your guys' wisdom on how that offer looks? I was kinda banking on a dual-motor car, but I can do without.

Are you looking to upgrade to a newer Model S? If yes, it's worth checking with Tesla how much they offer, and if they sweeten the deal on some nice inventory car. Deals can be good near the end of the quarter.

Wshowell: that's some real stinky analogy

 

[schonelucht]

What happened to Tesla strategy of having high priced fully loaded demo/inventory cars for loaner purposes. I thought they wanted existing owners to upgrade.

Owners who are susceptible to that tactic probably have already upgraded.

 

[Drucifer]

Making 200 or more CPO cars disappear isn't that hard. Just give each service location about 4-5 loaners and it's a done deal. Now take the inventory cars you were using as loaners and put them on CPO. Easy peasy actually.

 

[Dilbagh]

If they suddenly reverse course, we may be in the market again for a Tesla, but the current model won't push us up...it will likely push us to a different automaker altogether. Again though, if I were them, I would make this exact same play - it just makes good business sense for them at this point in their evolution.

Exactly my situation. Given the CPO mess, I may also have to get something else as my current BMW lease ends next month. Bad timing.

 

[MsElectric]

Making 200 or more CPO cars disappear isn't that hard. Just give each service location about 4-5 loaners and it's a done deal. Now take the inventory cars you were using as loaners and put them on CPO. Easy peasy actually.

The only thing i find confusing is that they already had CPO cars being used as loaners before. I guess what this does is preclude them from bring sold. I wonder if they are on the verge of discontinuing the 70.

- - - Updated - - -

Exactly my situation. Given the CPO mess, I may also have to get something else as my current BMW lease ends next month. Bad timing.

Yup. This is definitely bad timing for buying a CPO. There's hardly any inventory and what is available is not very well priced.

What was a good time to buy a CPO was when they had cars available for $40Ks and $50Ks. Perhaps after the quarter ends selection in that price range will return.

 

[Skotty]

I can't help but wonder if maybe the older CPO cars were less than perfect, but buyers were still expecting them to be perfect, resulting in Tesla having to do a lot of additional refurbishment they may not have planned for, leading to some of the cars being unprofitable or even costing Tesla money. This may have been an additional compelling reason to pull a lot of the older cars from the program.

I can't be pushed up to a new car, but going to another brand was not an option for me either. Luckily I had a big enough budget (though still less than what I would really need for a new car) that I was able to find something I was happy with among what was left after the Great CPO Purge. I'll get a newer probably nicer car than I would have otherwise, but I'm pushing the budget to the max. All while getting no tax credits or incentives and having a higher interest rate on the financed portion of the car as compared to buying new.

I fit a very unique set of criteria for someone who would buy from the CPO program at this point, so I have to suspect the CPO program as it exists today will not work for most people.

Unique criteria:
1) Interested in Tesla and only Tesla
2) $70K - $75K budget
3) Unwilling to buy a new base model for whatever reason
4) Willing to buy used, despite still being an astronomical price
5) Able to find a correctly optioned car among the remaining remnants

On the flip side, anyone interested in a new car that doesn't want to wait on a custom order now has a bigger set of searchable inventory.

 

[bonaire]

Another guess too is that you may not see many CPO cars on the web now - but you can still buy them by visiting your local Tesla store. Let's not speculate - just get in there and ask what they have available. The web does not define the entire inventory. For the past year, there have always been "cars available" if you asked. Now, they just have put some of them on the web.

 

[Zaphod]

It looks like the last time a CPO car was added was 12/17.

There were plenty added after that date, but they disappeared during the big purge. That is why it appears that none have been added since mid-December. With that being said, I don't believe any CPOs have been added since the purge, its only been inventory cars.

 

[Drucifer]

Unique criteria:
1) Interested in Tesla and only Tesla
2) $70K - $75K budget
3) Unwilling to buy a new base model for whatever reason
4) Willing to buy used, despite still being an astronomical price
5) Able to find a correctly optioned car among the remaining remnants

I was one of the unique criteria people. I will go a step further.

Budget of "2)" and would rather have a well optioned vehicle over a 'base' vehicle at the same price, even if not new and
Budget of "2)" and would rather have other options over AWD/autopilot/next gen seats/(possibly folding mirrors / parking sensors as well)

6) Able to finance or pay cash without needing it to be a new vehicle for the bank.

You get to me and a small handful like me at that point

 

[BEEZR]

Moving the lower-priced cars into the loaner fleet makes sense in that they can keep prices higher for used/CPO. They set the market and it doesn't serve their objectives to sell more new cars and keep the market value of CPO higher if they sell cars in the $40K-$50K range. A glut of cars depresses price/value and dilutes the brand. It also may impact residual value I suppose if they create a lower market price for lease returns. And they may be forward-looking to a wave of 2013 lease returns in 2016, so they need to maintain some scarcity now. And, assuming they are smarter than the average car company, they will analyze the data from CPO sales (or lack thereof) in the current fiscal quarter and adjust strategy as necessary.

Related to the Model 3 introduction... With the anticipated base price of $35K, optioned out those cars could approach $50K or more, don't you think? So then they start to bleed demand/excitement from the 3 introduction if you can get a lightly used S for not much more. Or maybe they want to take as many deposits for the 3 as they can, and then in the months following try to convert some of those people into buying CPO S -- or maybe taking an S in the interim until they start delivery of the 3...

 

[MsElectric]

Moving the lower-priced cars into the loaner fleet makes sense in that they can keep prices higher for used/CPO. They set the market and it doesn't serve their objectives to sell more new cars and keep the market value of CPO higher if they sell cars in the $40K-$50K range. A glut of cars depresses price/value and dilutes the brand. It also may impact residual value I suppose if they create a lower market price for lease returns. And they may be forward-looking to a wave of 2013 lease returns in 2016, so they need to maintain some scarcity now. And, assuming they are smarter than the average car company, they will analyze the data from CPO sales (or lack thereof) in the current fiscal quarter and adjust strategy as necessary.

Related to the Model 3 introduction... With the anticipated base price of $35K, optioned out those cars could approach $50K or more, don't you think? So then they start to bleed demand/excitement from the 3 introduction if you can get a lightly used S for not much more. Or maybe they want to take as many deposits for the 3 as they can, and then in the months following try to convert some of those people into buying CPO S -- or maybe taking an S in the interim until they start delivery of the 3...

As has been said before if their intent is to set the market prices for used cars they will fail in that endeavor. The market will pay for a used car what the market feels it is worth. Nothing more.

Most people don't buy used cars to pay almost as much as for a new car. I doubt many of those looking to buy a ~ $40K-$60K CPO Model S will increase their budgets by tens of thousands now that those cars have been taken off the market. Many will instead wait longer or buy something else if they are unable to wait.

The best advice I have for someone looking to buy a CPO is if you can't find what you are looking for within your budget, just wait. Prices and availability will return to what they were about a month ago. Used car's don't get more expensive as time goes by, this is likely true even for Tesla