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Hi guys! Indeed, I was the winner of the raffle and I just took delivery of it on this past Thursday. The Messner Foundation updated their webpage with a picture of me picking up the car too. The Messner Foundation
I bought only one ticket in the raffle just a day before the end of the raffle period when I saw that they were still very short of hitting their maximum goal of 5000 tickets to sell. In the end they only sold about 1000 total tickets, and I was watching the live YouTube stream as they spun the drum and announced the winner.
Although it took nearly 4 weeks for me to receive the car, it could have been only 2 weeks if I had not already had a previously scheduled vacation and I had opted to drive the car myself from Colorado to Texas.
You can see the IRS document that describes how this is handled here: http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-tege/notice_1340.pdf Basically, you have to pay 25% of the retail value of the prize to the sponsor of the raffle, and they have to in turn pay it to the IRS on your behalf.
You'll also have to pay for the sales tax of the vehicle, which varies by state. In Texas, the motor vehicle sales tax is 6.25% of the price. I will get back the $7500 federal tax credit for electric cars at tax time. Unfortunately, I cannot claim the $2500 Texas credit for "Light-Duty Motor Vehicle Purchase or Lease Incentive (LDPLI)" because Texas doesn't recognize Tesla as an approved dealer.
gg_got_a_tesla
Model S: VIN 65513, Model 3: VIN 1913
Fantastic! I always thought that most of these drawings are essentially spurious and that there are not really any publicized winners.
Congrats and welcome to the forums, @bovine!
Congrats and welcome to the forums, @bovine!
Yeah, I was a little skeptical of them before even buying the ticket, but I felt that $200 was not too much to lose even if it was a scam (or just didn't win). Of course I wasn't exactly expecting that I would win a 1:1000 chance, even though I hoped it, but I figured that the chances were significantly better than winning the lottery.
However, when I found out I won and was now obligated to directly pay the foundation a bunch more money for the estimated federal taxes, naturally I was again concerned about the legitimacy again. I attempted to look for ways to directly pay the IRS rather than paying the foundation on my behalf, but that turned out to not be legally permissible to them. Ultimately I decided to just trust the foundation at their word (run by an established law firm), wired them the taxes due, and I now have my Tesla.
purplewalt
Active Member
Welcome!
Great to have another Texas Tesla driver on the road.
Welcome to the Forum, you have a great opportunity to interact, teach and learn.
And drive.
Hope you have your local/at home power situated with a 14/50 Outlet.
Great to have another Texas Tesla driver on the road.
Welcome to the Forum, you have a great opportunity to interact, teach and learn.
And drive.
Hope you have your local/at home power situated with a 14/50 Outlet.
muleferg
Active Member
Something I've always wondered about raffles like this is that 25% of the retail value of the car is on the order of 22k. I don't know very many people that could drop 22k cash on a moments notice, so can the winner take out an auto loan to pay that tax, or do you have to somehow come up with 22k cash to claim the prize? I would hope that if I were to win a Tesla that I would be able to take out a loan to pay the tax, otherwise I'd never be able to afford to claim the prize.
mikes_fsd
Banned
Wouldn't that make all the game-shows on TV illegal?
The prize claims go through the same process/taxation.
There was at least one minor complication because I am in Texas and the foundation running the raffle was in Colorado... The foundation had already paid Tesla for the car and the Colorado vehicle sales tax within that state (but had not yet registered it, so that the raffle winner could be the first registrant and be entitled to the federal tax credit). However, for me to register the vehicle in Texas, I would still have to pay the higher Texas state vehicle sales tax, and Texas could not give me a partial credit for the Colorado taxes since they had been paid by the foundation and not in my name. Tesla was willing to refund the Colorado sales tax so that it could be paid by me to Texas instead, since the vehicle wouldn't be staying in Colorado at all.
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Some other raffles give away a car plus some cash as the prize, and I suspect the reason for the cash is to allow the winner to use that towards paying for the taxes on the car (and the taxes on the cash prize itself). See the http://www.humanesocietynational.org/ as an example.
Hi, @yobigd20,
Can you please supply a citation for the "foundation that got into legal trouble"? I'm curious because I'm thinking of doing a raffle myself.
I'm aware of the following raffles, all of which appear to have sold tickets to people who live in different states: Garfield High in Seattle; National Humane Society; Big Boys Big Sisters of Metro Atlanta; Messner Foundation, Denver, CO; Illinois Solar Energy Association; Osterville Library, Osterville, MA. All but the last used Teslas as prizes; the last uses various nice cars. Note that it doesn't appear to be legal to use the USPS to mail tickets across state lines; but there appear to be workarounds.
Thank you for your help.
Alan
Can you please supply a citation for the "foundation that got into legal trouble"? I'm curious because I'm thinking of doing a raffle myself.
I'm aware of the following raffles, all of which appear to have sold tickets to people who live in different states: Garfield High in Seattle; National Humane Society; Big Boys Big Sisters of Metro Atlanta; Messner Foundation, Denver, CO; Illinois Solar Energy Association; Osterville Library, Osterville, MA. All but the last used Teslas as prizes; the last uses various nice cars. Note that it doesn't appear to be legal to use the USPS to mail tickets across state lines; but there appear to be workarounds.
Thank you for your help.
Alan
every state has different laws regarding raffles which makes it a real PIA. the one i'm referencing was a raffle in Washington where they sold tickets to ppl not in Washington but found out the purchases had to take place within the state so they had to refund a lot of people. you'll need to check the laws in your state.
Hi, @yobigd20,
Yes, I agree with you, there is considerable variance in state-level laws. There are also some applicable federal laws. I have spoken with the organizer of the Garfield High (Seattle, WA) raffle and he reported no legal difficulties across three years of raffling first a Leaf and then (twice) a Tesla. If you know of someone else I should speak with, would you kindly PM me with the relevant information? I'm happy to honor requests for confidentiality.
Thank you for your help!
Alan
Yes, I agree with you, there is considerable variance in state-level laws. There are also some applicable federal laws. I have spoken with the organizer of the Garfield High (Seattle, WA) raffle and he reported no legal difficulties across three years of raffling first a Leaf and then (twice) a Tesla. If you know of someone else I should speak with, would you kindly PM me with the relevant information? I'm happy to honor requests for confidentiality.
Thank you for your help!
Alan
I think my new S70D is supremely awesome and it's really fun to drive, particularly the acceleration. It definitely seems to get noticed by other people, even by some that don't recognize it as a Tesla or for being an electric vehicle. I haven't yet taken it outside of the city or on a very long drive yet, but I may try driving between Houston and Austin this coming weekend. My prior vehicles for the last 15 years have been Jeeps, so switching to driving such a low height sedan alone takes a little bit of getting used to.
The rear view camera is convenient and allows me to back into parking spaces that I would have normally never had the confidence to attempt before. Being able to use the mobile app to start up the air conditioning just as I'm leaving the checkout line of a store is awesome. The integrated Slacker radio provides great music variety, though I suspect cell coverage might drop out occasionally in remote areas on long road trips. I've noticed a few glitches in the routes recommended by the driving directions, and the center console navigation doesn't always refresh properly when you force it to reroute, but I imagine that will improve as the software updates continue.
As a private pilot, I know the importance of flight leg planning, fuel management, and burn estimation... so it's a little amusing and immediately familiar when I read about other people planning out their EV driving trips and charging stops in a similar sort of spreadsheet.
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