Welcome to Tesla Motors Club
Discuss Tesla's Model S, Model 3, Model X, Model Y, Cybertruck, Roadster and More.
Register

Texas Direct Auto

This site may earn commission on affiliate links.
I bought my previous car from them. It was a 2008 Audi A6 that was coming off a 3 year lease and was sold at auction. Texas Direct Auto bought it, and then I bought it from them. Quite a good deal, got a good price on it.

I would say Texas Direct Auto is a "buyer beware" kind of place. You can indeed get some good deals, but the onus is completely on you to have the car checked out by a mechanic, check it's history, check it's title, etc. If you want to do the legwork to make sure the vehicle is for you, then you can get a good deal, but do not assume that every vehicle they have on the lot is a good deal -- many are not.
 
I just took delivery on a 2014 P85+ with 11k miles and autopilot that I got on ebay. I'm in Dallas so I had them ship it up here (they have an Irving trade evaluation location), and they gave me a very fair trade value on my S60 with 40k miles. It came with 1 key, no manual, but did have floor mats and is in great shape. Anyway - during the process, I found that they bought a lot of inventory cars from tesla. My guess is tesla dumped a bunch for a good price to them to boost sales in Dec to hit their numbers. Anyway - aside from their financing guy being slow it went just fine.
 
I bought my car there (2015 S85)... the sales dude told me they bought $1M of them from Tesla for resale...according to him (who of course, would never had a reason to lie), they sell more used Teslas than any other dealer.

So I got a reasonable price, I thought, but holy cow, do not go in there expecting them to have a clue. They literally sent me out the door for a test drive with no sales dude, so if I wouldn't have had a test drive recently, I would have had no clue what I was doing. Also, not sure if the sales dude would have been useful...it's a different enough car, especially with AP, that I don't think someone who sells one every six months will be very educational. Also, although my ad said no mats, one key, and no book, it had mats, two keys, and some little tiny book.... YMMV.

They also acted like it was a big deal I wanted it charged... I was heading to San Antonio, I thought that was a pretty reasonable request :D The dude that did my walk through had NO idea... didn't know what a frunk was, where the charge port was, how to activate it, etc, etc. He could make the lights flash, turn on the turn signals, and activate the brake lights. So know what you want to inspect before you go... they won't help you with that :D

On a user note, they have a snack bar there, and soda machines, but no wi-fi. Really? And it took FOR-FREAKING-EVER. I was there over 6 hours, between the charging, test drive, detailing, paperwork, etc, etc.

So... the service is what it is. They offered me a laughable amount for my trade-in, they didn't want to come down to what I thought was a good deal, but finally got within $500 of it, so I took it, but I was an inch away from walking away. It's like any used car dealer, I think.. you can't go in uneducated or unwilling to walk away, or else you'll pay a premium. The car is AWESOME, and they did a good job with the detailing, and finally got semi-close with a price, so I wouldn't have any huge issues buying from them again. I would definitely be buyer-beware on the trade-ins though... they offered me 13-15K for my 2014 Prius, which I sold two weeks later for $19K. Make sure you know what KBB is, and what you're willing to take (I had my brain at no less than 17K, and they were saying "middle of that range" for the Prius, sight unseen, and somehow, I think I wouldn't have gotten a good deal if they thought they had me trapped by my drive to Houston or desire for the Tesla... it would have been the "oh, there's a ding... maybe 13.1".)

So... if anyone is thinking of buying from them, I would suggest driving one first with someone who knows about them... an owner, the gallery, whatever. Don't make TDA your first Tesla experience :D
 
I went back and forth with them on some eBay cars - the deal I kind of regret not taking was a 2016 S P90DL they had - blue with black, fairly optioned out with only 1400mi on it - usual "one key, no floormats" which must be how they get them from Tesla?

They wanted $100k which was a probably a good deal. I offered $95k and they only came down to $99k. I was willing to pay the $99k but figured we could do some back and forth and I might be able to squeeze enough out of them to cover shipping. It had been up for several weeks with no bites so I thought I could nudge them down just a hair more.

Alas, it suddenly went "unavailable" before we could settle on price, someone local picked it up. Darn you, Texans.

I emailed them on a handful of cars over the course of a month or so, each time it was a different sales person that emailed me back, seems like a high number of younger guys dealing the cars so they must have a big fleet and a big staff.
 
What car do you have now? What price are you looking for? Would love to hear how it goes.
I'm driving a Kia Soul. I'm planning on getting quotes from Carmax and my Kia dealership also since they recently lost all of their used cars in the flood, they might not give me a sucky offer. I'm expecting between $5k-$7k for it which I take with me to the office of motor vehicles to pay what should be about $6k in taxes. If I get more money, that will just go towards unlocking autopilot.