Will Tesla remove FSD from used inventory?

[stopcrazypp]

For the sake of clarity lets table the TMC threads and focus specifically on the tweet as that was what led to my response. The various TMC threads on the issue just set the stage in my brain before I read the tweet. Like one was the gas, and the other was the match.

This is the tweet from the customer "I paid FSD for my Model 3 in November. I now want to upgrade to model Y and your team tells me you don't value FSD in your trade-in offer because you can do the software upgrade for free. Want me to pay again full price for FSD again? That's not fair, change that!"

So he's claiming the team told him they don't value FSD in a trade-in offer because they can do the software upgrade for free.

Elon didn't reject the claim
Tesla didn't reject the claim despite knowing exactly who the customer was, and the role he plays in the tech investment world
We know tesla can do the software upgrade for free
We know FSD was on a lot of used vehicles being sold by Tesla

So now we have to ask ourselves is this true?

The evidence points to it being true.

Now does that mean its conclusively true? No, but tesla doesn't operate with much transparency so how would we ever really know for certain? Sometimes when companies operate without much transparency the best reaction is to play hardball. That way they're forced to reveal what the hell is actually going on.

To have such a vertically integrated company having so much control over a product their sell for the entire life of that product sets a dangerous precedence whether its tesla or some tractor company.

Sure I agree with you that ideally one needs more evidence to say a strong statement, but at the same FSD owners have gotten screwed over. So I think we need to push back.

I'm tired of seeing owners make excuses for Tesla.

Tesla is not our friend.

That's all conjecture from you, yet you are suggesting to ignore any counterexamples that show Tesla values FSD at more that $0 in trade in.

We can only agree to disagree at this point, but if I see it repeated elsewhere I will still call it out, as I posted a clear counterexample where they are NOT valuing FSD at $0 at trade in (heck even in that thread the OP was not claiming $0 value, only $1000 vs KBB).

Nothing to do with Tesla being a friend or enemy, only being accurate.

 

[S4WRXTTCS]

That's all conjecture from you. We can only agree to disagree at this point, but if I see it repeated elsewhere I will still call it out, as I posted a clear counterexample where they are NOT valuing FSD at $0 at trade in.

At this point it doesn't really matter because I think we're both in agreement that Elon will likely resolve it in the near future.

Considering that we're still on HW3 it makes no sense to have FSD block a person from trading one Tesla in on another Tesla. Doing that just leaves money on the table, and bad taste in the Tesla owners mouth.

My hope is that Tesla will give near full credit for FSD on the trade in, and that's what it should have been.

Once the HW levels no longer match I could understand there being a more significant price difference.

 

[S4WRXTTCS]

That's all conjecture from you, yet you are suggesting to ignore any counterexamples that show Tesla values FSD at more that $0 in trade in.

We can only agree to disagree at this point, but if I see it repeated elsewhere I will still call it out, as I posted a clear counterexample where they are NOT valuing FSD at $0 at trade in (heck even in that thread the OP was not claiming $0 value, only $1000 vs KBB).

Nothing to do with Tesla being a friend or enemy, only being accurate.

The problem with accuracy is we will never know how many customers they valued FSD at zero dollars or how many customers they gave some $'s to. We also don't know what damage they did to the value of FSD by adding it to used vehicles. We suspect they did it fairly extensively to get better margins, but in doing so damaged the resale value of FSD due to the oversupply.

In any case to simplify it for other people.

This is the tweet: ""I paid FSD for my Model 3 in November. I now want to upgrade to model Y and your team tells me you don't value FSD in your trade-in offer because you can do the software upgrade for free. Want me to pay again full price for FSD again? That's not fair, change that!""

This is my interpretation of that tweet: "To make matter worse they've admitted they value FSD on a trade in at zero dollars so I can't get anything for it by trading it in to Tesla."

This is your challenge: "Tesla never admitted to giving $0 for FSD on a trade. It was a claim from one tweeter and Elon said he would look into it and agreed FSD should be valued on trade (but never said that Tesla didn't value it)."

My challenge to your challenge: Tesla DID admit to not valuing FSD on a trade to THIS customer. The customer is Pierre Ferragu, and he's well respected in the tech investment word. There is no reason to believe he is lying about what he was told or that he somehow interpreted it incorrectly.

Conclusion: Nothing about that tweet tells us how common this practice is, and I feel like my initial interpretation made it seem like a black and white thing so I'll correct that in future posts about it. If I know anything about Tesla as a company its that they're massively inconsistent. So its entirely possible that Tesla sales people are not all working from the same playbook. Its troubling that Elon couldn't just state what the policy was to clear things up.

Future area of interest for myself: My initial take was that someone accidently coughed up the truth because they didn't know any better. It was a pretty disastrous thing for a Sales rep to say. If Tesla had a PR department they would be doing damage control, but apparently customers serve as the PR department now days. In any case I find it interesting because of the precedence it sets. This is the first time in history where purchasable SW is such a major asset on a used vehicle. If I buy a used Tesla with FSD + acceleration boost it saves me from a $12K future purchases of them. That's quite a bit of money so it means I'll have to value a used vehicle with those much higher than one with out. But, how much? Well that depends on Tesla policy.

If Tesla had the policy of not adding/removing SW features on used vehicles they sold I would know the market itself would set the price whether I bought from Tesla or third party. I would feel comfortable in knowing the price would be set by supply/demand set by the market.

If Tesla had the policy of giving $0 for SW features on a trade in and then deleting them from the vehicles being traded in I would know my best bet would be to buy third party where I could get those SW features on a vehicle for less than the $12K I would be forced to pay Tesla for them. In this case the market still sets the price, but I would be frustrated since I'd lose out on potential benefits from buying directly from Tesla.

If Tesla had the policy of adding those SW features to used vehicles to get better margins from them I would instantly know that they were using the extensive margins on the SW to get better margins for the used vehicles. To me this is blood in the water and I'm going to feast when it comes to pricing. The reason is SW has a lot of margin and so there is more wiggle room. I would know whether I bought from Tesla or privately that I could likely swing a pretty good deal because of oversaturation of supply due to Tesla's action. It's also the worst policy as it doesn't protect the value of those SW features. It does make buying used a smart decision though especially if the HW version is the same as new as it is the case with FSD.

So going forwards it will be interesting to see what Tesla sets as policy when it comes to SW on used vehicles.

 

[ALSETJC]

This is a simple business move for more profit. The hardware is there and you can add 5k to a used vehicle in a blink of the eye . Why would you not add it to all inventory as added value for used cars . Makes the resale market very profitable for them. Also don't believe Tesla that FSD will continue to increase. Once there is competition and sales of FSD stalls it can come down in price.