Would you buy a Model 3 with no Battery?

[eloder]

The smart ED has the battery leasing approach.

It was very nice when leasing the car entirely, but it was an absolute nightmare if you wanted to buy the car and lease the battery. So many bad situations, including:

1) No good resale standard. You never knew if the battery was leased or not, leading to a lot of deception on dealers especially advertising glider prices only and not including the battery.
2) It was much more expensive than just buying the battery.
3) It was no different than an extended warranty as far as consumer protection v. tech advances go. Normal EV battery warranties cover advances in tech from most makers, just not increases in battery mileage. (Nissan, Tesla, smart falling under this category at a minimum).
4) Needless complexity.
5) You could end up in a situation where you had a car without a battery or made it harder to do so, for a person to pick up a lease on an old battery.

 

[JeffreyR]

My pleasure. I've posted on this several times over at TM forum. I understand why some don't want to use this option, but if they can make it work (storage, capex and financial exposure) seems like a useful one to me. I especially like the idea of upgrading for long trips.

 

[Mitrovic]

Yes. I think it is a great business idea. I have two Renault Zoe with leased batteries.

So, I do not need to worry about the health of the battery. Less worries, better life.

I have the Tesla Roadster and it is a worry how long the battery will survive.

 

[Yggdrasill]

Yes. I think it is a great business idea. I have two Renault Zoe with leased batteries.

So, I do not need to worry about the health of the battery. Less worries, better life.

I have the Tesla Roadster and it is a worry how long the battery will survive.

Much better to set aside say $75 each month, and then when you need to replace the battery 8-10 years later, you have $7200-9000 in an account ready to be spent. Then you're not paying someone to do the same thing for you, only at a higher cost.

 

[igotzzoom]

Sure. The more options, the better. As long as it's not mandatory.

 

[Ampster]

I agree, it could be a night mare trying to sell a used Smart with a battery lease. I have perused some used ones and some of the low priced ones leave out any mention of battery lease. If one's intention is to hold the car for many years then buying is the best financial decision. In that case@Yggdrasill's suggestion to put the battery lease amount into a savings account is the best decision .
I just leased another Smart Ed, and got the frequent customer discount which lowered the down payment to $850. After the California rebate of $2500 my company will have no cash outlay until the 11th month and then $146/mo for 25 months.

 

[tga]

Sure. The more options, the better. As long as it's not mandatory.

A manditory battery lease would be a deal killer for me. Period.

 

[mknox]

Here's a different slant on it: When I ordered my Model S (in 2012, pre-production) I wanted to get a Signature edition. Then it turned out the car wasn't NAFTA-eligible because of the level of "foreign content", namely the Japanese battery cells. Canada then imposed an extra duty on the car. I wanted to buy the car and battery separately so that I would only have to pay the duty on the battery, but Tesla wouldn't bite, so I switched to an early Production car to keep my costs under control.

 

[bxr140]

A manditory battery lease would be a deal killer for me. Period.

Kind of an odd stance. If tesla were to pursue this path (and they won't), what makes you think it would be anything like traditional auto leases?

 

[coco81]

A manditory battery lease would be a deal killer for me. Period.

And for me too!

You can say a lot of advantages about a theorical battery lease but here in Europe we have battery lease in Renault and Nissan and it's ridiculous... You should pay more for the lease than the equivalent fuel cost of an ICE car.

For example, for the Renault ZOE (a small car) you have to pay for battery lease:

36 month lease, 3000 miles / year ... 49 € / month
36 month lease, 15.000 miles / year ... 122 € / month.

So you pay 600 € every year only for battery lease to make a ridiculous 3000 miles. And in an similar ICE'd car (Renault Clio) yo can make this 3000 miles for less than 300 euros!!! If you make 15.000 miles/year you have to pay 1500 euros for the lease... a traditional car would make 15000 miles for the same amount.

If you lease the battery the cost of using an EV are higher than a similar ICE (you have to consider energy cost).

Battery lease plan are designed to sell a cheap car and make the customer hate the EV years later because high costs. It's marketing!

 

[tga]

Here's a different slant on it: When I ordered my Model S (in 2012, pre-production) I wanted to get a Signature edition. Then it turned out the car wasn't NAFTA-eligible because of the level of "foreign content", namely the Japanese battery cells. Canada then imposed an extra duty on the car. I wanted to buy the car and battery separately so that I would only have to pay the duty on the battery, but Tesla wouldn't bite, so I switched to an early Production car to keep my costs under control.

What changed between Sig and production to impact the NAFTA duty? A production car's cells are made in Japan, too.

Kind of an odd stance. If tesla were to pursue this path (and they won't), what makes you think it would be anything like traditional auto leases?

I don't care how it's structured. Lease == I don't own it. I have no interest in a long term rental. I want to own it, period. Anything else is a deal-breaker. Why would I possibly want to own a car, but not the battery that powers it? Something goes wrong, the lease ends, and I'm stuck with a worthless glider.

 

[DFibRL8R]

Here's a different slant on it: When I ordered my Model S (in 2012, pre-production) I wanted to get a Signature edition. Then it turned out the car wasn't NAFTA-eligible because of the level of "foreign content", namely the Japanese battery cells. Canada then imposed an extra duty on the car. I wanted to buy the car and battery separately so that I would only have to pay the duty on the battery, but Tesla wouldn't bite, so I switched to an early Production car to keep my costs under control.

Taxation issues are relevant. In Virginia, I pay annual personal property tax on the assessed value of the entire car including the battery. Given the large portion of the car's value that the battery represents it creates a dis-incentive to buy a new Tesla with essentially an extra cost for the value that newer technology has despite the benefits (less oil consumption, cleaner air etc). This impacts hybrids too to a lesser degree. If the battery was separated from the base value of the car with 2 separate transactions I believe it would be more appropriate.

 

[mknox]

What changed between Sig and production to impact the NAFTA duty? A production car's cells are made in Japan, too.

The production model was a little less expensive. The only thing that came standard on the Sig that I didn't get were the 21" wheels. So my production model + duty was close to what the Sig without duty would have been. Adding the duty to the Sig price was just too rich for my blood. Really would have like that Sig red color though!

 

[bxr140]

I don't care how it's structured. Lease == I don't own it. I have no interest in a long term rental. I want to own it, period. Anything else is a deal-breaker. Why would I possibly want to own a car, but not the battery that powers it? Something goes wrong, the lease ends, and I'm stuck with a worthless glider.

I guess I just see more FUD than anything with your response. If tesla has proven anything, it's that they can provide a superior product/experience over legacy automakers in almost every respect. If they were to implement some type of lease or fractional ownership option, you can be sure it would follow suit.

 

[tga]

I guess I just see more FUD than anything with your response. If tesla has proven anything, it's that they can provide a superior product/experience over legacy automakers in almost every respect. If they were to implement some type of lease or fractional ownership option, you can be sure it would follow suit.

I think it's a bit insulting to accuse me of spreading/falling victim to FUD. I don't doubt that whatever Tesla will "provide a superior product/experience over legacy automakers". I just think the idea of not owning a battery when you own the car sucks. I try to avoid doing things that suck.

The only possible argument for it I can see is some kind of risk mitigation for people concerned about battery life or the oft-feared, yet vague, "advancements in technology". Personally, I think the Roadster and S have shown there isn't much risk there, so I see no need to mitigate it. In fact, I see more risk in not owning that battery than in owning it.

I really want to add "Better Place proved it was a stupid idea to not own the battery", but there were far more issues with Better Place than just that...