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$35,000 Tesla Model 3 Available Now

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Re: $35,000 Tesla Model 3 Available Now

#611

Post by Maakuth »

emiliobumachar wrote: post #591
Maakuth wrote: post #553

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to counter you, but why would a low-income household consider buying a new car? A properly maintained ten year old car these days is normally quite reliable and safe.

Key expression is "properly maintained". And there's no reasonable way to know. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Market_for_Lemons

Not a fool proof way, but when you buy, say, a $10 000 car, you should budget some thousands for repairs. Then if it breaks down soon after and it's too expensive to repair, your downside is $10 000, which is how much your $40 000 new car would depreciate in a very short time. If you don't have especially bad luck, this doesn't happen for every second hand car you own, but the depreciation is guaranteed to happen for every new car.

Re: $35,000 Tesla Model 3 Available Now

#612

Post by gutnor »

jonathankoren wrote: post #560
bagels wrote: post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A large part of that is "savings on fuel"

Yeah that’s a Tesla trick to make their cars look cheaper than they are. It’s deceptive. When I buy a gasoline power car, I don’t figure the cost of gas into the purchase price of the car.

It also wrongly assume that you can charge it at home. I only have access to street parking in London. I would need to register to various charging provider in order to be able to keep a car reasonably topped up without having to go to the supercharger at the beginning of a journey.

The price of the monthly subscription(s) alone is a very significant proportion of my gas consumption (I'm a leasure only driver, I do maybe 5000 miles per year, the bulk of it is done in 4 to 5 road trips)

In Spain, the standing cost of a residential electricity contract that is sufficient to charge a Tesla (i.e. above the regular Spanish 3000W default contract) is similarly a significant portion of the gas price.

Re: $35,000 Tesla Model 3 Available Now

#613

Post by sjwright »

ghaff wrote: post #526
sjwright wrote: post #507

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always thought it was weird that we negotiate a price with new car purchases. I do negotiate hard on my cars (and on behalf of family) and I hate the process. It's stupid. I'd much rather the manufacturer nominate a fixed price and not allow any negotiation at all. Then the manufacturer would be forced to pick a price that competes with the market. There are only a few things that excite me more about a Model 3 tha…

There are no haggle dealers and have been no haggle brands from time to time. One problem is that the people who like and think of themselves as driving a hard bargain don’t like the inability to do so

For those people who like to drive a hard bargain, they can do what everyone does with every other expensive commodity—wait for the time when sales numbers are dropping off and take advantage of sharper prices.

After all I'm not saying that car makers can't have "deals" but the price of any new car for sale—on special or a regular—should be published and not negotiated.

Re: $35,000 Tesla Model 3 Available Now

#614

Post by sjwright »

aedron wrote: post #584
lsc wrote: post #551

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting. My experience is that if I want some idea of how I'll feel about the car in a year, a test drive of less than a week gives me almost no data. Personally? yeah, I think renting a car is the way to go, if you want to evaluate how you will feel about the car later. A 20 minute test drive, to me, is like laying on a mattress for 20 minutes in a store and expecting to know what it will feel like to sleep on.

An important part of choosing a car is ergonomics. I like to rest my arms on the door and middle console armrests while driving, but my brand new (expensive) SUV, bought sight unseen, comes just short of being able to do this, which bothers me a little every day. Obviously these things differ from person to person, so yeah, next time I'll probably go for a test drive first.

Find a reviewer that has a similar body size to you. There's literally hundreds of car reviewers on youtube, there will be plenty who will have the same ergonomic structure to you.

Remember: you're not special. You're just another meat bag that fits within a bell curve of normalness.

Edit: to the one person who voted me down, I was wrong. You aren't a meat bag, you are special.

Re: $35,000 Tesla Model 3 Available Now

#615

Post by AlgorithmicTime »

londons_explore wrote: post #575
turtlegrids wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's cheaper to Tesla if they "deliver" it at their factory. I took delivery of my Tesla at the Fremont factory. was still forced to pay full delivery fee. insane.

I wonder what an efficient car delivery service could cost? A car transporter carries 11 cars and can drive say 500 miles per day at a cost of $500 per day (including driver, fuel, and vehicle rental). If the average delivery distance from factory to customer is 1500 miles, then transport cost works out to $136. Add to that the 'last mile delivery' which is probably going to involve a $20 per hour employee driving to…

Shipping cars via rail is probably cheaper. Fewer personnel needed per car, less fuel needed per car. Car transporter can just be the last mile.

Re: $35,000 Tesla Model 3 Available Now

#616

Post by saalweachter »

bduerst wrote: post #97
fengb wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funnily enough, the listed MSRP usually much higher than actual dealership price.

Anchoring. It's a negotiation tactic since most purchases are through negotiation. Also the same with the advertised monthly leasing prices that you see on commercials - all subject to credit and other circumstances.

My experience has been that when you actually go in to buy a car, you get a swath of arbitrary discounts to the MSRP, then you get a few other fees and especially taxes that bring it back up to the MSRP.

So I'd guess that there's also a component of the high MSRP + large standard discounts which is also making sure that you don't come in expecting to pay an advertised price, get aaaallllmost all the way through the process, get the final price with tax that is ~10%/several k$ higher, and then crap out there both because it is a real kick in the pants and you may not have the extra money.

Re: $35,000 Tesla Model 3 Available Now

#618

Post by sjwright »

dagw wrote: post #583
sjwright wrote: post #505

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dealers are stupid and make no sense. I may be a weird consumer but whenever I buy something expensive I always think about the unrelated things my money is paying for. So for example when I visit a car dealership I notice the big land footprint, the shiny offices, and well dressed salespeople—and I think to myself how much of my car purchase is going towards the upkeep of this crap, none of which I like or want. If…

I wouldn't mind car dealers if they actually offered a useful independent service. When I go to buy a camera the person in the store can explain the pros and cons of Canon vs Nikon vs Fuji vs Sony and let me try them all next to each other. Why can't I go to a car dealer and have them explain the pros and cons of Honda vs Toyota vs Nissan and let me compare them right there in the store. I trust the guy at my local c…

Rule of thumb for life: Never ever get advice about what to buy from the person selling it, unless that person has literally no incentive whatsoever, or if the purchase is extremely low risk (e.g. low item cost or hassle-free returns policy).

Camera stores is a great example. The vast majority of salespeople know how to convince you that a product suits your needs, but would have very little clue what is important to get the best outcome. They're not photographers—or if they are, chances are they're no more of a photography expert than you.

Perhaps the worst is "high end" hi-fi salespeople. These slick operators are great at convincing you to buy the unnecessarily expensive product and the criminally overpriced accessories. Unfortunately for the customer, most of the things that matter in making a good system aren't sold in a cardboard box with a big profit margin, so you'll never hear about them from a hi-fi salesperson.

Re: $35,000 Tesla Model 3 Available Now

#619

Post by sytelus »

almost_usual wrote: post #359
tamal wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s a law.

"This is 2019," he said. "People want to buy things online." But he added that franchise-dealer opposition would be a violation of interstate commerce, and that is unconstitutional. "Good luck with that," Musk said. Sounds like Musk likes to pick and choose the laws he follows. Source: https://www.businessinsider.com/tesla-is-eliminating-most-of...

What you call “law” is mandate established by car dealers by buying off politicians. This is one of the most disgusting monopolistic snake oil business that had little chance of surviving otherwise for so long. Musk is doing great favor to all of us by showing them middle finger and letting them know that they can’t hide behind their purchased politicians.

Re: $35,000 Tesla Model 3 Available Now

#620

Post by sytelus »

leetcrew wrote: post #354
BoorishBears wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Courageous” If anyone has ever had to cancel a car sale you’ll realize how much of a hassle it truely is to “return a car” Your credit report will show a loan even after it’s been cancelled for weeks. I once cancelled financing for a car due to it not being as described. Started looking for a new car and found it. Got denied for a loan because my score showed a 60k loan with 0 payments made. It took almost 2 months…

if you are financing an (entry level) luxury car, you are doing something wrong.

If you have cash and you are not financing then you doing something wrong. Your cash will almost always provide much better returns than car loan interest.
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