Tesla will sue you for $50,000 if you try to resell your Cybertruck in the first year::Tesla may agree to buy the truck back at the original price minus “$0.25/mile driven” and any damages and repairs.
This is, surprisingly, not that unusual for vehicles in high demand. It’s to prevent flipping.
GM does it on certain vehicles as well:
(the C8 Corvette Z06, GMC Hummer EV, and Cadillac Escalade-V if you want to know without clicking the link.)
GM wasn’t harsh enough IMHO. They should have black listed people who immediately flipped base C8s for significantly more than MSRP. Base C8s (not Z51) going for over 100k, with miles on them, was fucking ridiculous.
I’ll say it now: car dealers are useless dinosaurs and there is no point to having them anymore. I don’t need a dealer to tell me what options I want on my car. I can select those on a webpage after I’ve reviewed the available options. I need a place to take my car for service if it’s a factory failure / warranty work. I can do the rest myself or pay another focused professional to do the work.
Yeah, pretty much every Hummer EV I saw was at a dealership lot, used, and marked up $100k
I really like your second paragraph!
Agreed, but I absolutely need somewhere to test drive the car as well before purchasing. There’s no way I would buy a car without it.
I would agree with that. I had a car shipped by an online sales company and when I showed up to test drive & but it, I didn’t actually fit in the car properly, so I didn’t end up buying it. Such is the life of being tall.
I’m just shy of 6 feet so not excessively tall by any means, but I test drove the Fiat 500 some years ago, and found there is no way for me to be comfortable in it. Interestingly the Mini Cooper was very comfortable, and could have easily accommodated someone taller - as long as anybody sitting behind you didn’t have legs.
Yeah the Fiat is VERY small and I concur on the Mini. I’m a bit over 6’ and I found regular Minis to be very comfortable with headroom with the countryman’s being a bit better on the backseat situation 😂
I’m no fan of flipping/scalping but the choice of the degradation of ownership is much worse. If they really own the car then they aught to be able to resell it.
Prediction; this will extend beyond just high end cars.
Like with other manufacturers with similar limitations, the limitation for resale is only for the first year. It literally is just to try and prevent people buying and flipping the car for a profit. If you don’t like the vehicle you can sell it back to Tesla outside the normal return window. Or wait a year and sell it to someone else.
The reduction in ownership rights is worse than scalpers. Not sure why you assume this is pure benevolence instead of companies making more money via their control of property you paid for.
The reduction in ownership rights is worse than scalpers.
I suppose it depends: would you like to at least have the item or be able to buy it only at a 3x price, if ever ?
Other high brand cars have even more stringent clauses (like, you cannot repaint the car in a certain color to not ridicule the brand). People are even perpetually banned from buying from the brand in some cases.Not sure why you assume this is pure benevolence instead of companies making more money via their control of property you paid for.
It is not benevolence, it is a try to solve a real problem that they think it could arise.
I think it is not in anyone’s best interests to lessen their ownerships rights to maybe save money. Their choice is also bad for me in that it shows companies they can to it too and could become the norm.
If a manufacture has a good reason to not sell to someone that would be fine but it is none of their business what colour I paint my car, or who I can resell it too.
If they wanted to solve the problem they could make more cars to meet demand (without the needless use of microchips, if that is still the bottleneck).
I think it is not in anyone’s best interests to lessen their ownerships rights to maybe save money. Their choice is also bad for me in that it shows companies they can to it too and could become the norm.
While yours are valid concerns, that type of restriction works only on specific items. I don’t see a car manufacturer pull the same stunt on a mass production car (or any other mass production item for the matter) because the problem this try to solve does not exist in the first place, maybe Tesla just think (true or false that it can be or based on the data they have) that the Cybertruck will be some sort of “status symbol” which would attract scalpers or the like of them.
In the end this is a battle Musk cannot win: he will be damned if he do (to ban resell in the first year) and he will be damned if he don’t (and thus allowing scalpers). He can only choose why he will be damned so he choose a way that maybe is more friendly (or less enemy from your point of view) to the consumer.
If a manufacture has a good reason to not sell to someone that would be fine but it is none of their business what colour I paint my car, or who I can resell it too.
I can agree with you, but the fact that the manufacturer put these restrictions and people still buy their cars means that maybe it does not really matter to the buyers since having the car is much more important that being able to repaint it pink, in their view.
People often choose what isn’t in their best interests but that doesn’t invalidate the criticism. I am unsure if this should/could simple be illegal but I will argue social stigma should be applied to people who don’t care about themselves or others.
My concern is companies will do it anyway for their own gain, regardless of if it was actually a cure to the issue of scalping, because users will let them.
Musk’s has enough variety of questionable choices but I’ll damn him here for needlessly making low supply, the cause of scalping in the first place.
Only for the first year is bs. I bought an object, I own it and I decide when to put it on sale for whatever reason I want, because you know, I own it.
If Tesla doesn’t like that they can stop selling vehicles to the public. Or they can come up with something creative like renting them, or only selling one of this trucks to someone who has proven to be a fan boy and have already brought 1 or 2 Tesla’s before
Or… Get this… You can just not buy the fucking car if you don’t like the terms. You’re not forced to buy a Cybertruck at launch.
Once production increases I’m sure this restriction will be removed just like most other vehicle resale restrictions from other manufacturers. Not all though, Ferrari has limitations even on things like paint color and wraps, Deadmau5 completely got rid of his wrapped Purrari because of that bullshit once Ferrari started trying to enforce it.
But none of you people will be in comments talking about the resale restrictions being removed once production is ramped, just complaining now about hypotheticals for a vehicle you never intend on purchasing to begin with because you either don’t like Tesla or Musk specifically.
Problem is, the more manufacturers pull this kind of shit the more it becomes normal. At some point your entry level yaris has some kind of stupid rules like this and maybe it spills over other industries too. Again, how about we stick to my property is my property and I decide what to do with it, the way it should be.
the limitation for resale is only for the first year.
I hate the “slippery slope” argument, but in this case…
What if the limitation was 2 or 5 years? What if the fine was $100,000 or a million? If they get away with lesser restrictions, why wouldn’t they? The point is, companies already have way too much power over what a private person does with things they legally bought (Right To Repair, anyone?) and this seems like an escalation of that…
How about the manufacturer builds enough stock so scalping makes no sense? I believe that if I buy a product I am entitled to do whatever I want with it as long as it doesn’t brake the law. I hate scalping too, no1 did anything when it happened to GPUs or consoles or toilet paper during covid, so why are cars special?
Stock does not just appear out of thin air. Manufacturing takes time to ramp up. So it’s often not possible to produce enough for a high demand product.
So maybe don’t release a model until you have at least a decent amount of units? Still doesn’t explain why cars are any different than other products that are scalped. Why are they not lobbying to create laws against such practices?
I feel like if they want to prevent flipping for profit, make the agreement that you can’t sell it for more than you bought it for, but still allow the sale. Otherwise you’re not policing the right thing.
It’s not possible to track how much it was sold for in a private transaction
Real estate and Ticketmaster: “Fuck yeah, flip that shit and inflate our markets to insanity!”
Auto industry: “Fuck you, we do the inflating around here. Pay me!”
Ticketmaster owns the resale sites too. And the venue.
Ford notoriously sued John Cena for exactly that reason with his Ford GT
It really is to protect consumers from scalpers.
Dealerships are the biggest scalpers.
Dealerships suck and everyone except the dealers themselves will be over the moon once they’re gone, manufacturers most of all.
Not really. I don’t particularly like them, but they don’t contribute much to the cost of cars. They barely make anything selling the car. That’s why they are always pushing extended warranties, accessories and trying to get you back in for service. Most of these guys are just hustling and getting as bad a deal as the rest of us.
The dealers are under huge pressure from the manufacturers to move cars. They are given sales targets they have to hit or they don’t get paid. That’s why they end up selling a car for like $500 profit or even break even. There’s a good episode of This American Life called “Cars”.
Of course, none of this applies to high-demand cars that sell themselves. They will mark those up like crazy to survive because the manufacturer doesn’t pay a bonus for those and barely gives them any inventory.
…forreal? You do realize dealership markups in the past few years have jumped as high as 40%?
They barely make anything selling the car.
If you’re as much of a snake as they are, maybe. For the rest of us, not so much.
Shame though. Would absolutely love to see a guy with a garage full of these things because he couldn’t find enough crypto bros to gouge.
I imagined them stacked on top of each other haphazardly, piled up in a garage with a sad white 30ish year old guy standing in the driveway looking sad.
Kinda curious why the company doesn’t raise their prices to fit demand then, since clearly, demand exists that allows those products to be sold for more (else the scalpers couldn’t profit). Not saying they should charge more, I’m just curious why an entirely profit-driven entity like a company wouldn’t charge as much for something as demand would allow for, it seems out of character?
Part of it is allowing the dealers to profit. If they price too high, there’s no wiggle room and incentive for the dealers to order the car.
Tesla has no dealers. They sell directly, which is why they cannot sell vehicles in some states. Some states require vehicles to be sold through dealers.
Oh, yeah, I know, I was talking about the GM cars.
Same with Ford F150 Lighting when it came out. Not sure if it still stands.
It’s to prevent flipping scalping
Somehow I get this weird feeling that the cybertruck will flip all on its own. ;)
Hey look, freedom!
Not sure what you are talking about. I have the freedom to not sign some dumbass agreement with tesla and not purchase a shitty looking cyber truck, and I will use that very freedom. No one is being forced to take this deal.
You have the freedom as long as it stays niche. Having no protections against such practices means they have a chance of becoming so commonplace as to be unavoidable.
This is what people don’t understand and is why so many freedom and privacy-violating practices have invaded modern life. That being said, a nerfed version of this clause that only prevents you from selling it for more than you bought it for would be great for preventing scalping.
as is customary nowadays with everything now
“Just don’t buy it” is a time-limited argument. If it becomes the norm to require signing a contract for ownership then you’ll have to argue “just don’t buy a car”. If you don’t like cars then maybe that’s okay but for other items that position sucks ass.
At some point, people need to band together and do something. Like $12 hotdogs and beer at stadiums. If people would just collectively say no to shit like that and refuse to buy them for a number of games, they would be forced to bring the prices back down to something more reasonable. But we as a group just cannot seem to do things until an extreme is met. To put it in perspective what I am saying is, if everyone just didn’t buy it, then it wouldn’t become the norm.
I appreciate this, and I agree with you completely. However, I think you’re greatly overestimating the strength of principles and the willingness to boycott of the average person. Which is why we have $12 hot dogs.
Yeah, I completely agree. There’s no way it would ever happen, but damn wouldn’t it be beautiful to watch if it did.
It’s an extreme edge case that car companies use when they have low units and very high demand, this applies to like 10 car models lol. Definitely no indication that it’s going to become the norm.
If there’s monetary intensive for them to control reselling then I think it’s fair to assume. Cars manufactures have already tried to charge a subscription for heated seats already in the car and presumably stopped due to a perceive a backlash which would cost them more money (for now).
In software it’s very common to be unable to resell a purchase and it should be no surprise when car manufactures try to prevent functionality being used by 2nd hand owners (if they are not already doing that).
Pfft, look at this cat over here…Why would you not want to own a life size version of a poorly made pinewood derby car-truck? I, for one, am willing to let them install a 5G chip in my brain as an accountabili-buddy. I bet I survive at least 3 months with the bill gates chip!
The dumbass agreement is the problem, not the buyer.
Imagine this:
If I were the second hand buyer of such a vehicle (yes, that means the original buyer has violated the dumbass agreement), would you say then that I am bound to the dumbass agreement too?
Freedom for scalpers! Yay!
“ Given the subscription model of much of the software Tesla EVs use, resale can be complicated. The Full Self-Driving feature, which costs up to $199 per month, is not transferable to a new owner, Fast Company reported.”
Just another reason I’m never buying
$199 per month?! Fuck me that’s moronic.
You don’t understand. It’s not like the self-driving feature is just software where they can price it at whatever they want. It’s physically consuming brain cells every month. And those aren’t free you know!
::: spoiler Do I really need a \s tag for this or does this tin foil hat make me look fat? :::
It actually came out that one of the self-driving companies has live operators watching every car and intervening in 2.5% of all decisions, so your intent may have been sarcastic but there is actually a reason to suspect there could be brain cells involved.
For my region it’s one time fee 9k $ “only”.
It is hilarious given the fact you can’t legally use it so it turns into better break asistent 😅Especially when you realize how bad, unfinished, and dangerous it is. You’re literally paying to be a crash test dummy / AI trainer for them. They should pay YOU.
They should make a discount for every person the self driving software hits. That shit would be basically free.
That’s just the new subscription cost. It is meant a san alternative to the full purchase cost.
As functionality has been added, the price has increased over the years, the current price is $12,000 for the FSD upgrade over basic Autopilot.
The subscription also lets you try it out and cancel if you don’t want it instead of having to make the decision up front for thousands of dollars.
Wait so another owner can never have that or…?
I mean it’s not actual “full self drive” to begin with. It’s a lame impersonation of more advanced self driving vehicles that aren’t even being sold yet. That doesn’t matter to the elon fans though.
The lie that actually gets people killed, while also tainting the overall perception of autonomous vehicles. Thanks elon.
It’s just that the license isn’t transferable. The second owner has to (re)license the software from Tesla. Irrespective of whether the seller has a “perpetual” license.
I guess if your license could be transferred to your new vehicle this would kinda make sense —- although frankly I’d expect a recurring revenue subscription model instead. Basically this feels like they’ve just been throwing shit at the wall while failing to deliver the feature.
I read it as the second owner would have to pay for it themselves to (re)unlock it. So Tesla would get paid twice for the feature in one car.
It is a monthly subscription. I am not sure what the problem is? the new owner can choose to pay it or not.
I must have misunderstood, because I know you have to pay $12,000-15,000 (seems the price has lowered) for the FSD to be available, then pay subscription on top of that. For some reason I thought they were saying the initial $12k+ “unlock” wouldn’t transfer.
You either pay for FSD via a monthly subscription OR the full price. So it’s either $200/mo or $12,000. It’s not both. The subscription option gives you an option to try it before purchasing, or to add and remove it when you want, like for long road trips or something like that.
It’s just two different options for people to pick from.
Thank you very much for clarifying. It makes sense if a subscription is not transferred but if someone does the outright payment that should be transferred. Asshole move if the one time unlock isn’t.
AFAIK the one time unlock stays with the car.
When I sell you my PC, you don’t get all my software licenses, games, and my internet service for free with it. You have to get your own licenses / subscriptions to those.
Capitalism is so schizophrenic. Is supply and demand in a free market meant to decide the value of goods or not?? If regulations and penalties are required, why not across the board??
A company is not capitalism. Pure capitalism without any regulation doesn’t work, because it tends towards having one big company that controls everything. However, every single company by itself strives towards that goal, bribing politicians to get its way when necessary. Thus, if those bribes go unpunished (like through the Citizens United decision in the US), capitalism eventually eliminates itself.
Tesla doesn’t want some other company to buy all its vehicles and turn around and sell them at a higher price, damaging the press around the Tesla brand and stopping its cars from getting to would-be Tesla super fans. It’s the same reason stores will sometimes say “limit 2 per customer” on certain items.
That’s one reason, anyway.
If regulations and penalties are required, why not across the board??
for thee, not for me
as always
It’s all well and good in theory but when you have a hit item to sell, you don’t want to make scalpers rich doing it. Absolute freedom = shit show every time. Peolle really need to grow up and learn how to be conservatives without being literalist absolutists about every damn thing.
you don’t want to make scalpers rich doing it
But why not? Surely people have the freedom to spend their money on legal goods?
I understand the situation; Tesla can’t make money selling to the general public at scalper rates, and scalpers are somewhat eating into Tesla profits. It’s all a scheme to ensure money goes to corporations first. That’s why the pharmaceutical industry is so fucked.
sUrElY pEoPlE hAvE thE FrEEdoM tO SpENd tHEir MoNeY oN lEgAl gOOds
Way to argue against a point no one made.
Arbitrage subtracts value from both vendor and buyer while producing no value. It’s a rent-seeking behavior applied to retail. It sucks, period. As you can see, Tesla wants none of it, and buyers don’t want a bunch of assholes boosting prices.
And there are perfectly legal ways to stop it, too. Have you ever been to a concert where the.l name of the ticket buyer has to match the name of the attendee’s ID? Tom Waits did that on the Mule Variations tour and it’s a) the only reason I was able to see him and b) the only reason I was able to see him for $40.
Fuck scalpers.
The best solution to this problem is not to buy one in the first place.
It is bizarre how much of a comic book villain Musk has turned in to.
What do you mean “Turned into” ?
He probably always was a bit of a right-wing loon, but everything about him over the last few years screams “cry for help”.
If he were a normal pleb, he’d have probably lost his job, or had a friend tell him that he needs to seek professional help. Because he’s a billionaire, I assume people just say he’s “eccentric” and laugh while people push him to do more crazy shit.
He doesn’t realise it, but people are laughing at him, not with him. He’s a performing monkey for the apathetic, and aspirational for the morally questionable.
It was always there. He just has the wealth not to care what anyone thinks now.
I don’t think any amount of money replaces human interaction, and because of his status, his perception of himself is probably so fucked up that I’d be shocked if he did anything but care.
I don’t want to infantise Musk, nor do I want to excuse what a total cunt he is, but if he were a child you’d basically call it a cry for attention or help. The primary difference between us and him is he can mask whatever mental health issues he’s got with money and social media…
He has the wealth, but not the ego.
I think he has an inkling of that now. Since he got booed off stage multiple times and locked himself in isolation for a while.
I think the correct phrasing should be “turned out to be”
Apparently some people are okay with extreme racism so long as you convert it into money first.
There was a time when he was like “watch this, I’m going to make the entire auto industry go electric to help save the planet.”
And he has pretty much done that. Great for him. But yeah other shit like his antisemitism and childish tweet wars have dialed up in recent years. Now he’s ruining Twitter itself because he doesn’t believe in content moderation or rules of engagement in a forum. Unless it’s tweeting already-public data about his plane transponder! Oh then it’s wrong! His pro-Texas bullshit and his anti-union bullshit has gotten stronger and stronger. He’s posting pictures of his gun now.
Yeah. The guy has changed. Maybe this is always who he was going to be. Maybe this was always who he wanted to be. But he wasn’t necessarily this guy, always, outwardly.
Jokes on them. I’d never buy one of these hilariously abhorrent piles of shit.
I used to think Teslas were cool. Now I just see the specter of Elon. Regardless, these look like a test for suckers.
I honestly would rather have a cyber truck than a generic F150. Fuck Musk though, so I’ll pass.
There’s a reason Ford sells so many F150s.
They’re great trucks.
They sell based on name recognition and history. Their father, grandfather, and great grandfather all bought a Ford so they will too. They have tens of decades of repair shops with experience, cheap third party parts replacements, and because many people just keep buying the same thing without ever doing any comparison or thinking about it.
Behind the wheel of one, I’d feel like an asshole.
Have you actually encountered a Tesla in the wild? They actually are all assholes.
In my experience they’re all Indian.
I am from the vaginal canal of Tesla. Toyota Camry status.
While this is an asshole move, companies like Ferrari do stuff like this too. They, for example, do not allow certain modifications on their cars and if they find out that you have done them, they will ask you to restore those parts back to originals. It is unreal how much car companies try to get from us.
Papa Enzo knows best. Don’t understand how that’s legal unless it’s some sort of lease agreement
Well, you’re welcome to not buy a Ferrari if you don’t like the strings attached, right?
Sure. But ownership comes with certain rights by definition. If you don’t have those rights, you don’t really own the thing. You’re just paying to subscribe to their club.
Right, the club being Ferrari owners. They maintain a specific image of owner, and part of that image is “if you don’t like it then go buy another car”. I think it’s silly too, but for what they cost it’s not as if you’re bumming for a daily driver at unfavorable APRs.
Sure. But, again, just don’t buy it if you don’t like the conditions. Not sure why that’s so controversial to say.
I think because it goes against the concept of ownership that you can’t do certain things with it after you buy it. I get that with digital or conceptual things, though I don’t agree with that either in many cases. But not being allowed to alter, resell, or repair a physical object you bought can be frustrating.
It’s because they have a brand to protect and that brand belongs to Ferrari, not the owner of the car.
I am also not welcome to buy a Ferrari because
- I can’t afford one.
- if I could afford it, I would buy something sensible and invest most of my cash for the future. (Land, Gold, etc.)
Implying this, less attractive than a Lego brick, thing is as desirable as a Ferrari is… Insane
Ferraris are dogshit just the same as this.
Can I mount a towing hook for my camper?
One of the things they don’t allow is removing their logos and the ferrari name off the car, so I suppose adding a hook would be fine. I don’t know if those cars are built for it, but I do think they would allow it… Felt really stupid typing that, as if they need to “allow” anything on a car you would own.
Absolute deal-breaker. I will not be dictated to on what I may or may not do with my personal private property, beyond the bounds of the law.
Isn’t the fact that the thing is ugly and poorly-designed more of a deal-breaker?
There are multiple deal-breakers, yest.
Well here’s the thing, they don’t want it to be your personal private property, nevermind that you bought it they still want it to be theirs.
Fun fact, I could give a fuck what they want.
Because otherwise, you would have bought one.
In fact, I would not. But even if I would, this bullshit would be a deal breaker. It’s basically saying “we know you’re going to regret this purchase, but we’re going to put a barrier in place to keep you from dealing with it.” That’s a gigantic red flag for any product.
You weren’t buying one anyway, what a weird comment.
You seem highly interested in whether I would have purchased one or not. What a weird comment.
Did you write this on a PC or iPhone?
I borrowed your mom’s Zune.
Forget the obvious bullshit that is being unable to sell it. What’s this about autopilot/FSD not being transferable?
Who the hell would buy this monstrosity of a truck. Be sure not to buy FSD since it will be a lost cost and never recouped for a capability that really doesn’t work yet. $12,000 down the drain.
If you pre ordered it, you locked in the fsd price at the time which was 7k I believe.
If you add FSD to a trade in service, you’ll get 2-3000 back.
So it’s not as terrible a deal as buying it at full price right now where its unquestionably not worth it.
But don’t expect anything beyond level 2 for the lifetime of the vehicle.
You wouldn’t preorder a car.
Or what was the saying again…
Reminds me of the you wouldn’t download a car.
But maybe with this polygon count its possible
I mean that is slightly better. Still a waste of money. Get enhanced autopilot and leave it there.
Who would buy it? The same type of people buying new BMWs. We all hate them, but they sell like crazy.
So is this thing actually called a “Cybertruck”? Because that sounds like something my 7-year-old would come up with. I hadn’t really given it much thought until now…
That’s how Musk names everything. He loves the letter X, he named the Tesla models “S”, “3”, “X”, and “Y”, the Cybertruck, his five most recent children including “Techno Mechanicus”… He’s absolutely unfit to be in charge of anything.
Oh my fucking word, it’s true
If this was 40k, Techno Mechanicus would be an amazing name 😂
It’d still be a job title
Yeah, true that
Wow I never realized the letters/numbers for the Tesla models spells “sexy” in l33t5p34k
He wanted the E instead of 3 but I think GM had the trademark on it.
It also looks like someone drew the initial plans for it in crayon on a napkin, so that checks out.
Musk being childish and you’ve only realised now? What hole have you been in (and is there space for one more?)?
Oh no, I know Musk is childish. This was just the first time I thought about the name “Cybertruck.”
I can’t see it without seeing Homer Simpson in that car he designed.
The glass punch during presentation was the sign of things to come.
Cybertwuck
Yeah, that’s probably how my 7-year-old would pronounce it.
It’s shit behavior that should be illegal, but I also can’t feel bad for any moron that sees this truck and still agrees to buy it.
In this situation there would be two morons
Very true.
So because your personal taste is not in favor of this car, you don’t feel bad for people who happen to like it. Got it. Moral superiority is alive and well.
Agree with the sentiment but not the tone.
Is this to be an asshole, or to avoid people reselling the car at x2 the price because of the lack of supply during the first year?
I hate Musk, but if this is intended to prevent price go urging, it might be a good thing (see nvidia scalpers)
Even with the best of intentions, which I doubt is the case here, a company that sells you a product shouldn’t be allowed to dictate what you do with the product once you’ve purchased it. They can be selective about who they sell products to, and use that as a barrier to attempt to stop scalpers. But once I own something if I want to turn around and resell it the manufacturer should have no say in that.
damn its ugly af
This is great: I was so frustrated by lack of availability for XBox, from all the scalpers. Same with tickets to pretty much everything. Same with Raspberry Pi. Look at how the eEVs like the Hummer and Lightning were hurt by both dealers and scalpers making vehicles hard to get and excessively priced
Scalping works great for those lower ticket items with tiny profit margins and high demand. Idk if it’s something cybertruck needs to worry about being none of those things.
Apparently it was a problem when previous Tesla models released
That was when everyone thought Elon actually had a brain
As much as I dislike Musk, I think this is a right move, as scalpers became a real plague during Covid.
But I am genuinely curious if they will ever sell it outside the US. This design seems far too dangerous for pedestrians and I can’t believe that EU authorities would approve it. Aren’t car hoods supposed to be of a very soft aluminium which is supposed to soften slightly the impact on a pedestrian in case of an accident? And what about if this monster is involved in front collision with some small car, like Renault Twingo here? I guess the chance of survivability of the Twingo passengers would be near zero.
Plus correct me if I am wrong but what happens if you have a small accident? Are they going to charge you for the full cast? Why aren’t people more concerned about this? The repairability of this car looks terrible.
Surely scalping can be addressed without infringing in my right to do what I like with my own damn property. Why is it better to let Tesla sue consumers than to just… limit the number of trucks a person can buy? 🤔
Lol ferrari took away Steve Wyns Las Vegas dealership because he flipped his LaFerrari for an extra million. I will never not find that hillarious.
That’s a business relationship.
No one is going to fucking scalp Cybertrucks lol
This policy exists because they expect a lot of people to be unhappy with their Cybertruck, is my guess.
Which sucks because I really wanted the aesthetic of this car to bring back more 80s-sci-fi to the vehicle market, as a lover of silly-looking vehicles.
Why yes, I too would buy a deLorian look-alike with a Mr Fusion prop on the back.
The dreeeam
It’s in the terms and conditions when you buy the vehicle. I’d say that Tesla is within their rights. If you don’t like the terms don’t buy the car.
Simply referring to terms and conditions when complaining about a company move is such a weak argument. Honestly half of the terms are void by European laws anyway.
In this specific instance we are talking about a luxury item that absolutely nobody needs. Anyone who would be buying this would be buying it out of choice. I think this is an instance where terms conditions set by the company of such a niche product is reasonably fair.
Flip it over and apply terms and conditions like this on mainstream consumer goods then we have a bigger problem. If this works I think you may find a lot of luxury car makers initially follow suit, you can bet that companies like BMW would absolutely love to take a cut of all second-hand sales.
It’s a slippery slope.
Doesn’t matter what kind of product it is.
ToS holds no weight in the EU.
If Elmo sues, he will just get denied. Because it is a garbage statement.
The majority of what you buy is by choice. Why is it ok to violate your rights as a consumer, as long as the product is expensive enough? Isn’t that the real slippery slope here? "Houses are luxury items that absolutely nobody needs- just rent an apartment. "
Terms and conditions that are illegal ate not valid and this goes against the first sale doctrine
Imagine applying this argument to an employment contact. “Tesla’s contract says you don’t get bathroom breaks & have to work in unsafe conditions. If you don’t like it, don’t work there”. Clearly doesn’t hold water. In the US, we need stronger consumer protections - right to repair, right to be forgotten, and right to safely do what you like with your own property.
Terms and conditions have been voided before, including NDA clauses. It’s why they always have a severability clause, stating that if any parts of the T&C are found invalid, the rest of the T&C remain in place.
There’s no way this sticks
limit the number of trucks a person can buy?
Useless. Here we have nominal tickets for events and that does not solve the problem by a very long shot, I suppose it would be the same for cars.
Ticket scalpers are blowing up because of collusion by Ticketmaster. Tickets are also a virtual product. Surely we can be clever enough to limit the sale of physical goods the size of cars
How ? But even if you succeed, what is stopping me from buying 1 cybertruck at X and resell it at 3X the next day ? And other people to do the same ? We all buy 1 car after all.
I think that here there will not be a Ticketmaster scenario, but more a scenario where a number of Musk haters will buy a cybertruck to resell it at a premium to a number of Musk fanboys just because.
So limiting the sale of it to 1 per person don’t really solve anything.
Interesting questions; let’s see:
what is stopping me from buying 1 cybertruck at X and resell it at 3X the next day ? And other people to do the same ?
Nothing should stop you from doing that, or at least trying. You are one person with one car, so there will be other stock available at a lower price for others to buy if they want. The problem of scalping becomes an issue when one person can buy a large portion of the product & artificially control the supply. If everyone decides to buy 1 and then resell higher, nothing is stopping consumers from also buying their 1 and getting lower prices from the manufacturer.
a scenario where a number of Musk haters will buy a cybertruck to resell it at a premium to a number of Musk fanboys just because.
Cybertrucks are a large ($50k) investment, and as a physical good that’s also regulated through the DMV, they are a lot more work to resell. So in this scenario you think there is such a large number of Mush haters with both the disposable income & free time for resale that they eat up a significant portion of supply. AND that there is such a large amount of consumers with disposable income & desire for a truck that they would support such a resale market. If that ever becomes a reality then… Good for Tesla? Those"haters" would be significantly contributing to Tesla’s profit.
Also, here is an academic paper that looks at the effectiveness of US anti-scalping laws on ticket sales, and it concludes future policies should focus on acquisition, not resale.
Nothing should stop you from doing that, or at least trying. You are one person with one car, so there will be other stock available at a lower price for others to buy if they want. The problem of scalping becomes an issue when one person can buy a large portion of the product & artificially control the supply.
Or when a high enough number of people buy each one a small number of the few items available in a low supply to resell them. True, the item should be some sort of “status symbol” or necessary item for this scenario to work out. I’ ve seen it in more menial situations where just a couple of people scalped on a low supply needed items (at least until production has gone to capacity).
The cybertruck situation is different from the ticket situation, you cannot produce 50000 cybertruck and then sell them, you need the space to store them, and the production needs to go to capacity so it will start low anyway. That’s because it could be vulnerable to scalping, at the beginning you have a small number of items so you need a small number of people that are willing to try to buy to resell.
Cybertrucks are a large ($50k) investment, and as a physical good that’s also regulated through the DMV, they are a lot more work to resell. So in this scenario you think there is such a large number of Mush haters with both the disposable income & free time for resale that they eat up a significant portion of supply. AND that there is such a large amount of consumers with disposable income & desire for a truck that they would support such a resale market.
Since I am talking about haters and fanboys, I would not bet that they would act rationally. I would not exclude that there are people that hate Musk so much to pull out these kind of stunts to other people that love Musk so much to be the perfect target.
Hmm, one thing I’m not understanding is that in these scenarios it sounds like every truck made is going to a scalper, and the issue is that even with one per person, the number of scalpers equals the number of cars. But why would they get dibs? A lucky scalper can’t get first dibs and buy out the whole stock before others get a chance, because it’s 1 per person. The real question is what is the portion of scalpers vs long-term owners.
Let me know if you have better numbers, but this article from back in January suggested 10k cybertrucks to be filled in 2023. Let’s say there are 10k potential scalpers, and 1M potential long-term buyers. That doesn’t mean the 10k trucks will get scalped by the 10k scalpers, it means we would expect 100 to be (again, individually) scalped, and the other 9,900 trucks to go to long term buyers. Additionally, since those scalpers only have 1, they will be competing against each other on resale price.
Since I am talking about haters and fanboys, I would not bet that they would act rationally.
I think that’s an ok assumption, but the question is more about the number of people who would act so outrageously. It seems very odd to me that there would be so many people who hate Mush and are ok dropping $50k and have the bandwidth to resell, in such numbers that they significantly match or outnumber long-term buyers.
Doubt suing will do better
…I think this is a right move, as scalpers became a real plague during Covid.
Tesla have no right to sue somebody selling their own property. This is just another attack on the concept of personal ownership by corporations.
If the car is leased, fair enough, but the fact Musk thinks he can do this shows how all the power is with the wrong people.
If it’s leased, they can’t sell it anyways
Scalpers will find a way. Only normal buyers will be hurt by this move. Also car companies are putting in more and more proprietary stuff that only they can repair practically, and charge a fortune for it. Tesla is leading in that too afaik.
Maybe it’ll stop scalpers. More likely it has made the scalper’s market at least 50k pricier to offset Tesla’s desire to double dip on these trucks
I expect Cybertruck will sell in places with a big truck culture. The US, Canada and Australia probably I think they will sell terribly in Europe where trucks are generally quite rare and disliked because they’re not practical on public roads. I also foresee that the EU might get pissed off with Tesla’s laissez faire attitude to safety critical stuff like - “unbreakable” glass, door releases, position of indicators, pedestrian safety and force them to change design to comply with more stringent regs.
I don’t see this being very popular in Australia. It misses the mark for why people buy a Ute or dual cab here.
The lawsuits won’t succeed due to the first sales doctrine
I don’t think anything about any car is designed to soften the blow for a pedestrian. They usually have a crumple zone to dissipate energy in a collision but that isn’t designed with pedestrians in mind. Also they would likely repair this like any other vehicle since the body is made up of several panels.
They absolutely design cars with some pedestrian safety in mind. That’s why hood ornaments went away and bumpers moved away from solid steel.
I don’t remember the exact numbers, but they have a metric along the lines of “X% of pedestrians survive impacts up to Y speed” that they need to meet.
I can’t find this rating anywhere. It was proposed this year but that’s all I can find.
Yeah, I’d love to see the cars safety certificate.
It’s basically the Sun Crusher of cars
