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Tesla vs Competitors: Cost of Maintenance Including Battery Replacement - YouTube
Channel: Ben Sullins
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- Recently I had an issue
with the windshield wiper
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on my Tesla where the
motor actually went out
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and the arm broke, and
this is the only issue
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I've had with my Tesla in the past year.
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This time what I had
to do is actually have
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a Tesla Ranger, this is a service person
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that comes out to your
house and fixes your car
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right there in your garage
or in your driveway.
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This all cost me zero
dollars because I'm under
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the four year warranty
where basically everything
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for the Tesla is covered.
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And being the data geek that I am
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it got me to thinking what
is the cost of maintaining
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this car, my Tesla Model S, compared to
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a similar gas powered car.
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Now first I should just
clarify that when I do
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my comparison it has to be
to a similar gas powered car,
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I've seen a lot of comments there
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well my Honda this, or my KIA that,
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yes of course, those are
cheap economical cars,
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they do not compare to these
luxury high end sedans.
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So for this analysis I'm going to use
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a Mercedes Benz S-Class, an Audi A7,
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and a BMW 7 Series, and I'm gonna look
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at the cost of ownership,
the actually maintenance cost
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of those cars compared to
what I pay for my Tesla.
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So first I should mention
that Tesla has had
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some reliability issues,
in fact just recently
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Reuters reported that they're spending
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about 1,000 dollars per
vehicle on warranty repairs
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compared to Ford and GM which are spending
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about 400 to 700 dollars per vehicle.
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So Tesla's actually having
to repair these a lot more
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and spending a lot more money.
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All I care about though
is how much it actually
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is gonna cost me and kind
of what the experience
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is gonna be like.
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So let's take a look at the data now
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and see what it actually tells us.
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First off Tesla offers
a prepaid service plan
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which spans three, four, and eight years
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depending on which one you choose.
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This will reduce your overall cost,
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but we'll compare those
alongside not having
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any prepaid plan as well, so I'll have
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all three examples here.
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So looking at the total
maintenance cost here
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over five years you can see
that all three Tesla options
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are a lot cheaper than
all the other options,
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the Mercedes, the BMW, and the Audi even
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are just many times over more expensive
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than owning a Tesla in
terms of maintenance.
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So if you take a look at
the total maintenance cost
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over five years what you can see is that
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the most expensive is
the Mercedes Benz S-Class
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clocking in at around 18,000
dollars in maintenance,
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the BMW 7 Series clocking
in around 17,000 dollars
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just behind it, the Audi
is significantly cheaper,
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around 10,000 dollars, or 9,500,
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and then all of the Tesla options
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are just significantly
cheaper than all of those.
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In fact, the most expensive
one is 2,800 bucks.
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There isn't really saving much in terms of
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the agony of dealing with
a car dealership here,
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but you are gonna be saving a ton of money
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over the cost over those five years.
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But what if we look at the
actual details year by year?
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So on the left here I have each car
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and then year by year I have
the actual cost of maintenance,
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and you can see that as time goes on,
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at least for the BMW and the Mercedes,
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the costs just tend to go up and up,
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where as the Audi and the
Tesla are all pretty flat.
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In fact Audi actually looks
like it decreases over time
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which is kind of nice.
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So I guess when you think about it
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there aren't gonna be
any big surprises here
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with the Tesla or the
Audi for that matter.
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Now if we wanna compare
on a percentage basis
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and we wanna look at let's
take the most expensive Tesla
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model, the Tesla service,
the non-prepaid one,
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remember it's about 2,800 bucks,
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compare that to the Audi A7,
the BMW, and the Mercedes,
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you can see that with the Audi
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you're actually still
saving about 241 percent,
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close to 7,000 dollars
over the cheapest car,
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the similar gas powered car.
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Compare that to the BMW and
you're at 500 percent savings
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and the Mercedes-Benz S-Class you're near
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550 percent savings, almost 15,000 dollars
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or North of 15,000
dollars that you're saving
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in maintenance costs alone.
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That's a big deal and that really adds up,
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and this is only a five year comparison.
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Now I know a lot of you
are out there thinking
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well what about the
replacement of the battery,
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I've even had people comment saying,
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you know you have to replace
the battery every year
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which I'm yet to find data on.
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But the way it works is there
is a eight year warranty
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on your Tesla battery, and
it's an infinite mile warranty
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up to eight years, so any
problems you have before that
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they're gonna replace it for you.
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But after that the cost
that we're looking at
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is about 12,000 dollars to replace it,
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that's based on current standards,
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exactly how they're producing them now.
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So if we were to forecast
out let's say eight years
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from when you bought your Tesla
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so that we're eight years from now,
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the price of producing the batteries
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is gonna continue to drop.
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So if we were to take
the 12,000 dollars now
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and reduce it down to say 8,000 dollars,
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and then add that in to the
cost here of our maintenance
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and let's just assume that we absorbed
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all of those 8,000 dollars
within the first five years,
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again it's a little wonky but I'm trying
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to appease anybody that has concerns
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about replacing the batteries here.
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If you wanted to do that
you would be a little bit
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over on the Audi, you'd be
saving a little bit on money,
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the 1.3 thousand or 12
percent over the Audi A7,
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but then you're still
saving close to 60 percent
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on the BMW and nearly 70 percent
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over the Mercedes-Benz S-Class.
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So you're still saving
six to 7,000 dollars
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compared to these other cars,
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that's with the assumption
that you would be
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replacing the battery on
your own within five years,
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which really isn't gonna happen.
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Now I'll put a caveat out there
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that of course owning a Tesla
is not a way to save money,
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that's not a good plan, but
if you are in the market
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for one of these high end luxury sedans
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and you look at this, you're gonna see
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that you're gonna have
a much better experience
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and save a decent amount of money there.
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In addition to saving money on amenities
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you're also no longer gonna have to worry
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about spending time
getting gas at the pump,
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no more oil changes, no more
filters every couple of months,
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all of that coupled with the fact
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that the car seats five people comfortably
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and has more storage space
than any of these other sedans,
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in fact it has more than
my wife's midsize SUV,
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and it has the highest safety
rating of any car ever tested.
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I think what you'll find
is that when you compare
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the Tesla to any of these other
luxury sedans in this class
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it comes out ahead in almost
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every category that you look at.
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All right, so there it is, the cost
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or the savings that you're gonna have
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of a Tesla compared to a
similar gas powered vehicle.
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I hope you like this video, if
you have any other thoughts,
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comments, things I missed, please put them
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in the comments below, subscribe,
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and I'll see you back here next time.
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