Musk took leased cars back so Tesla could use them as robotaxis. Instead, Tesla sold them

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Tesla ended an extraordinary policy last November, which forbade users to buy our cars at the end of lease.

The policy began in 2019, when Tesla announced that consumers could lease their large -scale market models 3 seeds but they would have to return to the end of the lease to use Tesla’s planned “robotics” network.

“You don’t have the option to buy,” said Elon Musk, an investor gathering in California in April 2019.

None of this will be true. Despite repeated promises, robotics never came. According to four people familiar with Tesla’s retail operations, Tesla instead found new buyers to make an extraordinary profitable way to make money by returning many off -lease cars.

Instead of storing used cars-a rapidly deprived asset-Tesla began to add features through software upgrades. People said that it then sold vehicles to new customers who would pay thousands more than buyers at the end of lease.

One of them said, who asked not to identify, was an easy way to “jack the price” of used vehicles.

Although the Musk has confronted what he said at the public level – and Tesla describes on his website with regard to the terms of lease – it seems that the strategy is legal. Nevertheless, this exercise denied the standard option of buying its vehicles and misled them for years.

It also maintained the fiction among investors that Tesla was fully close to sovereign driving technology. This belief has helped the Boy Tesla stock, which has increased much more than the current earnings and made it the world’s most valuable car maker.

Throughout the industry, lease contracts usually allow consumers to pay monthly payments to drive a new car for a certain period, often between two and four years. Lizzi does not own a vehicle and has to return to the dealer when the lease expires. In almost all cases, consumers can choose to buy a car at the end or before the lease.

Since 2019, Tesla’s financial statements show that the company has leased more than 314,000 vehicles, or 4.4 % of its total supply to consumers worldwide. It is unclear whether the non -buyer policy has been applied anywhere outside the United States.

The policy was well -fitted after the onset of the Kovide 19 pandemic diseases, when the inventors of the cars were severe and the increase in car prices. Recently, as the demand has decreased-some users are not so excited for the used Tesla because of the trouble for Musk’s right-wing political activities.

In upgrading to its off -lease vehicles, people familiar with Tesla’s retail operations told Reuters, the company often added ‘full self -driving’ software, which they have sold separately, 000 15,000 and now sold at 000 8,000. It also includes ‘Exception Boost’, a refreshing car that can make the car fast, which he sells separately in Separatily 2,000.

After starting a purchase policy with the model 3 lease, Tesla extended it to the lease of all models. By the recent reversal, its website states that “Tesla vehicles” are not eligible for shopping after April 15, 2022, and that “Model 3 and Model Wi -Lies are not eligible to buy, regardless of delivery date”.

Subsequently, on November 27, Tesla’s North American account posted on the X, Musk’s social media platform: “Lease Buyout now available” for new contracts. The company also updated its lease webpage, saying that the lease vehicles could be “eligible for purchase”.

For some of the former lesions, this discovery has been disappointing. At the beginning and end of his three -year -old model Y -Lease, which Mandin Hall told Reuters, Tesla’s staff said he needed a car back for a robotics fleet. But last year, he learned that Tesla sold the car after returning it.

The Indianapolis marketing businessman wrote on the X, “I am a lie about being unable to buy my lease.”

‘Bags hold caught’

Tesla’s story about keeping used cars for robotics fits a long sample of incomplete promises to deploy self-powered vehicles-recently announced for June in Austin, Texas.

Every year since 2016, Musk has promised that the driving Tesla will arrive at the end of next year. In 2019, when Tesla first offered to lease for Model 3, Musk told Podcast host Lex Friedman that the ability to add independent driving software would make every used Tesla a “admirable asset”.

Some investors have cited the alleged inventory of leased vehicles as a promising strategy. As a recent October-October-Hollywood program, Tesla, where Tesla had long shown a concept of robotics on the ‘Cyberkab’ robotics-Tesla stock, said that off-lease inventory quickly helps to enhance an independent ride-driven services.

“To jump the service, it can deploy the current model 3 and a fleet of model Wii vehicles, including the lease,” the Arc said in a research note at the time. This week, Sam Coros, director of research in the Arc, said that Tesla, even without off -lease cars, could still have other options, including new or third party vehicles.

Others had long doubts. When Tesla announced in 2019 that he was banning lease purchases due to his robotics plans, Evercore ISI analysts reacted to a research note: “Important, what?” Analysts added that the announcement “is an indication that Tesla believes her riding network will prove to be a viable business in three years.” “Keep us in a very skeptical camp.”

As a rule, auto dealers refrain from conducting used inventory because used cars are usually rapidly outdated. Michael Monke, a former representative of Tesla’s sales and one of the previous lease sales, told Reuters that the company would not allow the cars to “sit on the lot and to lose the price.”

“I knew it was not true,” Monke added, who was among the thousands of Tesla employees during the reorganization last year.

For most companies, the offering of Automoto Data Provider Edmunds, Joseph Yun, said, “For most companies, the offering of lease -by -out is” no mental “because dealers do not need to find a new buyer when lease expires. Now that Tesla’s used values ​​are “a type of tanning,” said Yun, the company lifted the ban on shopping at the end of the lease to avoid being “holding the bag”.

Since the age of the Tesla model and other electrical car makers face growing competition, the cars now lose more than any other vehicle. Cargors, from the sale of used car sales and data service, the average sales of used tesals have declined by 7.6 % over the past year, compared to a 0.8 % reduction for a comprehensive index of all brands. Tesla’s cyber truck prices have declined by 46 % over the past year, while Model Wii prices have declined by 14.1 %. During Tesla’s January revenue call, the company’s chief financial officer, Vibhu Tinaja, accused of “less profit from the used car business” as one of the reasons for reducing the margin in one of his units. Unlike almost all car makers with US sales, Tesla owns and works its dealership.

On dealership before the lease policy change, one of Tesla’s retail works said, “Consumers sometimes asked why used prices are like some new models. Sellers refer to software upgrade to those interested in buying. To achieve the lease, they kept saying that the cars would be used for robotics at the end of the lease. The man added, his explanation never changed, as the company never deviated from it until November.

Marshall Distal, a transport planner from Vermont, who leased the model in 2023, said he believed to research Tesla’s policies that he would have to return to the car. At that time, he said, he thought the purchase option would be good.

Now, he is not interested in buying anything from musk, which as US President Donald Trump’s adviser is separating some consumers. “I like the car, I just don’t like what is happening to the CEO.” “I don’t want to be associated with it.”