Gerrard Kaonga
Buying a car is normally a pretty big and important decision, but a YouTuber has now issued some advice if you're thinking of buying a second-hand Tesla.
YouTuber Samcrac thought he was getting one hell of a deal when he bought a used Tesla significantly cheaper than expected, but he wasn’t exactly right.
Speaking in a recent video, he explained that he bought the first-generation Tesla Model S for only $11,000 at an auction with 100,000 miles on it.
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Sounds like quite the steal right?
Well, he explained that things took quite an annoying turn.
He said: “I bought this old Tesla Model S super cheap and I’ve owned it for 8 months now.
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“In that time it broke, then it broke again, and again and today I’m going to fix it myself wishing I had just got a new one to begin with."
Ouch. He went on to explain that he recently purchased another car, a secondhand Model S Plaid, and it came with similar issues.
You guessed it, it also kept breaking on him and needed repairs.
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Speaking on his Model S repairs, it required he replace a battery fuse, front control arms, window regulator, trunk latch, and charge port door.
He was able to successfully fix some issues himself, but for others he needed to go to Tesla themselves which, as you can imagine, wasn't cheap.
He also said in his experience, this proved to be a lengthy repair period and would often result in escalated costs of the initial quotation he was given.
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In the end, he spent thousands of dollars on repair bills only months after the purchase.
Comparing the two second-hand cars, he called them 'moneypits' due to how much money he was having to shell out to get it fixed by a professional or do it himself.
Despite the issues he encountered, Samcrac said he still thought both vehicles were great cars. But he did have some wise words if you considered getting one that isn't brand new.
He said: “I still think they’re an amazing value as long as you can DIY fix them every time they break and as long as you don’t have some sort of catastrophic failure like a drive unit going out or like a high voltage battery failure."
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If you tend to rely on professionals to do your repairs, like most people do, a cheaper second-hand car might end up costing you more in the long run, so just be aware.
UNILAD has contacted Tesla for comment.