A "California Gold Rush" Is Coming For Used Tesla Vehicles - Even A 2018 Model 3 Is Going To Become Extremely Valuable

Even old and used Tesla vehicles are going to become very valuable sometime soon and this is going to trigger a "California Gold Rush" like event to snatch up used Tesla vehicles that can be used as robotaxis.

California Gold Rush Like Moment Coming For Used Tesla Vehicles

A California Gold Rush like event is going to occur for used Tesla vehicles on the market - once Tesla shows that they can operate at a level 4 autonomy without a driver. Because these will be the first autonomous vehicles offering ride-hailing autonomously (covering the entire U.S., not just select areas), the money to be made with these first vehicles will be quite a lot, until more vehicles and competitors bring prices down.

This boils down to the following key points:

• Tesla is on the cusp of solving autonomy: Most people see it happening within the next two years. Just look at all the incredible videos of no-intervention drives surfacing.
• The first Tesla vehicles offered in ride-sharing will make a lot of money: This is because the first Tesla vehicles won't need to drastically lower their prices - just enough to be preferable to Uber and Lyft. They are private, safe, and will arrive quick.
• A California-Gold-Rush like event will occur: This is because of the tremendous opportunity to have your own Tesla privately drive people around as a ride-share vehicle.
• There are few competitors: There are few competitors to Tesla's FSD that can be run just about anywhere. Competitors are going to have to license the technology to have autonomous vehicles - but will be slow to do so.

Tesla is on the cusp of solving autonomy

Tesla is on the cusp of solving autonomy. This breakthrough is going to cause a huge disruption and the price of used Tesla's, like a Model 3 from 2018 that's around $23,000, will shoot up greatly as FSD can be run on that car just fine with Hardware 3. That's right - any Tesla in existence today with hardware 3 will be able to run as an autonomous taxi.

Even with 100,000 miles on that used Model 3, it still has a few hundred thousand miles it can go before needing a new battery and motors. And, those can be replaced for a reasonable cost, less than $20,000, compared to what you would make doing ride-sharing every year.

The first Tesla vehicles offered in ride-sharing will make a lot of money

The first Tesla vehicles in ride-sharing autonomously will make a lot of money for their owners. The reason is that these vehicles can undercut Uber and Lyft and offer an autonomous environment with superhuman driving. It's private as well, not worrying about a driver.

An autonomous vehicle will drive reliably every time, once it's autonomous, and that will eliminate anxiety about a driver not paying attention.

If an Uber ride costs $1.00 for the mile, the Tesla owner can make that $0.90. Not bad for a superhuman, private ride that costs less than that Uber.

If your car is driving 300 miles per day for people, that's $270 per day. That's nearly $100,000 per year in revenue you make. Give Tesla 30% of that, and you still have about $70,000 in earnings. Take off $20,000 for maintenance, and you are left with $50,000 in profit just for one Tesla vehicle.

Knowing this information, I am watching FSD and the prices of used Tesla vehicles VERY closely. If I see that autonomy is about to get solved and the price of a used Tesla is still in the low $20,000 amount, I am going to buy another Tesla.

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A California-Gold-Rush like event will occur

I don't think there will be much lead time before the prices of used Tesla vehicles start increasing dramatically - especially those Tesla vehicles that have already paid for FSD. The prices are going to be driven up quite significantly, if you can make a $50,000 profit per year with a car after all expenses, what is the value to buy a car like that. I think it's well over $50,000...

Tesla is likely to do something to combat this - it might be raising the price of the outright cost of FSD to something very high, such as $50,000 or making the monthly cost $499. Tesla is no doubt going to do something in response to this rush that is going to occur.

Things are changing very quickly, and let's see what happens with Tesla's FSD and how they price it, as well as the prices of used Tesla vehicles.

A Tesla vehicle will be able to pick someone up without nearly as long a wait time as happens right now. A robotaxi network will have vehicles within 1 minute of every person in an urban area. It also won't need to stop for food or to use the bathroom. When you hail it, assuming it has charge, it will come right to you.

There are few competitors

According to James Douma, an AI expert, he sees there being about a 48-month lead time before a competitor can make a specific vehicle that can license Tesla's FSD software. That gives Tesla a 2-year head start (assuming 2 years from now Tesla vehicles become autonomous) with their own vehicles to start doing ride-sharing before any other competitors.

Outside of Tesla, who is going to provide 1 million EVs for ride-sharing autonomously. Competitors can get there, however, especially in the U.S., nobody is even close.

Tesla's biggest challenge will be dealing with Monopoly and antitrust issues.

The below video was mind-blowing - it's nearly 2 hours, and it's worth watching all of it.

For Further Reading: Tesla FSD Is No Longer Beta: Now Called Full Self-Driving (Supervised) - Why This Is A Big Deal

Do you think there is going to be a rush for used Tesla vehicles that can be used autonomously?

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Hi! I'm Jeremy Noel Johnson, and I am a Tesla investor and supporter and own a 2022 Model 3 RWD EV and I don't have range anxiety :). I enjoy bringing you breaking Tesla news as well as anything about Tesla or other EV companies I can find, like Aptera. Other interests of mine are AI, Tesla Energy and the Tesla Bot! You can follow me on X.COM or LinkedIn to stay in touch and follow my Tesla and EV news coverage.

Image Credit: DALL-E AI

Article Reference: Farzad Discussion with James Douma and Hans