Your time to buy a Tesla car is limited

If you’re thinking about buying a Tesla, you may want to do that sooner rather than later — at least if you trust Elon Musk’s vision of the company’s future. 

Answering a question on Twitter on whether consumers only have a limited time to buy a Tesla car, Musk at first answered with a simple “yes.”

He later clarified: “To be clear, consumers will still be able to buy a Tesla, but the clearing price will rise significantly, as a fully autonomous car that can function as a robotaxi is several times more valuable than a non-autonomous car.”

If this doesn’t make any sense, here’s a bit of background. For a while now, Musk has been saying that newer Tesla cars already have all the necessary hardware to become fully autonomous. It’s just a matter of software updates and getting regulatory approval, after which Tesla cars will effectively be able to ferry around passengers all by themselves. Tesla itself plans to launch its own ride-hailing network that would compete with companies like Uber (which is also working on autonomous driving). 

In this future, a Tesla car will be far more valuable as it will actually be able to earn its owner money. Musk previously compared buying any non-self-driving car to buying a horse, and called Tesla cars “appreciating assets.” Now, Musk spelled out a rough estimate, claiming that a robotaxi car is “several times more valuable” than a regular car. In short: Buy a Tesla now, or face having to pay a lot more for it in the future. 

This notion has an interesting outcome: If Tesla robotaxis can earn a lot of money — say, tens of thousands of dollars per year — ferrying people around, then it wouldn’t make sense for Tesla to sell them at their current prices. The company could simply grow its robotaxi fleet with each new car it produces, and anyone that wants in will have to pay a premium. This would make Tesla less of a consumer-facing company and more of a company that sells money-making cars to robotaxi businesses. 

While this isn’t entirely impossible, Musk’s comments should be taken with a grain of salt. No car company right now, Tesla included, is selling a fully autonomous car; in fact, there (officially) aren’t any cars on the road which are close to that goal. For example, just days ago, Mercedes and BMW announced plans to launch a Level 4 autonomous car by 2024. This is still not full autonomy; automotive standards organization SAE classifies fully autonomous driving as Level 5, meaning the car can drive itself under all conditions, requiring no assistance from the person sitting in the driver’s seat. Musk has previously said Tesla will have a fully self-driving car in 2020, but the company has previously missed several deadlines related to autonomous driving. 

Furthermore, it may take years until regulators approve FSD cars on public roads. 

Finally, as Electrek notes, Musk assumes that autonomous Teslas will make quite a bit of money as taxis — $30,000 a year, the company previously said — which may be unrealistic. 

The idea of a car becoming a (potentially very lucrative) investment is interesting, and — if it becomes true — will completely change the auto industry and the way we think about cars. While Musk isn’t afraid of bold predictions about the future, potential buyers should be aware that his timelines are often too optimistic.