Honda and Toyota have been smart, logical choices for American car buyers for decades. Once upon a time, they were the new kids on the block and they had to prove themselves with strong “performance for the money” or “value for the money” propositions. They did so, repeatedly, and they grew their market shares as a result.
Last holiday weekend, my brother in law (who also loves to test drive cars) suggested I drive 6 cars and get $265 in gift cards. I thought, “I get to drive cars, I get gift cards, and its a great story idea” (well, I guess you the reader will be the judge of that). What is the downside? Well, dealers calling me for the next month and asking if I want to buy the car I drove.
The Tesla Model 3 is a lot like the Buick Regal. Actually, no, not really. They do have a similar starting price, but the Model 3 is approximately three worlds better and also has a much lower cost of ownership.
I recently published some cost comparisons between the Tesla Model 3 and various Honda Accord trims. As I implied at the time, these models shouldn’t even be in the same discussion since the Model 3 is a much better vehicle (safer, quicker, more advanced tech, better handling), but the fact is that they do compare when it comes to 5 year cost of ownership. However, when I published the previous comparisons, I didn’t include the cost of interest if you took out an auto loan to finance the purchase.
Reporting on the Tesla Model 3 is weird. It’s a car that can smoke a BMW M3 on the track yet is cost competitive — or even cheaper than — a Toyota Camry or Honda Accord (seriously).
For our hot new CleanTech Talk podcast interview series, I recently sat down with ARK Invest Analyst Tasha Keeney to discuss various aspects of autonomous vehicles, Tesla, Tesla, and Tesla.
The “best car” on the market is generally something you’d think to tie to a specific price range, class, or at least body style. In 2019, though, I don’t think you have to do that at all. In my humble opinion (and I’ll make the case for it in a moment), the best car on the market is now cost-competitive with the highest selling mass market cars on the market. It wasn’t in the first quarter, but it is in the second.
I recently ran a Twitter poll to decide what to write about next. The top article the voters asked me to write was an article on how the Tesla Model Standard Range (SR) competes against models from incumbent auto manufacturers. The wonderful thing is that Tesla is now price competitive, without incentives. It is very competitive on a total cost of ownership basis. With incentives and TCO factored in, the Model 3 is tough to beat.
Let’s take a look.
We don’t really know how many Tesla Model 3s were sold in the USA in January and February, but the car should be in the top 20. With less than one day remaining to order the Model 3 Standard Range Plus for $37,000, I felt we still hadn’t done enough to compare the current Model 3 options with the top selling cars in the USA. So, here’s a new rundown comparison focused on one key category: 5 year total cost of ownership.
There are a lot of ways to compare cars. In most cases, once you whittle down to a specific body style and price range (vehicle class), there’s little difference between the options. Toyota Camry vs. Honda Accord vs. Nissan Altima — what’s really the difference? BMW 3 Series vs. Audi A4 vs. Mercedes-Benz C-Class — again, the differences largely boil down to style or slight variations in features.
The Tesla Model 3 versus any of these cars is an entirely different game.
