For the longest time, after the Cybertruck launched, Tesla wouldn’t take the cars on trade towards other models. Now the automaker has finally opened up the option, allowing Cybertruck owners to sell their cars back to Tesla, but in so doing it’s revealed why it never took them in before: Tesla doesn’t think used Cybertrucks are worth all that much.
Users on the Cybertruck Owner’s Club forum have been playing around with trade estimates on their trucks — simply out of curiosity, you see, they would never sell their beloved truck that they 100% fully intend to drive until they die and then be buried in — and they’re seeing stunningly low offers. The user who opened the thread, an owner of a Foundation Series truck that cost $99,900 new, got an estimate of just $65,400 for his truck — a drop of $34,500, 35% of the truck’s value, in just about a year. All that value lost with less than 6,500 miles on the odometer.
Cybertruck values are crashing fast
That 35% number is the sort of depreciation a normal car would have after three years, but the Cybertruck managed it in just one — a feat that would be impressive were it not so terrible for its owners. Depreciation is generally measured in three- or five-year terms, so it’ll be interesting to see how the Cybertruck keeps this track record up with time. Assuming, of course, that any of them last that long.
Tesla said late last year that it expected Cybertruck depreciation to sit at 30% after three years, even as the market clearly demonstrated that the truck wouldn’t hold that kind of value. Now it seems the company is finally recognizing reality, offering some truly staggeringly low rates for practically new cars — values that are still, somehow, on the upper end of the Cybertruck trade in value range. It seems even Tesla is starting to understand what the general car-buying public has long known: No one wants these dumb-looking janky-ass trucks.