Outspoken car expert John Cadogan has launched an epic blast against electric vehicles, accusing them of being expensive to repair and causing their resale values to plummet.
The experienced automotive journalist who leads the AutoExpert website made the comments in typically colorful fashion on a YouTube video posted Tuesday titled “Tesla EVs are just too expensive to own – says Hertz CEO.”
Cadogan uses the major US car rental company Hertz as a case study for the problems facing electric vehicles and Teslas in particular.
Hertz announced this week that it would delay the introduction of 100,000 Teslas into its fleet – of which only about 35,000 are in use – despite first announcing the bulk purchase in 2021.
An auto expert says newer brands Tesla (pictured a Model 3) are being heavily discounted as demand in the electric vehicle market slows
In a typically pithy and expletive-laden post, Cadogan explained why.
“Those damn things just cost too much to keep on the road and the resale value is damn poor,” he said.
Hertz Global CEO Stephen Scherr said repairing collisions and damage to a Tesla costs “about double what it would cost for a comparable vehicle with an internal combustion engine.”
The electric vehicle market worldwide is stagnating, says AutoForecast Solutions Vice President Sam Fiorani Business insider ‘the spectacular growth we have seen in recent years cannot be sustained’.
Cadogan explained this as a shortage of ‘virtue-signalling t**ts’.
“Electric Scientology fanatic customers appear to be at a plateau,” he said.
John Cadogan said if Tesla can only compete by lowering the price of its cars, the company is ‘doomed’
‘It could mean an end to the era of bullsh***.’
In response, he said Tesla CEO Elon Musk, whom he called “electric Jesus,” has been forced to “inelegantly lower prices to keep customers coming through the front door.”
He said this caused a sharp drop in resale value.
Mr. Scherr also mentioned this to justify Hertz’s slower introduction of the model.
‘The MSRP (Manufacturer’s Suggested Retail Price) declines for electric cars over the course of 2023, mainly caused by Tesla, have reduced the fair market value of our electric cars compared to last year, so that the salvage will lead to a larger loss and therefore a greater loss. burden,” Mr. Scherr said.
According to Cadogan, prices of new Teslas have fallen by as much as 20 percent.
“Face the facts Tesla fanboy, how many 20 percent price drops are sustainable for Tesla before the s***show just collapses,” he said.
“If lowering prices is the only countermeasure to increased competition, Tesla is doomed.”
He pointed out that a major buyer like Hertz would have gotten its Teslas at a significant discount and negotiated a good deal on maintenance.
“Even this has not been enough to reverse the double whammy for Hertz that Teslas are too expensive to repair and resale values have imploded,” Cadogan said.
According to Cadogan, discounting new Teslas was a cynical move that had major consequences for owners.
US car rental giant Hertz has announced that it plans to slow the introduction of Teslas into its fleet
“Any time electronic Jesus just cuts prices, it also has a major impact on the resale value of existing owners,” he argued.
‘He’s happy to destroy existing owners as new loyalists come in, which isn’t a very sustainable long-term commercial strategy, is it?
‘If you really take the biggest bath on your (Tesla) Model 3, are you really going to be at the front again? How much of the Koolaid did you actually use?’
He thought that what was true of Teslas was largely true of all battery-powered vehicles.
“It seems like every day there is another brick in the wall of evidence that this mad rush to switch exclusively to battery-electric transportation is little more than an all-you-can-eat sandwich buffet,” he said.
“And I think it’s problematic that we’re running out of bread.”
This week it was announced that US car giant Ford will scale back its investment in electric vehicles following the stunning news that it was losing around US$36,000 ($57,000) for every battery-powered vehicle produced.
Ford’s longtime rival General Motors also announced it had abandoned its goal of producing 400,000 electric vehicles by the first half of 2024, citing declining demand, production bottlenecks and low profitability.