Cybertruck too big for parking spot, and Tesla won't let him return or resell it
businessinsider.com
businessinsider.com
I don't understand how this can stand, not to deny it does, but the idea anyone aside from government can really sustain "I sold it to you, not to you to sell on" is a bit wierd. Wierd, but alas, not uncommon. It happens with concert tickets, with books, with music, sometimes with real estate. Usually with real estate there is a stated purpose behind it like 'first home owner grant' type initiatives.
With Tesla, it's purely commercial: "we don't want you stagging the buy price or undermining the integrity of our sell price after the surge"
Ticketmaster and Tickettek would be watching anyone changing that rule, as would the book and music publishing industry.
I am unsure they can remote-engine-lock the car, but who knows? Certainly I have seen stories if you are out of SIM range and low 12v battery it's possible to wind up unable to enter the car, but lock/unlock processes don't have to be symmetric across car-user-cloud experience.
Can you still air gap new cars?
I think he assumed it was done at the regular services from a diagnostic port upload.
Trucks have had live engine monitoring since they became half-a-million dollar assets. I would be amazed if a serious trucking enterprise didn't ask about the feed buying these beasts. Do we still demand a driver tachometer paper exercise?
That seems fine. There's generally no lasting commitment between buyer/seller.
The seller can be mad, paid, and free of claim/more annoyance. The buyer can enjoy what they bought and carry on elsewhere. It can make servicing/replacement parts needlessly difficult, but fine.
Now, the blocking of the resale, I have trouble with that. It sounds like a lease with fewer steps. If I'm paying purchase money, I want purchase benefits. Autonomy. Heh.
Not to dismiss leases: they allow for people to enjoy something nice for smaller/regular payments. Freeing up the larger chunk is valuable.
The point is kind of fuzzy: one shouldn't be able to 'sell'/transfer their rights. This is like selling part of yourself.
Where this meets practicality? Selling things carries the rights with it. I feel like choosing my belongings/who gets them/under what terms are all part of those. If I don't own it, be honest.
It's a financial imposition after the sale is done, 'simple' as that. It can be argued. It shouldn't have to be IMO.
Edit: Grandstanding now on my soap box - scalpers are the boogeyman to create a cartel
Who's to say I didn't just give it to someone else for really, really bad terms? There may be implications RE: buyer selection/taxes. I'd consider it worthwhile to spite the former owners, Tesla.
On offer? Something that would solve all of your newfound problems. Whatever it/they may be. He doesn't need it though; in fact, it's wasting space. Plus, he'll toss in a car good enough to not make a new issue for you, and a little money for the effort.
Why does Tesla or anyone not in this otherwise legal transaction get to deny this? So that yet another unrelated party can buy a price-fixed commodity? We're several degrees detached from reason.
Is it not greater to let this amplification factor/trade happen? The free market succeeded, woohoo.
This resale limitation stuff is a weird wedge in the concept of autonomy/ownership in my opinion. Akin to regulatory capture. The manufacturer becomes the scalper.
It's always purely commercial. Bands don't want scalpers to resell their tickets. Airlines want an exclusive monopoly on last minute ticket sales. Game publishers not wanting people to be able to arbitrage their deeply discounted sales.
(emphasis mine)
It'd only protect you if tesla tried to sue you for copyright infringement, but not for anything else.
It simply says that you're protected if Tesla sues you when you try to resell a Tesla, it does not limit that protection to IP-related issues.
i.e. "that limits the rights of an intellectual property owner to control resale of products embodying its intellectual property" and "a seller of a good is limited in controlling resale even in non-IP-related contexts" can both be true at the same time.
That being said, I don't know whether or not the wiki text is representative of the actual law.
There's a reason the state regulates certain contracts to be literally boilerplate (home purchase) and you have to specifically negotiate any deviations. Unless there was reason to believe this wasn't the same car purchase contract you would get with any other car then clauses like this should get thrown out on the same grounds you can't put, "and also you agree to turn over your life savings" in a contract. Nobody reads them, no one is expected to read them.
Otherwise there's no meeting of minds going on here.
Why not? If I list my house for 80% or 90% of the realistic market value with a set of conditions that are “absolutely no negotiations; take it or leave it”, I’m a willing seller and the purchaser is a willing buyer, right?
"Buy my house but only if you operate a crack den, and sell drugs to my friends" would not only be un-enforcable, it would be unconscionable.
To be less ridiculous, "buy my house but you can't sub-divide it despite local planning laws" would be unfortunate.
You appear to be arguing "they consented" -which is nearly always true in a contract between equals, but rarely true when there is an asymmetry of need.
Whereas for things sold by major corporations, there often are not.
There's nothing else even remotely similar to a Cybertruck anywhere else.
When consumers can shop offerings from hundreds of different competing companies then there isn't really a power imbalance. If you don't like the terms with one, you can probably find terms you do like with another.
When there are only 5 manufacturers in the market, or 3, or just 1, that's where the power imbalance happens. Companies get to dictate terms because consumers have no real alternative.
And if you want to go further and opt out of the standard home purchase contract entirely you get lawyers involved on both sides so you're again negotiating.
The implicit assumption you're making is that offering the house at 80/90% of market value is a concession but that's not how that works. You can't do the negotiation for the other side, say take it or leave it, and say that counts. You can't negotiate against an imagined person in advance
If you offer it take it or leave it you're at the whim of the judge saying, "that's absurd no reasonable person would assume that was in a home purchase contract."
> Since ordering the vehicle, Raddon's living circumstances have changed… He said that he and his wife separated and he's since moved into a new apartment complex, and his new Cybertruck doesn't fit comfortably in its parking space.
And after that I suppose he made the mistake of not rearranging his life to suit his Cybertruck.
But refusing to allow resale appears to be a straightforward violation of the first sale doctrine.
It really isn't. The first sale doctrine only applies to IP law. It doesn't apply to anything else.
I remember Network Appliance (Netapp) could not prevent buyers from reselling their gear when they didn’t need it so they tried to make the software licenses nontransferable, rendering their hardware useless. You might have been thinking of this case.
On top of the fact that the owner couldn't have known the above, I'd say one can blame Tesla: for their abusive contracts and bad customer service.
Although the inability to sell it is bullshit.
The lessee would need to insure it themselves, obviously.
Looking at the picture, maybe needs more practice parking, ask to move the fire extinguisher enclosure to the next wall or back wall, or use the auto park function. That’s a thing on it right?
It’s only a year. This seems like a nothing story to regurgitate Tesla policy clicks. I liked the Porsche Taycan story about a guy who couldn’t trade in his vehicle because the dealer wasn’t able to sell his previous gen and was overstocked already. He was 25k underwater and supposedly couldn’t afford to sell privately. Then the heater/ac broke during the video.
Pre-orders are always a risk, he took the risk, he lost. And it is not a huge loss, just a year of uncomfortable parking before he can sell it, or he can buy a smaller vehicle, leave the Cybertruck in a rental garage for a year, and then sell the truck. Buying a $80k+ vehicle and not even thinking about its dimensions shows either a bunch of disposable income (so he can absorb the loss of having to wait a year before selling), or a lack of discipline, which would have gotten him into trouble in a way or another.
My guess is that he is not stupid, he doesn't want his truck anymore because of a change of situation, and he uses exposure to try to weasel out of his contract. If it can save him a few thousand bucks overall, why not try it? All he needed to do was to contact Business Insider, who, in turn, get a good story for their paper.
In short, confounding.
The vehicle is the least important thing to him [now, probably], yet this quirky little contract is a needless thorn.
Why should he endure all of the erosion you open with? The paper agreement? Holding someone to a technicality encourages being beat on one. It harms good faith.
I don't know, feels like we're doing too much. The sale should be finished, and at most, continue between him and the bank (I haven't bothered to learn his specifics) on his terms. I don't like the redefinition of ownership.
Tesla feels parasitic with this, seeming to wash it with the fear of scalpers.
I feel for him/others. This policy serves Tesla, as fanfare if nothing else, more than him or you/I. It's a toy/commodity - nobody needs these.
Innumerable would-be-buyers being priced out of their new toy is preferable to one being unable to... truly own their belongings/freely transfer them.
I can complain because I'm aware of the terms and chose to not participate. This is why. I will agree it is a little silly to complain about terms one agreed to, though...
However, people's circumstances change and in this case he has a fair right to resell it.
We shouldn't point and laugh at other people for getting screwed over by companies, but critizise the companies committing the crimes.
I might be wrong, and if I am please tell me.
At what point I did that?