Tesla offers two primary consumer subscription tiers for its vehicles: Premium Connectivity for in-car entertainment/navigation ($9.99/month (or $99/year)) and Full Self-Driving (FSD) Supervised for advanced driver assistance ($99/month).
When do you think you will buy a 100% pure electric vehicle?
- Thread starter dmclone
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Would there be any extras besides these? The first is basically on-star or satellite radio. The second would be unique but probably not used a whole lot I would guess.
If I want to buy a used Tesla (or any company that doesn’t have onsite dealers) can you go test drive them or get actual looks at them to see what care was taken of them?
Those are just examples. Lot's of other services to purchase and they're always adding more!
Those are the only two options that I know of that are monthly/yearly subscriptions. The $100/year connectivity package is kind of a no-brainer. We tried a few weeks without it, and I felt like it was dumb to have this type of car without it.
You can also buy the performance add-on to some vehicles for a one time charge of $2,000, which will drop the non-performance version down to low 12 second 1/4 mile, which is a hell of a deal if you've ever tried to mod an ICE vehicle.
They can't have "dealerships" in Iowa but in Des Moines you can pick up your Tesla there and also schedule a test drive. We did a test drive of the model Y before we bought ours, and they just left us with the car and didn't bug us at all. If you're thinking of buying a used Tesla, run it by here, and we'll tell you the shortfalls. The Model Y since 2024 has been stunningly good, but there are some versions before 2024 that had some issues. For example, we have a 2023, which rides rougher than the 2024. Some Model Y's before 2024 have the old cameras, so their FSD options are not as good.
I know Rivian has used vehicles available at several of their service centers. I see quite a few of them listed in St Louis and Bloomington.
So you deal online but go check them out at that location? Or is there someone there to deal with?
I got the data back on my first month using timed based charging from Mid America. I don't have the data on how much energy I used for the Tesla in June/July last year, but I know we used it a lot less.
2025
11.90¢ per kWh regardless of time of day
2026
Starting on June 1-Oct 1
Off-Peak (10 PM – 8 AM): 7.60¢ per kWh
Regular Hours (8 AM – 1 PM & 6 PM – 10 PM): 10.08¢ per kWh
On-Peak (1 PM – 6 PM): 21.98¢ per kWh
I made two big changes during this time. I moved car charging to start at 10:15pm. I also changed the thermostat so that it would cool down to 70 from 11:30a-1pm, and then not kick in unless it got above 77 until 6pm.
My billing cycle was a little jacked last year(new build/moving), so it only included 26 days.
2025
1,139 kWh=$144.31
2026
1,344 kWh=$144.60
"Even though you consumed 205 more kWh over a billing cycle that was 3 days longer, your actual electric cost only went up by $0.29"
During this specific 29-day billing window, your log tracks 20 total charging sessions:
EV Share of Bill: Your Tesla accounts for 20.4% of your total monthly electricity consumption
"If you had paid a flat 11.9 cents ($0.119) per kWh (your all-in flat rate from last summer), the cost for that same 274.71 kWh of charging would have been $32.69.
By shifting to the Time-of-Use plan and automated overnight charging, your actual utility cost for that power was $20.89, keeping an extra $11.80 in your pocket for the month."
From those 18 home charging sessions, you gained a total of 1,105 miles of range.
Breaking that down with your actual utility cost of $20.89 for that specific electricity window, you were driving for just 1.89 cents per mile in fuel costs.
If I would have driven my Kia Telluride that gets 21mpg those 1,105 miles, and fuel costs $3.80, what would that have cost me?
Driving the Telluride for those 1,105 miles would have required roughly 52.62 gallons of regular unleaded, costing you $199.95.
Comparing the two vehicles for that exact month of driving:
Not gigantic savings by switching to TOU plan, but it seems positive overall.
Just realized that I need to adjust my charging to reflect the 7.6 rate, not 6.
Adjusting for the true "all-in" summer off-peak rate of 7.6 cents ($0.076) per kWh (which includes MidAmerican's base rate plus the fuel and energy riders) gives the corrected breakdown for your home charging during this billing cycle:
2025
11.90¢ per kWh regardless of time of day
2026
Starting on June 1-Oct 1
Off-Peak (10 PM – 8 AM): 7.60¢ per kWh
Regular Hours (8 AM – 1 PM & 6 PM – 10 PM): 10.08¢ per kWh
On-Peak (1 PM – 6 PM): 21.98¢ per kWh
I made two big changes during this time. I moved car charging to start at 10:15pm. I also changed the thermostat so that it would cool down to 70 from 11:30a-1pm, and then not kick in unless it got above 77 until 6pm.
My billing cycle was a little jacked last year(new build/moving), so it only included 26 days.
2025
1,139 kWh=$144.31
2026
1,344 kWh=$144.60
"Even though you consumed 205 more kWh over a billing cycle that was 3 days longer, your actual electric cost only went up by $0.29"
During this specific 29-day billing window, your log tracks 20 total charging sessions:
- Home Urbandale (AC): 18 sessions
- Tesla Supercharger Shelby (DC): 2 sessions (on June 25th)
- Total Home Energy Used: 274.71 kWh
- Total Self-Tracked Cost: $16.48 (calculated at your baseline app rate of ~$0.06/kWh)
EV Share of Bill: Your Tesla accounts for 20.4% of your total monthly electricity consumption
"If you had paid a flat 11.9 cents ($0.119) per kWh (your all-in flat rate from last summer), the cost for that same 274.71 kWh of charging would have been $32.69.
By shifting to the Time-of-Use plan and automated overnight charging, your actual utility cost for that power was $20.89, keeping an extra $11.80 in your pocket for the month."
From those 18 home charging sessions, you gained a total of 1,105 miles of range.
Breaking that down with your actual utility cost of $20.89 for that specific electricity window, you were driving for just 1.89 cents per mile in fuel costs.
If I would have driven my Kia Telluride that gets 21mpg those 1,105 miles, and fuel costs $3.80, what would that have cost me?
Driving the Telluride for those 1,105 miles would have required roughly 52.62 gallons of regular unleaded, costing you $199.95.
Comparing the two vehicles for that exact month of driving:
- Kia Telluride: $199.95
- Tesla Model Y (On Time-of-Use Plan): $20.89
PDF
Not gigantic savings by switching to TOU plan, but it seems positive overall.
Just realized that I need to adjust my charging to reflect the 7.6 rate, not 6.
Adjusting for the true "all-in" summer off-peak rate of 7.6 cents ($0.076) per kWh (which includes MidAmerican's base rate plus the fuel and energy riders) gives the corrected breakdown for your home charging during this billing cycle:
- Total Home Energy Used: 274.71 kWh
- TeslaMate Logged Cost (at 6¢): $16.48
- Adjusted True Cost (at 7.6¢): $20.88
- Correction Deficit: TeslaMate underreported your bill impact by $4.40.
Updated Comparison vs. the Telluride
Even with the adjustment to the true rate, the math still heavily favors the Model Y for that month's 1,105 miles:- Kia Telluride Gas Cost: $199.95
- Tesla Model Y True Cost: $20.88
- Actual Net Savings: $179.07
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You start here:
Pre-owned Rivians ready for more adventures
Discover every benefit of the Rivian experience, now at a pre-owned price. Pre-owned electric SUVs and trucks are available now in the R1 Shop.
Little rich for me right now but thanks for linking it.You start here:
Pre-owned Rivians ready for more adventures
Discover every benefit of the Rivian experience, now at a pre-owned price. Pre-owned electric SUVs and trucks are available now in the R1 Shop.rivian.com
If you're in Iowa, you can test drive a new vehicle, but they are not going to have any used vehicles. You can buy one and have it delivered, but the cost to do this isn't worth it. If you want to buy a used tesla, you want to drive it and see it, the best bet is to drive to KC.
You can also occasionally find used EVs at other local dealerships from trade-ins, I assume there's no problem test driving those.
Does anyone here have a BMW electric vehicle? I had to take my X3 in for routine service and was loaned an i4 for the day. It had some decent zip and was pretty fun to drive. Wondering if anyone here has a BMW ev and if they like it or not.
I find rivians hideous. So that wouldn’t work.You start here:
Pre-owned Rivians ready for more adventures
Discover every benefit of the Rivian experience, now at a pre-owned price. Pre-owned electric SUVs and trucks are available now in the R1 Shop.
I don't, but I'm really intrigued by the iX3 that's coming soon. If it has decent sized rear legroom, I may be in.
I'd also like to know what is so hideous about Rivians, particularly the R2. I'm not saying people can't have opinions on what they like aesthetically, but the R2 is about as 'normal' of an SUV as you are gonna find. And if it's because of the front gate/lights etc who the **** cares...you're driving it you aren't looking at the outside.
Its the lights I'm sure. There is a small group of people who can't seem to accept them.
Most people think Rivians are very sharp looking vehicles.
