# Long-term Rental Replacement Advice?



## Azthrillhouse (Dec 2, 2017)

My TM3 was rear-ended on a road trip in California two weeks ago. Substantial cosmetic damage to the bumper, trunk panel, tail light housing, and left rear panel, but the car is still drivable.

No injuries and the other driver's insurance is covering, but.....the body shop (Tesla approved & insurance approved) is telling me that the car will need to be in their possession to tear-down before they order the parts....and they are giving me an estimate of* 70 days f*or the repairs to be complete (unlikely best-case scenario 30 days, but they really have very little to go on. They have another TM3 in the shop that's been waiting 2 months for parts.)

So......anybody have any advice on wrangling an acceptable replacement vehicle? That is a long time to be without my spaceship. Renting the cheapest Model S on Turo would be about $7,300, about 3K more than the repairs and 3K more than renting most "standard" vehicles.

I can legitimately claim that renting an ICE car will cost me $225 extra in fuel over that time span...but other than that I don't see how I'm going to get the insurance company (theirs or mine) to buy off on that.

A Bolt or a Leaf would be an acceptable substitute, even though charging becomes more difficult - but I don't see any of those for rent.

Am I doomed to ICE-ville?


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## Bokonon (Apr 13, 2017)

Azthrillhouse said:


> My TM3 was rear-ended on a road trip in California two weeks ago. Substantial cosmetic damage to the bumper, trunk panel, tail light housing, and left rear panel, but the car is still drivable.
> 
> No injuries and the other driver's insurance is covering, but.....the body shop (Tesla approved & insurance approved) is telling me that the car will need to be in their possession to tear-down before they order the parts....and they are giving me an estimate of* 70 days f*or the repairs to be complete (unlikely best-case scenario 30 days, but they really have very little to go on. They have another TM3 in the shop that's been waiting 2 months for parts.)
> 
> ...


Sorry to hear about your spaceship. 

This may be a completely hare-brained idea with taxes and fees considered, but here goes anyway...

What about BUYING a used LEAF (2013+, with as many bars remaining as possible) for something in the neighborhood of $8-11K (Carguru), then selling it at the end of the rental period? If renting an ICE is going to cost you about $4K, you might be able to do a little better than that on the buy/sell spread, since an $8-10K car isn't going to depreciate much over the span of a few months. Plus, in the (likely?) event that your Model 3 takes longer than 70 days to repair, you're not stuck looking for another rental or paying rental prices for additional time.

Downsides: additional hassle, requires having a sizable chunk of cash available.


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## Azthrillhouse (Dec 2, 2017)

Bokonon said:


> Sorry to hear about your spaceship.
> 
> This may be a completely hare-brained idea with taxes and fees considered, but here goes anyway...
> 
> ...


Not hare-brained, but the hassle/risk of taking it in the shorts threshold is too high for me.

In talking to my insurance (while their insurance waits to get back to me), California requires the rental be of "comparable value", which takes into consideration the current value of the car (as a brand new vehicle, this helps a lot). So, given the accident happened in California with a California driver, I might have a leg to stand on to get a decent reimbursement amount.


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## AZJen (Dec 20, 2017)

How is your repair going? I was also rear-ended in my M3 and the shop just started the repair on Monday. I am also in AZ and getting the repair done at New Image Paint and Body. After tearing it apart they realized that I needed a new trunk floor and Tesla is saying that there is no "release date" for the part. They said there is another M3 there in the same situation. It is giving me anxiety to not know how long the repair might take (and I'm not happy to be back in an ICE for an indeterminate period of time).


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## Azthrillhouse (Dec 2, 2017)

AZJen said:


> How is your repair going? I was also rear-ended in my M3 and the shop just started the repair on Monday. I am also in AZ and getting the repair done at New Image Paint and Body. After tearing it apart they realized that I needed a new trunk floor and Tesla is saying that there is no "release date" for the part. They said there is another M3 there in the same situation. It is giving me anxiety to not know how long the repair might take (and I'm not happy to be back in an ICE for an indeterminate period of time).


Jen, sorry to hear that - I actually just dropped my car off this morning (at Service King in Chandler). I've been fighting the past month for any solution that would let me drive something besides a crappy ICE rental, to no avail. So, I guess we'll see if I have more significant damage.

The guy there said that they've seen an uptick in parts timelines from Tesla in the past month. He also said that Tesla assigns a "customer advocate" - somebody that we can call directly and plead our case, and that sometimes making that direct connection with the Tesla rep does pay dividends.

Driving the Nissan Altima rental to work on the freeway this morning after dropping of my 3 was just painful. I will take some revenge in putting hard miles (and crushed Goldfish crackers in the back seat, I'm sure) on this piece of crap by driving it to San Diego and back.


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## Azthrillhouse (Dec 2, 2017)

Shockingly, I am getting my car back in its beat-up state while the parts are on order, on my way to pick it up today!


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## AZJen (Dec 20, 2017)

Azthrillhouse said:


> Shockingly, I am getting my car back in its beat-up state while the parts are on order, on my way to pick it up today!


I drove mine for about 3 weeks with a crushed-in rear end while they ordered the parts.

They were able to repair the trunk floor - it was basically the insert part where the second trunk is (when you lift up the trap door and it has that extra room underneath). One of the corners was mashed in a little bit so the technician welded it and it looked good as new to me. It doesn't compromise the structural integrity so I think it's fine.

Otherwise it is almost done! As of Tuesday they told me that the parts were painted, they just needed to reassemble it. They are estimating that I will get it back this upcoming Tuesday or Wednesday (they should be updating me today).


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## Azthrillhouse (Dec 2, 2017)

AZJen said:


> I drove mine for about 3 weeks with a crushed-in rear end while they ordered the parts.
> 
> They were able to repair the trunk floor - it was basically the insert part where the second trunk is (when you lift up the trap door and it has that extra room underneath). One of the corners was mashed in a little bit so the technician welded it and it looked good as new to me. It doesn't compromise the structural integrity so I think it's fine.
> 
> Otherwise it is almost done! As of Tuesday they told me that the parts were painted, they just needed to reassemble it. They are estimating that I will get it back this upcoming Tuesday or Wednesday (they should be updating me today).


That's awesome!


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