Guaranteed buy back vs 1.49 APR

A sales associate told me (whatever that is worth) that the buy back guarantee requires a 6 month enrollment and that afterwards you could refinance with your preferred bank and maintain the guarantee. I would ask ownership to confirm.

Nothing in life has ZERO risk.
Nothing.
If you simply remember Sept. 2008 "derivatives", mortgage and real estate bubbles, Fannie Mae, Lehman Bros., AIG, GM, Chrysler and collapse both domestically and internationally.
There is a "Y" in the road, yet you DO have an opportunity to choose your path and understand that there may be consequences.

Your Tesla may depreciate more than 50% in three years, the "bet" is it will not depreciate more than a comparable vehicle (S Class MB, 7 series BMW, etc.)
The reality is Luxury vehicles lose value rapidly.
Model S is a Luxury vehicle.
That is how the entire market is structured, Elon just added his own wrinkle to salve some (anxious) potential owner's nerves (or their accountants or their wives).

I took the 1.49% interest for almost 100% of the loan.
Wells Fargo would not quote me a rate in Texas.
My primary bank could not come close to the 1.49% interest, nor the amount.
They had their chance, weren't interested in further developing/retaining my business, so I took it somewhere else.
(If I needed to, I could have paid cash, but why move money around that is already earning MORE than 1.49%?)

Such is Life.

I went with the low rate. Intention is to keep it 8 years.

Low rate for me as well.

I had planned to pay mostly cash, saw the 1.49% rate and decided to mostly finance. No brainer at that rate.

The guarantee allows two things to happen. 1) If you're the type to trade in your car regularly, then you have a floor on the price. 2) If the Model S turns out to be incredibly unreliable (or a "better" version comes out that's extremely compelling) then you have the opportunity to unload it at a specific price. If i were concerned about #2 then I wouldn't buy the care in the first place--at least the unreliable part. What is the likelihood that you'll want to get a new car in 3 years? If very high, then the guarantee may be worth the extra $5k. Remember, you don't have to trade it in, you can still sell it on the open market, so the guarantee costs you exactly $5k.

As someone else noted, you can finance for 6 months then pay off the loan via cash or a refinance. Will cost you much less then $5k for the guarantee though I don't know what kind of rate you'd get on the refi.

Went with my credit union's 1.49% APR car loan, but for 5 long years; much better APR than that offered by Tesla's "partners" in the buy back deal.

Still ends up being about $3k in finance charges though. Ouch!

Financed 100% at 1.49%. Even if you don't personally participate in the buy back program, the program will have an affect on the used Model S market in 3 years. In theory this will establish the floor for all used Model S's, not just those owned by people in the program.

I went with the higher rate and buy back, although I intend to only carry the financing for the required six months and then pay it off (or refinance).

heh, again lucky bastards. Here the best rate I got was 6 month euribor + 3.2% i.e. 3.8% right now. And I'll have to buy the car outright from Tesla, bring it to Estonia and then refinance it getting majority of the money back.

I decided to go with Alliant Credit Union at the 1.49% interest and lower down payment.