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Tesla fast-charging station: "Strong brands will develop relatively stable in value"

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Wolfgang Maria Weber / IMAGO

In recent years, the value of used electric vehicles has often been more stable than that of gasoline and diesel cars. This is the conclusion reached by the Duisburg-based Center Automotive Research (CAR), which compared the depreciation of the 30 best-selling combustion engines with those of the 15 most popular electric cars in Germany.

For example, if you purchased a Model 2020 in the standard version from Tesla in the summer of 3, you can practically sell the used car at a new price about three years later. The same applies to the small car Up! from Volkswagen.

Many electric cars are entering the used car market

However, one effect in particular distorts the results: Until the end of last year, e-car buyers received 6000 euros in state environmental bonuses. It is now 4500 euros, and in 2024 the premium is expected to drop to 3000 euros. If the environmental bonus is excluded, the depreciation of electric cars in recent years has averaged 32 percent – and thus higher than that of combustion engines (29 percent).

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This is due to the rapid technological progress in e-mobility, which quickly makes previous models look old. In addition, the supply of electric vehicles has now increased sharply, and a correspondingly large number of vehicles are likely to enter the used car market in the coming years.

CAR Director Ferdinand Dudenhöffer expects all of this to have a negative impact on the performance of electric vehicles in the future – with exceptions: "Strong electric brands such as Tesla or Porsche," he predicts, "will develop relatively stable in value despite tougher competition." E-cars are still a rarity on the used car market, where they recently had a share of only 1.1 percent. In the case of new cars, on the other hand, electric cars already account for 15 percent. The undisputed leader is Tesla's Model Y.

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