Popular YouTuber JerryRigEverything Says Elon Musk Promised His Tesla With FSD Would Gain Value. Seven Years Later, It's Worth Just 20%

Popular tech YouTuber Zack Nelson, better known as JerryRigEverything, just called out Elon Musk for a bold promise that hasn't aged well. In a post on X, he shared a screenshot showing that his 2018 Tesla Model X is now worth just $22,400. That's about 20% of what he paid for it, despite Musk’s claim that Teslas with Full Self-Driving would appreciate over time.

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The “Appreciating Asset” Pitch

Back in 2019, Musk said buying a Tesla was an investment, not an expense. “If you buy a Tesla today, I believe you are buying an appreciating asset – not a depreciating asset,” he claimed. The idea was that Tesla would keep raising the price of its FSD package, making used Teslas more valuable.

But reality has gone in the opposite direction. Tesla has cut the price of FSD multiple times since 2023, and used Teslas are now losing value three times faster than the average car, according to recent market data.

In replies to the YouTuber’s post, many Tesla owners shared similar frustrations. Some said they “drank the Kool-Aid too” and bought more than one Tesla and saw each of them lose around half their original value. Others criticized Tesla for prioritizing its future robotaxi network instead of completing promised FSD features “they sold us years and years ago.”

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A Decade of Missed Targets

Musk has been overly optimistic about autonomy for years. At a 2015 Nvidia conference, he said self-driving was a “solved problem” and predicted that fully autonomous cars would arrive in just a few years.

That timeline has repeatedly slipped. On a recent earnings call, Musk finally admitted that Tesla's current hardware isn't enough to make full autonomy a reality. He said the realization was “absolutely painful and difficult.”

Ross Gerber, one of Tesla’s early investors, summed it up bluntly in a recent post: “My Tesla FSD is like a 12-year-old driving next to a Waymo.”

See Also: Elon Musk Told The U.N. If They Could Show A Plan For Ending World Hunger He'd Donate $6 Billion – ‘I Will Sell Tesla Stock Right Now And Do It'

Still Waiting

Despite Musk's original vision of consumer-owned Teslas becoming income-generating robotaxis, the company is now shifting to a small geo-fenced fleet in Austin, Texas. Meanwhile, customers who paid thousands for FSD are left with a driver-assist system that still requires constant supervision.

Even some loyal fans are starting to lose patience. As one commenter put it: “The man is a genius at marketing to people on the spectrum. How on earth would any machine with as many moving parts as a car possibly appreciate in value?”

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