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This is not a topic I ever thought I’d get a PR email about, but we do get all kinds of odd PR pitches these days. It’s about wear & tear on cars, particularly as it relates to outdoor parking. Incidentally, I was just talking with someone about some notable roof damage on their EV from weather wear and tear of some type.
The email I received is about the matter broadly. However, how they caught my attention and got me to cover the research was a Tesla highlight (or lowlight) they noticed. Here’s what the email stated:
“Alan’s Factory Outlet conducted a two-part study to understand how weather impacts vehicles parked outdoors. We first examined climate data from 200 major U.S. cities to rank locations by their risk of weather-related vehicle depreciation. We then surveyed 1,006 car owners to learn how they protect their vehicles from the elements and what weather damage has cost them.
Florida dominates the list of worst cities to park outside, with Hialeah, Pembroke Pines, Hollywood, and Fort Lauderdale all within the top 5 due to weather-related damage risk
Car owners reported spending an average of $585 per incident to repair weather-related damage to their vehicles, and nearly 1 in 4 said they spent over $1,000
Tesla owners reported the highest weather-related repair costs, spending an average of $927 per vehicle.”
Yikes — $927?! And that’s getting close to double the average?!
Here’s more from that linked report above: “Tesla owners faced the steepest repair bills, averaging $927 per repair, followed by Jeep ($789), Mazda ($717), BMW ($717), and Chevrolet ($701) owners.”
Tesla’s repair costs were even significantly beyond BMW’s. I wonder what those extra costs were, and why. One thing that comes to mind for me is a common bubbling problem on Tesla steering wheels. I had the problem years ago and it was fixed for free, but it is somehow not a warranty issues and I’ve seen many people say they had to pay for it, and it wasn’t cheap. I made a short video about it in 2022 when it happened and have gotten many comments in the past few years of owners struggling with this issue.
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I assume it was caused by the sun. I used to park outside and figured the harsh sunshine of Florida was the main factor. However, the Tesla service technician didn’t think it was that and hypothesized it was related to hand sanitizer, but I hardly ever used hand sanitizer, so that seemed less likely to me.
In those video comments mentioned above, one person wrote, “Tesla wanted to charge me $933 for the repair.. I wrote an email to customer service that this was not the way to treat your loyal customers and the next time I am in the market for a car, this would be one of the reasons why I might choose a different brand. Never heard back from them.” Another commenter mentioned getting quoted around $900 and another one mentioned $1000. This issue alone, if presumed to be caused by the sun, is almost a perfect match for the $927 average for Tesla, funny enough.
Some commenters on that video also mentioned that their seats were starting to bubble. I’ve never seen that. Another thing I thought to bring up, though, is that the vast majority of Teslas come with glass roofs, and the sun beats down pretty strongly through them. I had to get sunshades to block that. I wonder how much the sun coming through those glass roofs would damage components of Tesla vehicles routinely parked outside. The touchscreen can get scorching hot sitting in the sun.
Anyway, considering the potential expenses of parking your car outside, this is a reminder to look for opportunities to park in a covered, sheltered spot when it’s an option.
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