In a recently published YouTube video, Ryan from The Kilowatts broke down the 2021 financial results for two Tesla Model 3 units the group purchased in January of last year to rent on Turo, a carsharing platform where owners can “host” their cars for rentals.
The Kilowatts purchased two different Model 3 units to host on Turo at the same time — a base trim Standard Range, single motor, rear-wheel-drive Model 3 with no Full Self-Driving (FSD) for $41,415.96 USD, and a dual-motor, all-wheel-drive Model 3 Long Range with the $10,000 FSD add-on for $58,500.96 USD. The higher-end Model 3 even has a $1,000 custom vinyl wrap.
Over the course of 2021, each of the Model 3s drove a total of around 35,000 miles (56,327 km). The lower-end Model 3, nicknamed “Flow”, was rented out for 190 days during the year, while the FSD-equipped Model 3 Long Range, nicknamed “Forrest”, was rented out for 185.
The Flow was rented out for an average trip length of 3.3 days over the year, at an average price of $118 USD per day. Forrest, on the other hand, posted an average trip length of 4.3 days and fetched an average price of $135 USD per day.
In total, Flow made $21,821 USD, while Forrest made a very similar $22,496 USD. Combined, that’s enough to buy another, brand new Model 3 Standard Range.
The Kilowatts were able to snag a full year of free Supercharging (which came out to about $6,600 USD combined for the two cars) with the timing of their purchase, which helped bolster earnings for the year.
At the beginning of this venture, The Kilowatts intended to find out whether a higher-priced trim of the same vehicle makes a difference in earnings when renting on Turo.
Going by the 2021 results for the two cars, what was a 41.25% difference in cost price only netted the Kilowatts 5.7% more in rental earnings, which would suggest that spending more on the same car is unlikely to make a significant difference.
In April, Turo became the world’s first carsharing company to offset 100% of its carbon emissions.
