Tesla has changed course and announced that the company will not sue buyers of the upcoming Cybertruck if they resell the truck within a year. Just days earlier, Tesla quietly slipped the "For Cybertrucks Only" clause into its terms and conditions for other vehicle purchases.
Under the policy, if a buyer wanted to sell their Cybertruck within a year of its delivery, they would have had to notify Tesla in writing to gain an exception from the policy, at which point the company would buy the Cybertruck back at a reduced cost. If Tesla declined, they would have needed to give the reseller written consent to sell the Cybertruck to a third party.
If a reseller had sold a Cybertruck to a third party without Tesla's consent, the automaker would have had the option of suing the seller for $50,000 in damages and refusing to sell them vehicles in the future.
But for one reason or another, Tesla decided not to move forward with the policy.
It's possible Tesla briefly adopted this policy to discourage would-be flippers from purchasing the Cybertruck specifically for that purpose. The anticipation for the Cybertruck has been incredible since it was first announced in 2019.
One reason Tesla may have felt it necessary to introduce the policy for Cybertrucks only is because of the anticipation and the slow rollout of the vehicle. Earlier this year, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said that production on the Cybertruck is very complex and it will be difficult to mass produce the vehicles.
Millions of Cybertrucks have already been ordered, and it's estimated that some buyers could end up waiting for as much as five years for their truck to arrive. So, it's easy to see how someone who receives the truck sooner may take advantage of a buyer who is willing to pay extra to not have to wait.
Tesla Cybertrucks are attracting large crowds in showrooms across the United States ahead of the first deliveries. Deliveries of Cybertrucks are scheduled to begin Nov. 30.
Of the short-lived policy, Wedbush analyst Dan Ives told Bloomberg Radio, "It's a supply-demand issue. This is going to be a tough vehicle to make. You're not going to be able to produce it from a mass perspective. This is just them putting some guardrails."
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