Tesla announces Model Y lease price increase ahead of tax credit expiration deadline

Tesla teased that demand for its most popular vehicles like the Model Y and Model 3 is so high at the moment that it might have to raise prices to meet it. It has now announced that the current Model Y lease promos will be ending on September 21.

The monthly Model Y lease price will increase from the current $399 starting payment to $479 a month after September 21. The Model 3 lease payment increase, on th eother hand, is more modest. The cheapest Tesla lease now starts from $299 and on September 22 it will go up to $349/month.

That is an $80 Model Y lease payment increase, and $50 bump for the Model 3, as Tesla is capitalizing on the order rush it is raking this quarter thanks to the government's tax credit expiration deadline. Those who want to use the federal tax credit as a down payment towards their new Model Y and still take advantage of the $399 Model Y lease promo will have to order on or before September 21 to do so.

Afterwards, the Model Y lease price goes up but if they sign up for a lease with even a modest down payment, or initiate a trade, customers will still be able to take advantage of the $7,500 tax credit when they take delivery, even if it happens after September 30 when the tax credit officially expires.

Tesla argued that all those Model Y APR financing rate deals and lease promos that it is running have created a level of demand that hasn't been seen in the last few quarters when its sales started to go down thanks to Elon Musk's political activism and general EV markter malaise.

This is why it started to gradually remove some incentives like the free wheels or color upgrades for inventory units, but that hasn't been enough to tame demand, it seems. Tesla warned that all those extra components it had to order from suppliers outside the contracted quantities have resulted in manufacturing cost increases that may necessitate a price bump.

Since customers in the US mostly lease their Teslas, the EV maker preferred to opt out of the promotional monthly lease payments for the Model Y and Model 3, rather than raise cash prices outright, or tweak the promotional APR rate that remains 3.99% for the Model Y.

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