How I got a Tesla for Free

So this is the infamous $78 Tesla Model 3, the one that's now been viewed over 5.6 million times. Completely unbeknownst to me, this car would quickly become the single best investment that I have ever made. And here's why.

It all started six months ago when I placed an order for a Tesla Model 3. Now, at the time, I wasn't necessarily in the market to go and purchase a new car, but after going on their website and analyzing the tax benefits and really running the numbers, I quickly came to the conclusion that this car was only going to cost me out of pocket $78.39 per month to own within the first year. Now, from a financial perspective, the cost of the car just made too much sense to pass up. Not to mention, the cost of electricity is significantly cheaper than the cost of me paying for gas. So I went ahead and bought one, knowing that this car was going to end up saving me a lot of money.

Then, 31 days later, the car arrived. Within a few hours of driving the car, I immediately fell in love with it. The steering was so responsive, the immediate electric acceleration felt faster than my Lotus Exige S 240. Oh, and also, the car was completely silent—all for less than the cost of owning a Toyota Camry. It was also at that time that I posted a video detailing my financial breakdown, tax deductions, and rebates which brought the car down to the $78 per month, along with my experience buying a Tesla online. Almost immediately, the video just took off. I honestly didn't expect that video to get so many views or so many dislikes, but the sheer number of people who clicked on that video more than exceeded my expectations of what I ever thought was even possible for a channel like mine. And that's also what unintentionally caused that car to be the best investment I have ever made.

Here's how that works. Now, when I bought the car, I had two options. Number one was to buy the car outright in cash. This means I would wire $44,437.01, including taxes, license, and registration, and that would be it. I would be done; I wouldn't have to make any more monthly payments, and I would own the car outright. Or, the second option, I could finance 100% of the car through Tesla's website at a 3.75 percent interest rate. This means it would cost me zero dollars out of pocket to own, besides taxes, license, and registration, which I would just be able to put on a credit card. To me, between the two options, that was a very easy decision. I went with 100% financing.

See, not only does a 3.75 percent interest rate loan become a write-off against my income, but I also get to take advantage of a wonderful term called leverage. This is the practice of borrowing money at a low interest rate and then taking that money and using it somewhere else to make you more money. Doing that frees up much more money for me to invest in real estate, where my money is much better used.

So after all is said and done, this car cost me $4,437.01 up front, most of which I was able to get back through federal tax credits, rebates, and tax write-offs again, leaving me with a car that cost me almost nothing to take delivery of.

Now here's where the magic happens, though. The video that I posted, breaking down my experience buying this car, generated a lot of revenue. In fact, that single video made more money than any other YouTube video I have ever posted here on the channel. And to show you, I'm going to take you inside the world of my YouTube analytics so you could see for yourself firsthand. Within the first twenty-eight days of posting that video, it gathered over three million views, over twenty million minutes of watch time, and from that, $25,000 in ad revenue. To my dismay, it didn't stop there. The views continued climbing, and in the month of May, the video received another 859,000 views, 5.2 million minutes of watch time, and over $7,800 more in revenue.

And nope, it didn't end there either because in June we had an additional 615,000 views, 3.6 million minutes of watch time, and another $6,600 in ad revenue. Just like the Energizer Bunny, this video just keeps going and going and going. I'm not gonna bore you with the details of each and every month, but it will show you, in total, over the last five months, this video has generated about $50,000 in ad revenue, enough to pay for the car in its entirety, plus profit.

But if you thought the revenue stops there, well, it doesn't because there's more. Because of the success of that one single video, this channel generated over 10 million views in the month of April. I was just blown away because that number was higher than just about any other business, finance, or entrepreneur-related channel here on YouTube. And because of that staggering number, I chose to share exactly how much YouTube paid me for those 10 million views in a video appropriately titled "How Much I Made from 10 Million Views in 30 Days," which, if you're wondering, that number was $103,740.48.

Now here's where we start getting into the inception of YouTube—a video talking about how much money I made on YouTube, mainly because of the Tesla video, ended up making me another $7,500 on YouTube. See, now it's almost as though I'm making a video on YouTube talking about how much I made from YouTube from a video talking about how much I made on YouTube. We've officially just entered the matrix of YouTube.

See, here's the way YouTube works. When you receive views on one single video, a small percentage of those people will go on to watch other of your videos as well. Then, from those people, an even smaller percentage will continue on to watch even more of your videos and so on. There almost becomes like a trickle-down effect from one video to another where if one video receives one million views, that could lead to an additional 250,000 views throughout other of your videos, which could then lead to an additional 50,000 views throughout even more of your videos.

Meaning that the total amount of revenue generated from one video going somewhat viral becomes much more difficult to properly quantify. But objectively, we could see that a nearly zero dollar out-of-pocket cost by a Tesla Model 3 generated $50,000 in ad revenue, plus an additional $7,500 in a subsequent video. Although, I would estimate that the total cumulative revenue generated from the influx of viewers throughout my entire channel was likely in excess of $150,000 throughout the last five months—all for a down payment I just put on my credit card.

Now, don't get me wrong because that was not intentional. I never expected that video to do so well or for my channel to generate so many views. Most of that I believe just happened by a random stroke of luck and a gift from the mighty YouTube algorithm gods. But now looking back in hindsight, buying that Tesla was the single best purchase that I have probably ever made.

But now, after all of that is said and done, how is my actual ownership experience of driving a Tesla Model 3? Well, after driving this car over 7,000 miles in the last five months, I am very pleased to say that I love the car. Now cosmetically, the car needed some improvement. Like many of you have said, the original aero wheels on the car were not doing it any favors, so I went ahead and swapped them out for lightweight flow-forged black diamond wheels.

Then, instead of paying for the upgraded paint on Tesla's website, I instead chose to save the money and have my buddy over at the RAF district wrap this car in satin black with a gloss black trim. Then, of course, to accentuate the car a little bit further, I went ahead and had the brake calipers and emblems painted in acid green.

As far as drivability is concerned, I am very pleased to say that this car has been nothing short of spectacular. The basic autopilot works incredibly well on road trips and doesn't leave you with the normal fatigue you get by the time you finally arrive at your destination. Now, I will admit on long trips, it does sometimes become a little bit tedious to stop the car every 150 to 200 miles to go and supercharge for 45 minutes, especially if you're in a hurry to get somewhere. But overall, it's been refreshing to be able to take a break every few hours to stretch your legs and sometimes visit a place you would never normally visit.

And around the city, I don't even notice the charging. I just get home at night, plug it in, and it charges at about a rate of 32 miles an hour. By the time I wake up, the car is always at a full charge, and this costs me about one dollar a day compared to the four dollars a day I was spending in gas from my previous car. The amount of storage this car has is also quite surprising because not only do you have a front trunk, but you can also put the back seats down, and the car turns into a hatchback for just about anything. Then, you have another hidden compartment below that for even more stuff.

However, I think a review like this wouldn't be complete without the bad. First of all, when you buy the car unless you go with the top-of-the-line model, it doesn't come with any floor mats, so you're gonna have to go and buy that aftermarket. But secondly, on my drive up to San Francisco, I stopped to charge the car, and all of a sudden a weird white steam began appearing from the front. After a few minutes, it got pretty severe, and I began hearing a hissing sound coming from the front grille. After a quick call with the Tesla service center, it was found that the AC was no longer working. That was fun. Here I was driving on the freeway and bumper-to-bumper traffic nearly 300 miles away from home in 90 to 100-degree heat. The car basically turned into a sauna.

Now, of course, in Tesla's defense, I was able to schedule a service as soon as I got back into town, and as a replacement loaner car, they gave me a Tesla Model X P90D. It was also with that car that I was able to surprise my dad with it, and here's that video: "What's up guys, so I just picked up a Tesla Model X, and the cool thing about this car is it has what's called Ludicrous Plus mode, which means that it goes 0 to 60 in 2.6 seconds. So of course, naturally, I'm gonna go and pick up my dad so we can get his reaction of going two point six seconds. He has no idea how fast this car goes or what it does; he's gonna go crazy."

"Yep, oh wow, oh whoa dude, that's incredible! Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay, that is great for the freeway, got one too. Well, okay, stop, okay, no more, no I'm done. What do you think? I think that's, that is amazing for electric car."

So overall, I've been incredibly happy owning the Tesla Model 3, and I can easily say that this is the single best car I have ever owned. Not only that, but by pure stroke of luck, the car just ended up paying for itself within a few months and brings in an entirely new audience here to the channel. So for that, I sincerely want to thank you, and I will continue to share every single step of this YouTube journey with everyone who wants to watch. I will continue answering all the important questions everyone wants to know, like how much money that Tesla video made, and I will always, and never stop asking for everyone to smash the like button for YouTube's algorithm, if you have not done that already.

So with that said, you guys, thank you so much for watching; I really appreciate it. As always, if you have not subscribed yet, make sure to destroy the subscribe button. This video took me like five times longer to make than pretty much any other video I do. So anyway, if you wouldn't mind subscribing and hitting the notification bell, that would be greatly appreciated. Also, feel free to add me on Instagram; I post there pretty much daily, so if you want to be a part of it there, feel free to add me there.

Also, feel free to add me on my second channel; it's called the Graham Stephan Show. I post there every single day; I don't post here. So if you want to watch me now every single day, you could do that if you subscribe there. So with that said, thank you again for watching, and until next time.