There are a number of states where you can’t purchase a Tesla (or any vehicle with direct sales) locally.  West Virginia is one of them. Your only option is to order online and pick it up in a neighboring state.

This is a guide to doing that based on my own experience in the summer of 2021.

Why I Purchased a Tesla

Let’s get this out of the way first:  I don’t think I’m saving the world. I am aware that the initial environmental cost for the construction of an electric vehicle (EV) is actually higher than for an internal combustion engine (ICE) car. I am also aware that currently the vast majority of electricity in my state is produced from fossil fuels (mostly coal in the case of WV). 

One study I read said I’d have to drive around 70,000 miles before I made a net-positive environmental impact. If you want to look at it another way, this is your opportunity to drive a coal-powered car in West Virginia!

So why do it?  Here are my reasons:

• Maintenance: The only maintenance items are tires, brakes, and wipers. No oil changes, no 50,000 service, no belt changes, no mufflers, etc.
• Financial: Fully charging my car at home from 0% to 100% costs about $9. Also, at the time I did the purchase, with the chip shortage and spiking used car values, it seemed a good time to trade-in my car and make the jump.
• Convenience: With home charging, I liked the idea of leaving every day “with a full tank of gas” and never having to stop at a gas station. Or paying attention to gas prices.
• Updates: A Tesla is like an iPhone that you drive around in. And like an iPhone, it gets frequent software updates with new features.
• Curiosity: I just really wanted the experience of owning an EV to see what all the fuss is about.
• Owner Satisfaction: Everyone I know who has an EV loves it and wouldn’t go back to driving anything else. In fact, we have two different EV reservations to replace our other car now.

Choosing a Car

In my case I chose the Tesla Model 3. Most of the time it will be just me driving the car to work, so I didn’t need anything big, and I didn’t have a need for the extra space to justify the additional expense of a Model Y. Also, I made this decision in the summer of 2021, before there were many viable alternatives to the Tesla offerings.

However, I did want to shell out the extra money for AWD and longer range because of the weather here (and range anxiety). I opted against the performance package since frankly I’m not that interested and the range actually decreases, which seems counter-productive.

I kept the default 18″ wheels. The 19″ wheel upgrade looks nice but is expensive and you actually lose range with the 19” wheels.

Check Insurance

You definitely want to check with your insurance company on how your rates will change after purchasing the Tesla. Mine wouldn’t change much, but I’ve heard stories of people having to switch companies because their current company wanted to massively increase their rate.

Placing the Order

You definitely want to order through a referral link. The benefits of using a referral link change constantly, but there’s usually something. Get a referral link from a friend who has a Tesla, or if nothing else use this one (thanks!)

Just like any car, you pay for your Tesla through a combination of an optional vehicle trade-in, optional financing, and cash. 

Here are how your costs break down:

1. Actual cost of the car based on your selected options
2. Destination fee ($1,200 at the time)
3. Tire fee ($4 at the time)

You will have to put down a non-refundable deposit when you order ($100 at the time), but this comes out of your final cost when you settle up before delivery. 

I decided not to purchase Full Self Driving (FSD) since it was in beta. That ended up being a smart move since they later offered Advanced Autopilot separately, and a month-by-month option for FSD.

Trade-In

Don’t just accept the trade-in offer from Tesla.  It’s a joke. You want to shop around. Try Carvana or CarMax. Look into other local dealerships who are buying used cars. I ended up finding a local dealership that purchased my car for $2,500 more than Tesla offered. That saved me a trip to CarMax.

Financing

This wasn’t as bad as the trade in. I actually got a competitive rate on the financing through Tesla and went with it.

Between selling my car and cash, I covered about 60% of the cost of the car and financed the remaining 40%.

The Ordering Process

When I was purchasing my Tesla, I had a chat session open with a sales rep. She offered to stay on the chat if I had any questions during the ordering process, which was nice. My advice: If you want to do this, do the actual order in a separate window. I lost the chat session on the second or third screen in the ordering process.

However, literally as soon as I hit submit on the page with my contact info, I got a call from my personal sales contact with Tesla. I wasn’t even done with the whole ordering process! He was also super helpful and offered to answer any questions I had. He also gave me a number where I could text him with questions.

He told me my car would take about 9 weeks.  On the website it said 11-17 weeks.  Turns out he was dead-on.

Post-Order Actions

There are a number of items you should take care of while you wait for your car. Fortunately you have plenty of time to do it.

Change Delivery Location

By default, Tesla sends all WV deliveries to the dealership in MD. You can move it by calling the dealership you want to move it to and giving your order number. In my case my personal sales contact was able to move it to the Wexford, PA dealership.  That’s a 90 minute drive for me vs a 3 hour drive. Someone from Tesla Operations told me that only PA residents can pick up their cars in PA for tax reasons or somesuch.  Totally wrong.  You can pick up in PA. The Wexford dealership does it all the time.  Note: There is now a Tesla service center in Presto PA (close to Bridgeville) which is much closer to the WV border.

Prepare Home Charging

You really want to be able to charge at home. Buying an EV without being to charge from home is really missing a key benefit of buying an EV in the first place.

In my case, the Telsa purchase kicked off a month-long process of purging and reorganizing so we could finally — after being in this house for ten years — park both cars in the garage. It’s tight, but it works.

For home charging, I went with having a 220v 14-50 outlet (like for an electric stove) installed in the garage, close to where I’ll be parking the car. I then purchased the 14-50 adapter for the charging cable that came with the car. That’s $45 vs $500 for an actual Tesla charger. The Tesla charger has a slightly better charging rate, but if it’s charging overnight anyway, who cares if it charges an hour faster while I’m asleep?

Purchase Other Items

There are some other items you may want to consider purchasing for your car. You don’t have to order them before you get the car, but you might want to have them from day 1.

All-Weather Floor Mats

You can purchase these directly from Tesla. I ended up purchasing a third party set. They look good and seem to fit pretty well. 

Center Console Organizers

I ended up getting the ones from Tesla, but there are a number of good third party options.

Read the Owner’s Manual

This is not a normal car. It’s worth the time to read through the manual a couple of times.  I keep finding new stuff every time I look through it.

Waiting

This is the worst part, the waiting. 

There’s really nothing to do here. When it’s time to actually do something, Tesla will email and/or text you. If you want to torture yourself, you can login periodically and watch your estimated delivery dates bounce around.

That’s what I did.

There is one thing you can watch for:  The VIN. When the car has left the factory and is about two weeks from delivery, the VIN will appear on your account. Some time over the next few days you will need to set up insurance using that VIN, and upload the insurance information to your account. You can’t take delivery of the car without that.

Taking Delivery

Eventually, you will get an email letting you know that it’s time to schedule your delivery appointment. Just follow the link and schedule a date and time. I’ve heard you only have so many days to pick up your Tesla, but in my case I scheduled for the second day that was available since that’s the first day we could both be off work to go up and get it.

After you schedule, you’ll quickly get a second email to pay off the non-financed balance. The one thing with this is they use Plaid to handle the payment. It only works with certain banks, and you have to give Plaid the username and password for your account with the bank.

So be prepared for that.

Exactly 24 hours before your delivery date, you’ll get another email letting you know your purchase agreements are ready for review. Here you want to verify:

• Your full name and address are correct
• The VIN is correct

You may want to print out the proof of payment to bring with you just in case.

I brought all my paperwork with me, but I only ended up needing my license and proof of insurance (they said the one I uploaded was “blurry” for some reason).

We met our delivery rep, he made a copy of my license, and he led us to the car. It was inside and charged to 88%. 

Based on some other information I found online, I had created a pre-delivery checklist for the car. However, it looks like the Wexford dealership has already adopted something similar. When we were shown the car, our delivery rep said the car had already passed their “pre-delivery check”. He left us along with the car for a few minutes, and I checked a bunch of stuff out, but didn’t find any issues.

When he returned I signed the final paperwork to accept delivery along with paperwork for my temporary PA plate and for them to send me the package to self-register for WV (and pay the WV sales tax). We also set up my phone as a key.

After that, I was on my way. I’d recommend stopping before you go too far and do the following:

• Connect your phone via bluetooth.  This is different from setting it up as a key and allows you to access music and send/receive text messages.
• Set the car to auto-lock when you walk away.
• Create a driver profile and adjust the seat, steering wheel, and mirrors.

Driving the car was disconcerting at first, but once I got used to it, it was a blast.  I found myself laughing out loud at the acceleration when I needed to pass a truck on I-79 on the way home.

We made several stops to do some shopping while we were up there, but I still had 55% battery when I returned home. I plugged it in, and it was up to 65% after only a couple of hours and we took it out again. It easily charged back to 90% overnight.

Post-Delivery Actions

Configuration

There are a number of configuration settings I recommend after you get home:

• Set max charge: My car was set to 90%.  I’ve heard 70%-80% is even better for preserving the battery.  Take it up to 100% for road trips only.
• Connect your home WiFi.

There are a couple of additional items you should consider:

Homelink Adapter

This, I think, is the big whiff from Tesla. Homelink doesn’t come with the car.  It’s a $325 option that they mail to you, then you have to have them install it for you. At least the installation is included in the price. When you get it, don’t open the box. They won’t install it if the box has been opened.

I had the bright idea of ordering it early and calling the dealership to have it installed immediately after getting the car. At the time they said that wouldn’t be a problem, but when I called back to arrange it after setting my delivery date, they said their service department was too busy and actually couldn’t do it — so sorry.

Tesla service is really backed up. When I went to schedule the installation, the closest date was a month out. Our delivery rep said that mobile service was available since we live so far away, but that didn’t show up as an option when we scheduled.

Lift Pucks

Other Tesla owners (and mechanics) highly recommended getting a set of Lift Pucks to protect the battery when the car goes on a lift, for example to rotate the tires.

Final Thoughts

I’m really impressed with this car and I’m glad I made the switch to electric. I was about halfway home when I thought “I’m so glad I did this. This car is amazing.”