Tesla has found a new showroom, and it is other people’s driveways. From October 28, Turo will let United States renters search for Teslas with Full Self-Driving (Supervised) enabled, and will verify each car’s status directly through Tesla’s API rather than trusting host listings, TechCrunch reported. Eligible hosts who rent their cars on the platform will also receive a free one month trial of FSD. Turo says thousands of FSD enabled Teslas are already listed, and that the Model 3 and Model Y are its third and fourth most popular vehicles this year.
The timing follows Tesla’s own disclosure last week that the subscription push is working. Around 1.7 million customers have paid for FSD globally, out of more than 10 million cars built and sold, and more than 75 percent of customers who took delivery in North America in the third quarter paid for an FSD subscription, a roughly 20 percent increase from the second quarter, even as United States vehicle sales declined. Chief executive Elon Musk wrote that people are buying FSD with a car attached, not the other way around, and finance chief Vaibhav Taneja told the earnings call that customers now ask first for an FSD drive.
The rental channel reaches drivers a showroom cannot. A renter spends days, not twenty minutes, with the system, and a host who takes the free trial and keeps the $99 a month subscription can recover it in daily rates. Electrek notes Tesla has rented its own cars with FSD in Southern California since last year; the new element is verified FSD on a third party marketplace at national scale.
The supervision caveat travels with the product. Renters will see warnings that the system requires an attentive driver ready to intervene, and access to a Tesla tutorial. Tesla shares were the megacap leader on Monday, up 5.21 percent at $391.62 in the market tables, a move the tables record without a single named driver in this morning’s reporting.