That is not a typo, and it is the clearest sign that buying a used electric car is a different game to buying a used petrol one. The number on the windscreen is being moved by things that have nothing to do with the car in front of you.
A newer car that's worth less
Follow the Tesla Model 3 through our listings, and it behaves normally right up until it doesn't. A 2019 car asks around $57,000, and the price climbs steadily with each newer year to about $64,500 for a 2022. Then the 2023 cars land at roughly $45,000. Newer, fewer kilometres, and thousands cheaper. The Model Y does the same thing, dropping from about $64,000 to $50,000 between the 2022 and 2023 builds.
Median asking price by build year. The 2023 cars sit well below the 2022 ones.
There is no mystery to it. Tesla cut the price of a new Model 3 and Model Y in Australia repeatedly through 2023, in one round after another. When the price of a new car falls by thousands, every used one on the market falls with it, because nobody pays near-new money for a used car they could buy new for less. The previous owner did nothing wrong and still watched their car lose value overnight, by decision, not by wear.
Why EVs move differently
A used petrol car's price is set by supply and demand for that particular car. A used EV's price is set by that, plus two things a petrol car never has to worry about. The first is what the maker does to the new price next quarter, and Tesla has shown it will cut hard and without warning. The second is how fast the technology moves. Every model year adds range and knocks something off the last one, so a three-year-old EV can feel a generation behind in a way a three-year-old Corolla never does. Add lingering nerves about battery life and warranty, and you have a recipe for prices that lurch.
But it isn't every EV, and that's the real lesson
Here is where the easy headline falls apart. Not every electric car cratered. A used Hyundai Kona Electric held about 87 percent of a near-new one's price over two years, barely behind the petrol Kona at 90. The Volvo XC40 Recharge was much the same. And the Kia Niro actually held its value better as an EV than as a petrol car. The honest takeaway is not that EVs are money pits; it is that their values are unpredictable and specific to the model in a way petrol cars simply are not. Overseas the picture is harsher; US analysts at iSeeCars found electric cars made up eight of the twenty-five fastest depreciating models. Here it is messier and far more car-by-car.
The wave that's coming
This matters now because the used-EV market has gone from a curiosity to a flood. Around 1,000 electric cars entered the Australian used market in 2020. In 2024 it was more than 34,000, and it is still climbing.
Electric cars entering the used market each year, by the year they were first listed.
A lot of Australians are about to buy a used EV for the first time, straight into a market that behaves like the chart above. It pays to know the rules before you play.
What this means if you're buying or selling
If you're buying, the volatility is the opportunity. A 2023 Model 3 at $45,000 is a great deal of car for the money, precisely because the first owner already wore the drop. Two things protect you. Check what the same car costs new today, because if the maker cuts again your used one follows it down, and check the battery's state of health and how much warranty is left, which is the EV version of a compression test. A tired battery is the one repair that can cost more than the car.
If you're selling, understand that an EV bought new is the most exposed car on the market to somebody else's pricing decision. Price it against what a new one costs this week, not against what you paid, and be realistic. The buyer can see the new price too.
None of this is a reason to avoid a used EV; plenty are genuine bargains right now. It is a reason to check the specific car properly first. A used EV still needs the same history that any car does: a clean write-off and finance record and an honest odometer, on top of the battery. A Carify report covers the history side in one go, and there's more on living with electric cars in our electric vehicles guides.
How we did this
The figures are median asking prices from Carify's analysis of the Australian used-car market, grouped by build year. We have deliberately not called the Tesla move simple depreciation, because it is driven mostly by cuts to the new price rather than age or wear. To separate the electric effect from everything else, we compared each electric model against the petrol version of the same nameplate, which controls for brand and class. Figures use medians to keep outliers from skewing them and exclude obvious pricing errors.
