← The ladder
Stillwater, OK
RequestedThis is a planning tool, not a prediction. Of the 80 numbers behind a season in Stillwater, 30 are published figures, 34 are worked out from published figures, and 16 are our own estimates. 43 of them were read straight out of a federal file that covers every city in the country, so there was no citation to trust and no page to misread. You can change any of them. Your result is only as good as the numbers you agree with.
How long until
you have your $10,000 back
2.0 months
After 90 days the project is worth
$12,286
Against the $10,000 you put in
+$2,286
This projects the first 90 days forward in a straight line. Early months
carry start-up drag, so later ones may run better. It is a direction, not a date.
Where the money goes on day one
The project is behind before the car turns a
wheel. That is true in every town on this list, and it is the hole the months above are
measured against.
You put in$10,000
Hard costs, paid once
Down payment on a $28,900 car
-$2,900
Installing home charging
-$2,250
Permits and onboardingplaceholder
-$650
Money left to operate on$4,200
Plus the car equity. You paid $28,900, but it would only fetch
$27,166 the moment it is yours, and you owe $26,000 of that
+$1,166
What the project is worth on day one$5,366
The project is $4,634 down before the
first fare: $2,900 genuinely spent, and $1,734 that vanished the moment the car stopped
being new.
Two honest caveats. The permit figure is marked
placeholder because the model invents it — the obligation is real, the amount is
not researched. And nothing here counts sales tax, excise, title or registration on the
purchase, which vary by state and this model does not yet carry, so every figure is a best
case.
What comes off every fare before you see it
The rider pays100%
The network takesour estimate
−30%
Reaches the business70%
That 30% comes off the
top — before energy, cleaning, insurance, the depot or the loan payment. Every
figure on this page is already after it.
Tesla has published no owner-operator
revenue share for Robotaxi, anywhere, so this is an expectation rather than a reported
figure. 30% is roughly what the established ride-hail platforms take and what people
following the rollout broadly expect. It is the largest single lever in the whole model:
at 25% instead, the same season leaves about 7% more in your hand — more
than any driving decision you can make. Fares also settle 7 days after they are
earned.
Rides a day
491
all operators, town-wide
Fast charging
$0.52
per kWh, public
Why this town is in the game
The first town a reader asked for and got. Suggested through the form, confirmed by email 226 seconds later, researched the same night. The note named the Oklahoma State University enrolment and the county seat, and the Census agreed with the population to within 46 people.
What this row rests on
80 numbers describe this town. Every one of
them says where it came from.
30 published by somebody else
34 worked out from those
16 our own estimates
Citations we went back and checked
12 held
/ 3 failed
Anything that failed was demoted to an estimate and says so.
What we could not find out
1
- rides_per_day: the five named sources were checked and none publishes a trip count for this city, so the estimate stands on its own arithmetic
Some of the numbers, and where they came from
A sample. The whole pack is in the data API.
Rides a day, whole townour estimate491 rides/day
Total app-hailed trips a day across every operator in the city -- the pool your fleet competes for a share of, not the number you will get. no published figure we could verify
Average paid trip lengthour estimate3.2 miles
Nobody publishes TNC trip length for Stillwater; the city's own 29.79 sq mi land area and 15.4-minute mean commute are the strongest local facts, and the national ride-hail mean of 6.1 miles is for much larger metros. no published figure we could verify
Passengers boarding a yearpublished34,729 enplanements/year
Overnight electricityworked out0.071 $/kWh
Year-round all-in cents per kWh on OG&E General Service SmartHours Fixed (GS-TOU) for midnight–06:00 at secondary voltage (Service Level 5): energy + fuel + energy-efficiency + storm riders. Midnight–06:00 is always off-peak on this tariff; OG&E has no cheaper
Evening peak electricityworked out0.373 $/kWh
All-in GS-TOU summer on-peak price (energy + fuel + EE + storm riders) at Service Level 5. OG&E’s peak is 14:00–19:00 weekdays June 1–September 30, not 16:00–24:00 every day: after 19:00, weekends, holidays, and all winter you pay the off-peak/winter rate (~0.
Insurance on each car after the firstworked out246 $/month
What each additional vehicle adds to the premium. Lower than the first car because a fleet policy spreads the administrative part of a premium across the vehicles while the risk part scales with them -- which is part of why growing is the way out of the trap.
A small commercial bay, per monthworked out855 $/month
This is a derivation, not a local quote: a national published figure scaled by a published local index. Nobody publishes what a 1,500 square foot bay lets for in a town this size, because small commercial bays let privately, one handshake at a time, and no ind
A full interior cleanworked out81 $
This is a derivation, not a local quote: a national published figure scaled by a published local index. Nobody publishes a full interior detail in a town this size, because it is a manual service: keeping a price list current is work, and the price is whatever
Demand generatorsour estimate
OSU (27,655 students, ~5,500–6,000 staff); Stillwater Medical Center (117 beds, ~1,800–2,000 system staff); Boone Pickens Stadium (52,202 seats); Stillwater Public Schools; City of Stillwater
These are the named institutions that actually move people in Stillwater: the land-grant campus, the community hospital, the football stadium that fills the town, the public schools and city hall. no published figure we could verify
Published paid-ride count (independent check)our estimate0 trips/year
No Oklahoma or Stillwater agency publishes TNC or taxi trip counts for this city, so the independent check is an audited zero rather than a silent omission. no published figure we could verify
Researched 2026-09-09 on pipeline 2.1.0. Measured on sim 1.5.0, 12 seeds, median reported. A result is only comparable to another from the same sim version.