djkmac

Never put money down on a lease; instead, put it in a bank account and pay the difference every month. If you ever total your car, u will lose that money.

jmark

I am buying mine. No lease.

marsb007

This is the eternal leave v. buy question... here we go again...

Pros/Cons to leasing:
1. You get a new car every "x" months.
2. You know exactly how much you will pay for your use of that car.
3. You don't have to worry about selling it when you want to get rid of it.
4. You have to be stuck in the lease until the end, otherwise you'll be penalized.
5. If you get into an accident, you don't lose money on the resale
6. You can't mod your car
7. "Lease" payments are generally lower than "buy" payments.
8. You don't own anything (other than an interest in driving the vehicle for "x" months).

Pros/Cons to buying:
1. It's your car, you do whatever you want with it.
2. Costs more to "buy" than "lease" on a monthly basis... because you're paying 100% of the car as opposed to only a fraction (depreciation + fee).
3. If you get into an accident, be prepared for your resale value to go south (yes, you can claim depreciation of value if it wasn't your fault in some states).
4. Your car depreciates as you sign the papers...
5. Generally speaking, it's a bad idea to buy a car if you're not planning on driving it for more than 5 years...

That's my opinion at least... I'm sure there are those which will greatly differ.
Either way, getting out of a lease is generally not a good idea. Suck it up or place your car on SwapLease or similar, although I imagine there are pitfalls with those services too.

jmark

^ Lease Con don't forget you have a mileage limit or pay a penalty.

marsb007

Yep, sorry, I just assumed that would fall under #2 You know exactly how much you will pay for your use of that car.

Leases are for predictable people, that drive no more than 15,000 miles per year...

mw09g37

iTrader: (3)

no. there's nothing wrong with leasing.

I mean I've seen occasions where the lease agreement ends up being better than the financing cause a lot of manufacturers stack cash on top of it. My friend bought an ES350 a while ago the lease agreement came out to be equivalent to 1.9% financing for a 40% residual when they were offering the usual 5 year/4.9 financing. AT the end of the lease he ended up just buying it out right and pocketing the extra 4k after selling it.

if you like the car. take out a bank loan and spend 7 years paying it off.
if not, take it back and buy something else. total money spent? depends on the car, but it's pretty close to the cost of depreciation, if it isn't and you have low mileage, you can opt to pay off the residual and sell it for the extra cash. hell you could buy it and sell it back to the dealership for bluebook.

as long as you know exactly how much you are going to be paying (lease rate can be based on Final OTD negotiated price) and an understanding of your car's approx value at the end of the lease term, leasing isn't really a big deal. I mean limited mileage sure... but most people don't really drive more than 12000 miles a year. and even if you do, there's always the option to purchase and the resale is probably going to be more than what you have paid thus far.

the ONLY reason I can think of that would make a lease purchase suck, is that hell at the end of the lease you're thinking about a new car again instead of putting away money for something that doesn't depreciate.

Gs have great lease rates tho... I think there's like 60% residual for 36 months... that's crazy good. pay 14k+TTL to drive a car for 3 years? that's like nothing...


of course if you can't do any of this. leasing is the worse thing an impulsive person can get themselves into. nothing like being stuck in a relationship you can't get out of easily =P