My Take: Before we get started, I’d like to explain to you that these numbers are NOT official numbers from Mazda Credit. These numbers are derived from their “Mazda Summer Drive-Off Event” by using doing a little algebra with the lease calculator. Here’s a brief explanation of this special sales event. Mazda is “waiving” security deposits, 1st month payments and not requiring any down payments. Essentially giving you a ZERO DRIVE-OFF lease. The terms are for 42-months allowing 12k miles per year. In reality, I think they are just rolling in all the inception fees into the lease loan since these cars aren’t very expensive. In terms of lease rates, the numbers are unspectacular. I’m not saying they are horrible, I just think they are “OK” leases with decent potential to be GOOD leases if you can drive the sale price down.
Check out the new LIST for the recommended leases of the month.
2010 Mazda3
2010 Mazda3i Sport Sedan
42-month | 12k miles | residual 57% | .00169 base money factor
2010 Mazda3s Sport Hatchback
42-month | 12k miles | residual 57% | .00196 base money factor
My Take: Not the greatest lease in the world, but close. The car is cheaper than most cars I post here, so it’s worth a look if you are on a the market for a fairly inexpensive AWD sedan. Two $1500 dealer cash offers going on right now, you can’t combine them. either way, the car retails in the low $20ks, so with the 2010 models out, you should be able to get a sub-invoice price. Remember that at invoice, the car is still not a “great deal”, you need to dig below invoice to make that happen.
Update: Loyalty cash is $500. My Take: There is $4000 dealer cash available on the EX35 this month, however it cannot be combined with the special financing, which is actually pretty darn good. 2.9% for 72 months, 1.9% for 60, 0.9% for 48 and 0% for 36 months. I’ve emailed David Baker regarding the cash for leasing, my guess its probably not applicable, but it’s worth asking about regardless. I’m really like the money factors though, the residual is still above average, so it’s worth a look. At invoice, the deal is still slightly more than what I would consider a “good deal”, but if you can get around $1000 below invoice, then deal becomes quite good.
My Take: Looks like MINI is shying away from the 24-month leases by dropping the residual close to a 36-month lease. It’s no question that the sweet spot is the 36-month lease, specially with the residual value this strong. I have to say that I am pleasantly surprised how the leasing world has began shaping up after the major credit meltdown we had last year. Sure, the $400 a month for $40,000 car leases are pretty much gone, but I was expecting things to get worse with GM, Ford and Chrysler getting out of the leasing market. Anyway, MF still a bit high, but the residual is so high that it easily offsets the money factor. This is not a keeper at lease-end though, so just turn it in.
My Take: MF rises .00010 points from June, so things got a bit more expensive than last month. Seems like the Prius is selling well, which could explain the sudden rise in MF. I would recommend passing on this car this month. Maybe next month will be better.
My Take: Lot of questions I haven’t gotten around to answer, so I’ll keep this brief. The residual is below average and the money factor is better than average. I wouldn’t call this a “deal”, but for the right sale price, it could be.
My Take: Something weird going on here…the Q7 3.6 Premium seems half decent for a “Lease-to-Buy”, low residual, low MF. But here’s the thing, Edmund’s TMV states about $2300 below invoice sale price, but I don’t see any rebates floating around. The way I feel about TMV is that whenever it shows a sale price near MSRP, I think you can do better. Whenever I see a sale price that’s way below invoice, I feel like that only applies to purchases. That has been the case for the most part, which is why I stick by that logic. Anyway, should the sale price of $2300 below invoice be attainable, then this wouldn’t be a too bad of a deal. Unfortunately, in the “real world” I haven’t seen anyone reporting that kind of money off the Q7 yet.