Yup folks, I am officially back! As you know, I’ve been away on vacation since the New Year began. The Southern Hemisphere was warm and toasty, which was a welcome break from Wintertime up here in the US. In any case, a lot went on while I was away, so let’s begin with what matters…
Lease Rates
I will be skipping the January lease rates because for the following reasons:
- We are already in the last couple weeks of the month so it’s somewhat pointless to spend all that time research and posting information you can only use for a week and a half.
- Since my return, I’ve been pretty swamped with work and the jet-lag hasn’t helped.
However, the last and most important reason for doing this is because…
- Tarry Shebesta, the boss of ACS and LeaseCompare requested that I stop posting the rates he posts on many online forums.
As some of you know, the bulk of MB, BMW, Audi and Porsche numbers found online comes from him, so I had little choice but to follow through with his request. However, there’s some good news to all of this! After a few emails exchanges, Tarry has agreed to allow me to redistribute his numbers as long as reference links are in place. Special Kudos to Tarry and LeaseCompare for making this happen since I think this would be a win-win situation for everyone.
My Vacation
I got back from Uruguay Saturday morning and I have been dealing with work, emails, a mild case of jetlag and a three-day birthday celebration. LOL. So my apologies for not updating the site these past few days. You’d be happy to know that during my vacation, I ate a lot, slept a lot and walked a lot. The auto scene in Uruguay is sharply different than here in the US. Public transportation is the primary form of transportation there, however you still see many cars on the road (primarily Taxis). The majority of those cars there are compact models from Fiat, Renault, Peugeot and Citroën. Of course, you will still find the occasional Hyundais, Fords, GMs, Dodges, as well as some Chinese brands such as Cherry. Above this post, you will see a 3-door hatchback version of the Audi A3 which I thought it was pretty sharp. I also saw hatchback versions of the BMW 1-series as well. Personally, I would love to see both of those models brought over to the States. Leasing is non-existent in this country because most people get cars the old-fashioned way, they buy them.
hatchback BMW 1-series
Fiat, please do not bring this to the US as a re-badged Dodge or Chrysler
I may not know what these cars are, but I do know they are small
Looking Ahead
As stated previously, based on what’s been going on recently, I thought it would be more “time efficient” to wait until February to resume posting lease rates instead. I hope this doesn’t disappoint many of you. I did get an email from John Milly regarding a Lexus IS250 for his wife. It looked like a decent offer so I thought I would share some of the details…
2010 LEXUS IS250
– Auto, RWD
– MSRP = $38,600 (includes $4,410 package and $875 delivery)
– Sale Price = $33,947
– Buy Rate = 0.00200
– Residual = 62%
– Customer Cash = $986.23
– TOTAL MONTHLY PAYMENT = $415.02 + Tax
Buy Rate was a bit higher than I personally prefer, but the residual and sale price discount more than made up for it.
I also have a couple rides (a 335i from iwc5002 and a 135 from MWGuy) to post on the Wall, so stay tuned for those!
welcome back G
Thanks B! Glad to be back. I’m pretty excited about seeing how the lease rates shape up next month. Wife’s TSX is do in May 15th, so I have to start doing my homework next month. Pretty excited about all the prospects. She did stress the fact that she doesn’t want to pay more than $370 (with taxes) this time around, so it seems that the MBs and BMWs of the world will be eliminated from the list. I’m sort of disappointed about that because I really liked the C300 and 328i. However, until there’s a new ride in our garage, one can only hope. LOL
lolz, well you can get that $370/month if you want to break the cardinal rule… cap cost reduction up front 🙂
That’s against my religion. LOL.
@g
warm and toasty… I was in coconut grove fl. for new years (Frezzn)ever see frost on palm trees? Any way nice to hear you got some time off.
Welcome back G!
Happy to hear you enjoyed your vacation…they are always much needed 😉
Looking forward to see the new rates for the Feb…perhaps i’ll even get lucky and get to see some Mazda3 rates… 🙂
Take care,
Anthony
Thanks guys! I think I am ready to tackle the new year now. Haahaa. It’s kind of scary to think that the TSX lease is almost over. That means I have about 1 year left on my G37 before I have to replace it. How time flies!
@G. Take an additional look at the Subaru Legacy. They do have good programs, and for the base model you are looking at under $300 with 12k/36 months with $0 drive off. Choose the limited edition and you might be around $370 with all taxes with $0 drive off.
@zamo. at the autoshow, we checked out the legacy and the wrx. wife was not very fond of them. kind of disappointing because they were giving a crap load of rebates in december, plus they where offering another $500 to autoshow attendees that sign up for their monthly newsletter. oh wells. I think it will be a challenge to find the wife something below $400 that’s to her liking.
@anthony. ahh don’t remind me. I just celebrated my bday monday…yet another year has flown by…
@jake. I have never seen any lease rates for commercial vehicles. not one. I think going to the fleet manager would be the best option. Dealers will literally lease EVERY vehicle on the lot, so the numbers are there, it just seems the more popular ones tend to trickle down to the consumers.
Tell me about it…the older you get the faster time goes by….lol
@g
I’m so happy I’ve known about your site all year you’ve saved us big $ on a few leases (msd’s) (mf rate) etc. no more games @ the car stores. I have a Q about comm. Trucks/vans example chevy express, ford f150 xl and well other work trucks, where can I get lease #s for these trucks? you never posted this type of lease. Any help would be great. THANKX!
G, check out mandvleasing.com. look at the posted specials and see what you think. Also check out the other posted leases. They seem pretty decent with zero down. Maybe they would like to buy a spot on your site or not. What I like is everything is out front — no send info and they will get back. 2010 x5 for $525 36 month 10k miles. Decent or not ?
@DZ. I checked out the website and I’m a bit skeptical. I mean, ZERO down doesn’t mean you pay nothing upfront. It usually means you don’t have to put down cap cost reduction, but you are still responsible for fees and taxes. It does seem like they try to negotiate a low price, but because they are the middlemen, I would approach this with some caution. When it comes to leasing, once you find out the mf and the residual, the only thing left is to see how low the sale price is going to be in order to get the monthly payments that you want. So there really isn’t too much room to go down. Take the 2010 BMW 128 coupe for example. They claim a $309 a month, no money down. A barebone 128 is $30,025 MSRP, Invoice is 27,695. MF is .00170 and residual for 10k miles per year is 63%. You take those numbers and the best payment I can get is $323 a month. The broker would have to dip $700 below invoice in order to make this happen at $309 a month. Personally, I don’t think it can be done because no one is gonna want to roll around in a barebone 128i so the payments are bound to be higher. The other thing is, if the dealer has to sell the car below invoice, how’s the dealer going to make money AND pay the broker a referral fee? Just something to think about. I’m not against brokers, but I feel the prices they posted on their websites are somewhat misleading. Of course, if they had their own leaders, it could be possible…
G, I saw that you posted the IS250 deal. Guess what? I got an even lower quote and our local dealer said they’ll match anything on paper. We’re doing the deal this Tuesday.
Here’s the new details:
2010 LEXUS IS250
– Auto, RWD
– MSRP = $38,889 (this one has spoiler and dealer added mats)
– Sale Price = $34,305.25
– Buy Rate = 0.00200
– Residual = 62%
– Customer Cash = $952 (just 1st payment, DMV and doc fees)
– TOTAL MONTHLY PAYMENT = $400 + Tax
* RWG Dealer Rating = < 1.09
When dealers compete, you win 🙂
//J
@millyman. Awesome! I like it, specially since the upfront cash isn’t a whole lot!
G –
I am looking to lease a Denali or Escalade – any idea if GMC started to lease again or if there are any “deals” to be had with these trucks? I’m located in NJ.
Thanks
@jaycee. GM itself, doesn’t finance leases anymore, but it seems U.S. Bank as stepped up to fill in the void. The “bummer” part about this is that I don’t run into US bank lease rates very much (I think I was only able to find rates for the Caddy SRX some months back), so I would recommend contacting your local dealer to provide you with those numbers.
@G, VW CC has a nice 39 month plan, although someone will be out of warranty on the last 3 months
@zamo. I am not fond of 39 month leases partly because 3 months out of warranty is a long time, PLUS car registration fees in CA are kind of expensive. But the CC looks good. I am keeping tabs on the sign/drive program to see how it looks next month. I hope they extended it until March 1st.
@G, agree with you. What you can also think about is, how much will 3 months cost you for the lease? Lets ballpark it at $350 per month. Figure out if $1,050 is something you can “spare” and turn in the car at 36 months instead.
I did eat 2 months for my 08 XC90 but I did not purchase new tires (it was like a grand) and managed to get the disposition fee waived by VCFNA ($395). I did use all miles though 🙂
Just a thought.
@zamo. I would only eat the cost if I knew for a fact that at the end of the lease, I would have to pay close to that or more. (ie. damages, disposition fees, etc…). But you got a point. It comes down to how much would you save now than later. With 3 months down and $367 per month, I think that’s still too much to absorb. I personally would rather keep the car until the lease is up AND get the new one. That way, I still get to use the old car for a few months (specially since you are paying for it still) and keep the miles low on the new one so I can drive it more later.
Interesting site! Good work G.
I live in Atlanta and have been browsing around for the past week or so for 24 month lease deals through the car and dealership websites. Seems like auto companies are shying away from this to avoid clutter of inventory back in their dealerships very soon. 36 month has become the common term now. Any thoughts? Where can I find more 24 month specials?
Hi Ziva! Thanks for visiting!
Last year, I began noticing that many captive banks where readjusting the residual values for the 2009 and 2010 model years to reflect a more “realistic” estimate of what resale values would be 2-4 years down the road. This in turn has made 24-month leases more expensive (and to an extent, 36-month leases have also increased in price, but not as dramatic as 24-month terms). Finding a cheap 24-month lease is pretty rare now, but it may still be possible, but you would have to look at outside financing or wait for captive banks to introduce some sort of special lease program. I would recommend looking at sites like LeaseCompare to see what kind of lease programs they have. Then compare them to what captive banks have to offer to see which one is the better deal. Sites like LeaseCompare use multiple lenders, which means there is a possibility to find something good every now and then.
Hey G!
I’ve got the following deal…and was wondering your thoughts on it…
Mazda 3 5dr with manual transmission and no moonroog package.
MSRP: 21,090.00
Sale Price: 17,500
Money Factor: .00184
Residual Value: .56
Aquaisition/Bank Fee: 595
Dealer Doc Fee: 399
Other Fees (such as DMV, tire, etc…): 413
Taxes:726.25
I’m told by the salesman that the monthly fee is around 269/month, however, i can’t seem to get to that number using your calculator. Just real close.
Thanks for the info!
Ant
@anthony. If you get really close, then you might be on the right track. The only way to get exact numbers on the calculator is if you do not roll in all the fees and taxes into the lease loan. I am getting $253 a month with taxes and 1st month payment due at signing. I am assuming you pay all the sales taxes on the fees and the loan as well.
Ahhh…makes sense. I’m wondering if the deal is worth going for or if I could do better else where.
Thanks again for the advice!!! 🙂
@anthony. 17% off the MSRP is actually pretty good. The doc fee is a bit steep, so the discount gets reduced to 15% off MSRP, still a fairly good deal. Overall, I wouldn’t feel too bad pulling the trigger on this.
Cool..thanks G!
Appreciate the response. 🙂
@G. Looking to lease a BMW 328i coupe with just the sport package. MSRP is $39,075. Selling price is $37,060. 36 month/10k miles. $1100 due at signing. MF is 1.7. Residual is 63%. Monthly payment is $472 plus tax. What do you think about this lease? Please advise. Thanks much!
@JJ. If you pay all your fees and bank acquisition upfront, your payment should be $450 + tax. If you roll in the bank acquisition fee (very common practice), then your payments would be $472 + tax. Overall, I think the deal is pretty good. The price is practically invoice, which is also very good. Getting invoice or lower (without rebates) is pretty rare with BMWs, so if you are ready to lease, go with it. Just double check your inception fees. Make sure there aren’t any MACO or Training fees.
Thanks for your input G! After double checking the figures, the total Cap Cost is $37,830 including $725 bank fee, $45 doc fee, $180 training fee, and $380 MACO fee. Dealer said MACO and training fees are not negotiable. Edmunds.com said this car’s invoice should be $36,000. Also, I tried MSD’s and that brings the MF down to 1.21. This ends up with a monthly payment of $442. What do you think? I have to order the car BTW. Thanks again!
@JJ. MACO and Training may be legitimate fees, but they are far from non-negotiable. Plenty of readers on this board have had one of both waived. Worse case scenario, knock off another $560 off the sale price and they can charge that MACO and training fee. LOL.
@jj
Dealers are in bizz to make $, just shop around and say your not loyal to any store you just wanna get the best price, who cares where it comes from it still will be in you driveway. Think of it this way a few hundred saved shoping around is like haveing a free nite out with your wife/GF or girl on the side LOL.