leasing a car?

[AndyP]

Anyone lease a car before? We're thinking about leasing a Honda Accord. I've heard bad things, but from people who haven't had first hand experience. Pros? Cons?
Thanks :D

[kikiek]

1. Pay taxes on the lease monthly then on the purchase at the end if you

buy. I wouldn't buy it though when you're done. Also I think we had to carry higher insurance coverage.

[benddem]

2. Awful experience!

I finally bought the lease so I didn't have to pay for all the dings and paint chips and problems with the car. Mileage was also a real problem. I was so worried about it, it affected where I went and what I did.

[Nite Owl]

3. Not a terrible experience

but you have to watch everything you do, the car really isn't yours. And if you drive a lot of miles it's just too expensive.

[Floogeldy]

18. It is a terrible experience if you know anything about "math."

Or money.

:smoke:

[Bleacher Creature]

4. I'm a bit crazy -- so I hated it.

As other people have pointed out, they charge you a lot per extra mile if you go over. I had a three year lease and could never drive anywhere without thinking about my daily "ration" of miles. It got to the point where I was coming up with formulas to figure out what my pace was and how many days I wouldn't have to drive so that I could take X or Y trip (I said that I'm a bit off).

In the end, I turned in the car with about 5,000 miles less than I paid for.

[AndyP]

7. see that's what we're worried about

I don't want to be charged a buck a mile or something. I guess you can get leases that are for 15,000 miles instead of 12. We live in Tucson and it's a pretty spread out city.

[nytemare]

5. You might be better off buying a barely used car.

If you like to change cars every 2-3 years, it is ok. If you want to be in your car a while, it is throwing money down the drain, then they try to sell it to you at a hiked price at the end of the lease. My mom leased a Camry for 3 years, then bought it for 15000. Thing is, in the end she ended up paying probably over 30,000 dollars for a car she probably could have bought for 18 or 19000.

http://www.carbuyingtips.com/ This is a great site. It helped me enormously when I bought my last car.

Good luck to you!

[johnnie]

6. I leased a S-10 a few years back

I got 12,000 miles a year and after 3 years I had 15,000. I took it back and gave them the keys, that was it. I am now leasing a Jeep Wrangler and I am still at low miles. I like to lease. I haven't had a problem in 5 years of leasing 2 vehicles.

[Bozita]

19. Your dealer absolutely loves you.

You paid for 36,000 miles and drove it only 15,000?

You wanta rent (lease) anything, you let me know.

[johnnie]

21. I just didn't drive a lot

I paid the same I would have if I would have maxed my miles.

[aquaman]

8. The concept of leasing a car does not make any sense to me......

But that is me, for some it works out fine. To me, it's like paying rent for a place and then moving out without anything to show for it.

[Floogeldy]

9. DON'T DO IT.

The interest and lack of ownership are total fucking jokes. You talk about throwing away a ton of fucking money for something you do not need.

A car is to get you around, from home, to work, to the store, etc. . . .

Save your money and go pay cash for a car that runs good.

Trust me.

[aquaman]

11. Hey new best friend while enigmatic is away......

How the hell are you? Listening to any good music tonight?

[Floogeldy]

13. Thanks for asking, aquaman!

Incredible as it sounds, I'm listening to Rita Coolidge doing "Hula Hoop" on an old re-run of SNL.

What are you listening to? :)

[aquaman]

15. On a classics thing....

Listening to the Allman Brothers "mountain jam" song. The damn song is 33 minutes long. Listened to 16 Horsepower before that.

[Floogeldy]

17. You have great taste in music.

:)

[evlbstrd]

12. That's what I did.

A used car that still works, no payments and low insurance and tax payments.

[Floogeldy]

16. Sometimes a basic capitalism lesson is necessary.

The entity from which you lease a car has to buy the car. That is an investment made by them. Money has to be made from the investment, either from profit, or interest, but usually both. That means the buyer is paying more than the car is worth. It also usually means the buyer is paying a lot of fucking money for a status symbol in the way of a name brand, model and year.

In other words, you may be an evlbstrd, but you ain't nobody's fool. Heh heh. ;)

[evlbstrd]

20. Thanks for the props, Floogledy.

I paid $200 for my current automobile, and put another $600 into it. It's an Escort, gets great mileage, and my insurance is cheap. I'm a cheap evlbstrd.

[ScreamingMeemie]

10. We're on our first lease after being skeptical. But it was $179/mo.

for a Pacifica. We bought extra miles otherwise it would have been 139/mo. We had one problem with the car and I loved it that I could drop it off, pick up a rental and be on my way. So far, so
good. :hi:

**Usually if you get another car from them...they are willing to drop any over mileage charges.

[LynneSin]

14. The absolute key to leasing is how many miles you do a year

I use to sell cars and leasing has both pros & cons but the biggest con is people who don't factor how many miles they drive a year into doing a lease.

I have a good friend who leased a Saturn for 3 years and barely did 8k miles a year on that car. The buyout on the car was thousands less then it was actually worth and they actually bought out the car and then sold it for a $3k profit.

Then I had an ex-boyfriend who was stupid enough to lease a car (we were on a timeout when he did it) and never considered that he was doing 20K miles a year on a car he had a 5 year lease. He had no choice but to buy out the car because he had over 100k miles on the thing and would have lost major money turning it back in.

If you want to get rid of the car at the end of the lease the car has to be in good condition if you don't want to get stuck with extra fees. You can always pay $100 to have the car detailed to almost new condition but if you're putting high miles on the car you will pay through the nose!

If you're doing around 10k miles a year, with a Honda Accord you could do really well with a lease. Accords maintain their value and you could probably do better than what my friends with the Saturn did. But if you're putting miles on cars then please do NOT lease.

Another option if you're looking for lower payments are 'Certified Used' cars. You can probably get a 1-2 Honda through the local Honda dealership that has been throughly inspected, good long-term warranty and a few thousand dollars less than brand new.