NFT: car buying and leasing

But they low ball you on the trade in

Ask if they have pull ahead programs to get you out of your lease early into ANOTHER new Caddie. Otherwise you can't avoid making all the payments in the lease contract. Choose a lease term that matches the time you will want to own the car. With a lease you will only have yearly maintenance costs in addition to your payment.

If you buy..your loan term should not exceed 48 months if you plan on trading it in two years down the road. You will be upside down if your term is 60 or 72 unless you put significant cash down. Also... Plan on additional repair and maintenance costs with a used car. Tires and brakes at the very least are in the future if you hold the car to term.

Caddies do not hold value well. There presence is rental fleets hurts trade values.

Big thing is how many miles do you put on the car? buying a used one for a couple years is a bad idea esp a American made one they lose value fast.

No worries on tires brakes and anything else that goes wrong. The warranty is worth it if your trading it in two years.

put $5k down on a $30k car and you are still at $500+ per month. Put $2k down on the same car and lease for $300 per month with virtually all maintenance included throughout the lease. And with tech changing as rapidly as it does being stuck with a car that your are still paying off for 5-6 years sucks.

Sometimes you get lucky and get a good car hat lasts 10 years where you make out better financially but it's such a crapshoot IMO. For every Volvo like my stepfathers that lasted 10 solid years you have a horror story of people paying huge prices for car fixes past 50k miles. No thanks, I'll lease and midigate my risk, getting a new car every 2-3 years in the process.

If you are going to hit the mileage numbers of the lease then leasing is good. If you will go significantly under or over leasing is a rip off.

In comment 13500602 UConn4523 said:

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put $5k down on a $30k car and you are still at $500+ per month. Put $2k down on the same car and lease for $300 per month with virtually all maintenance included throughout the lease. And with tech changing as rapidly as it does being stuck with a car that your are still paying off for 5-6 years

The service costs are not influenced by your financing choice. Doesn't matter if you lease or buy, what is covered is covered and what is not is not. Also, there is no law that says you have to keep a car you bought for longer than 2-3 years.

there is now law that says you have to keep a car for longer than 2-3 years after buying but you are still paying more up from and more monthly. So if you want a new car every 2-3 years, leasing would save you thousands per year. The only way to make that money back is to have the car paid off and go multiple years with no payments.

not thousands per year

That when you buy a car you get to Sell it and you get some money back

But I don't know how anyone stays under those mileage limits. 10K a year? Get the hell outta here.

I'm simply saying that it it's a big up front cost for a lot of risk. Some cars depreciate slower than others so your options to really come out well are pretty limited.

It all depends on your lifestyle. If you are really into cars, know when and what to buy and don't mind spending the time to set yourself up you can probably make out ok. But others want a quick fix that gives you more flexibility with less up front costs. I wouldn't say either option is better but for me i tend to lean towards leasing.

Just be aware you are paying for that convince. And you never stop paying.

There is a reason dealers push leases so hard.

couldn't you just leave it unlocked with the keys in the ignition in an empty lot in Newark? Wouldn't the insurance money take care of it?

Think, people.

Then lease.

I own my vehicle out right 2012 Ford Explorer. Its great not having any payments and it still has low miles (44,000). Im not trading that for a while.

We lease my wifes car. Since she lets me lead her in a direction to what to get I get the new car experience every few years. We always raise the miles to 12,000.

and have worked on cars.

Disagree with almost everything that's been written here.
Except for sarcastic SAm scum is consistently scum after all.
Cars are marvelous today, the horror stories are the exception and exaggersated. Brakes and oil changes through 150,000 and minimum costs afterwards depending on your driving exposure.
No idea who need to impress by turning a car over every two years is almost silly.
Buy the car and when it's paid off go for a few years without collision and comp. Lowest cost and you still have a healthy residual when you trade it in.
A car depreciates almost 50% the first year and slowly after that. Just re-read that relative to your situation.
Leasing made more sense when you had "safe harbors" and could play with the investment Tax Credit or use the lease cost as a form of accelerated depreciation..now its a scam to make the dealers rich.

In comment 13500602 UConn4523 said:

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Sometimes you get lucky and get a good car hat lasts 10 years where you make out better financially but it's such a crapshoot IMO. For every Volvo like my stepfathers that lasted 10 solid years you have a horror story of people paying huge prices for car fixes past 50k miles. No thanks, I'll lease and midigate my risk, getting a new car every 2-3 years in the process.

It's only a crapshoot if you buy cars with a bad history of reliability. Or you don't take care of them. Buy a quality car and it will hold up a high percentage of the time. We've bought 7 new cars in our lives. 8 years is the shortest we've kept any. Currently have a 10 and 11 year old car. Probably replace one next year. The other probably has another 3-4 years at least it should be good.

If you're dead set on a new car every 3 years, then yeah, you're probably better off leasing as long as you can predict the milsge you will use reasonably and don't put undue wear and tear on the car. But you're not saving yourself money.

are costs of running and maintaining ICE-driven vs. electric vehicles. The rate of change in EV adoption may increase dramatically, for a variety of cost and cultural issues.

That said, the inducements (financial and otherwise) to switching are muddied by the rapid fluctuations in the price of fossil fuels. Oil and gas right now are cheap and getting cheaper, so the tradeoff is not a no-brainer. But over time, as the costs of EVs continue to come down, their driving range increases, and charging stations and options become more convenient, ownership raises more questions. As noted, this is a longer view, but changes in the automotive industry are coming, like it or not.

agreed. In the long run know I'm not saving money, I'm paying for convenience and somewhat "future-proofing" myself. With electric, fuel cell, etc all probably taking off at more affordable prices in the next 5 - 10 years, I'll probably buy then. Also daycare costs will be gone so larger car payments will be more affordable.

now I buy and depending on the interest rate it impacts what I put down.

For 0 - 1.5% or so interest it's a no-brainer, maximize the financed amount, it's free money. In general I don't go longer than 60 months on a term, but if there was a reason to I would. If the interest rate is in the 3's or higher I'd put more down and finance the least amount I could afford.

My last few cars I've experienced multiple years of no payments and no noticeable significant degradation in technology or style.

I've had acuras and hondas primarily.

I also have zero desire to change cars every few years so that makes buying a safer decision for me. My Acura TL was over 10 years old and still ran fine. Honda pilot the same.

I leased a Ford Escort (probably the equivalent to the fusion now?) because I was just out of college and it was cheaper than buying, and went way over in the miles an the condition of the vehicle was only so-so and when the lease was up I owed a ton of money so I bought a new Ford Escort to which they rolled my overage of the lease into and it took me a long time to get out of that shitty situation and those shitty Ford cars.

of course Cadillacs are not Ford escorts, but the principle isn't much different.

In comment 13500635 Greg from LI said:

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But I don't know how anyone stays under those mileage limits. 10K a year? Get the hell outta here.

You can lease a car with to to 20,000 miles per year. Obviously that increases your monthly payment.

In comment 13500743 ColHowPepper said:

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are costs of running and maintaining ICE-driven vs. electric vehicles. The rate of change in EV adoption may increase dramatically, for a variety of cost and cultural issues. That said, the inducements (financial and otherwise) to switching are muddied by the rapid fluctuations in the price of fossil fuels. Oil and gas right now are cheap and getting cheaper, so the tradeoff is not a no-brainer. But over time, as the costs of EVs continue to come down, their driving range increases, and charging stations and options become more convenient, ownership raises more questions. As noted, this is a longer view, but changes in the automotive industry are coming, like it or not.

Bigger factor I think will be self driving cars. The ability to order up a vehicle on demand that meets your need of the moment and at a lower annual cost will end many if not most people's car ownership.

, so no finance, or finance very little. Once I get into a normal small down scenario then I always gravitate towards leasing. One other factor is with a lease you don't have to worry about how much the car is going to be worth at the end of the term. You just turn it back in, the leasing company has taken the risk on if the car holds its projected value or not. With a purchase, you may calculate that the car is worth $10K 3 years from now but in reality its only worth $7.5K by then.

Also if you go to D&M or Autoflex, you can lease used cars too.

you'll thank me later.

In comment 13500952 Deej said:

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you'll thank me later.

If you get rid of a horse for insurance money, you'll have to deal with the PETA crazies...