Expect to pay the fee. It is common.

 

Thanks guys. Just one more question: From reading a book on leasing, it's recommended that one must take a closed-end lease vs. open-end lease because in an open-end lease, one is responsible for the difference between the residual value (established on the front end) and the fair market value (at the end of the lease). When I asked the dealer, they say "we don't do open-end leases anymore". Is this true? Where on the lease document can I see that it's a closed-end lease? I just want to make sure that when I pick up the car and sign the docs, I'm not getting hosed in some way. Thanks again for all of your input.

 

If you do decide to lease - don't go in and just agree to the advertised terms. I leased my S2000 a couple of weeks back after analyzing the terms. The money factor worked out to approximately a 2% financing rate. The lease company is buying the car from the dealer at about 31800 - that is 1500 over invoice. Demand that the dealer sell the car to the lease comapny at invoice or lower. Also make sure to have them capitalize your sales tax into the car payment, this is so that if anything happens the insurance covers the tax as well. I was going to buy the car but having a finance rate of 2% was too good to pass. My lease payment is 356 a month with a littel over 1100 due at lease signing to cover the 595 bank fee, title & registration, doc fees, and first month payment.

 

WOw heliflyer,

thats is one hell of a lease deal you got.

what lease company did you use?

that was not ahfc

as for your question calbear, no one does open end leases anymore.
dont worry about that. thats the whole point of a lease, at the end you just turn the keys in and the car and walk off (unless you went over mileage).

closed end lease, means just that, at the end you close your exposure, in an open end lease, if there is a difference between residual and actual cash value of the vehicle, you are on the hook. no one does this type of lease anymore. trust me.

American honda finance does not do open end leases.

But you are right, you dont want an open end lease.

 

[QUOTE=CalBear,Aug 23 2005, 02:34 PM] Thank you in advance.

 

another option in order to avoid depreciation is to buy 1-2 yrs used, since the car has taken it's biggest hit already. then if u decide to sell, you loose less.

regarding a lease, the honda deal is really good and leasing isn't bad all the time, just most of the time.

 

another option in order to avoid depreciation is to buy 1-2 yrs used, since the car has taken it's biggest hit already. then if u decide to sell, you loose less.

regarding a lease, the honda deal is really good and leasing isn't bad all the time, just most of the time.

 

^ I wholeheartedly agree with that. I always buy 1-3 year old cars.

Yes, the honda deal is good, as is leasing hondas in general. leasing a chevy or hyundai is a stupid idea due to their sky-high depreciation, but people do it anyway, usually because they want to save money.

 

This whole lease deal has been debated before, with plenty of info, and I even linked the spreadsheet I used to lease my S2K in early August. Search is your friend, but heck, I'll be your friend too, here's the thread:

https://www.s2ki.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=311947

(my spreadsheet is linked on page 2)

Bottom line, the current lease deal is a sweetie, and you can negotiate the price of teh car down to get an even lower payment ($273 for me, even after sales tax was added back in -- something not accounted for in the $299 base deal). You're not likely to find a better deal with regards to financing, so this is a case where the lease is a no brainer. Even if you buy the car at lease end, the overall cost is going to be lower than most finance deals you'd find right now for Hondas.

Craig

 

Unfortunately, that's not the case. If you finance or buy your car and then build some minimal "equity" into it with payments, if it gets totalled in an accident you're going to have a hard time finding any equity in the situation -- they will not pay you back for the amount of equity you have in the car -- you'll get the current residual for the vehicle, no matter what you've paid into the deal. And if that situation happens in the early part of a financing program, you'll be lucky to come out even! Cars are not the kind of thing you will get much, if any, equity from.

Proponents of the lease will say it's better because you're only paying for the depreciation of the vehicle during it's time with you. That's true, but may also be misleading. You could easily be paying "too much" for that lease. Long term owners may not care about the first 3 years or 36,000 miles of depreciation because it becomes irrelevant many years later. So a lease doesn't make sense from that perspective, unless you are considering it as part of the overall purchase process.

In reality, you need to do a lease vs. buy analysis of every situation, and take the one that makes the most financial sense by some metric that matters to you.

In the current deal, if you run the numbers for financing versus leasing, and then look at overall cost of the car, the lease makes more sense. That's not always the case however.

Craig