I am looking for a lease for my 2005 MCS. The numbers given by the dealer is very unattractive (0.0030 money factor with lots of extra fees). Other then leasecompare.com which requires you to pay tax upfront, what other good venues can I use, and what kind of numbers should I be expecting?

And does anyone know the current lease rate?

Thanks a lot!

 

My lease rate for my 05mcs is around 4-5%. My notes are $315 a month plus tax which brings the total ammt to $340. The total price for the car was $22,800(before the 05 markup) and that's for a 4 year 12000 mile lease. But it also depends on your credit as how much you are going to pay a month. I ran it online, with $1800 down and it came out to $294 without tax but when I got a quote from the dealer it was about 20 bucks more. Well worth it though. I also had my dad sign for it under his name so it would be lower. It was about $35 higher for me but also insurance is a little cheaper that way too. So it all worked out pretty well in the end. Out of the 25 something cars I have been with friends/family/myself to buy, surely this was the most painless, wonderful, fastest experience I have ever been through. And I would do it over again in a heartbeat. Good luck.

 

I think leasing a MINI is a bad idea, but not for the reasons that most people give. The car is meant to be driven, and a lease, IMHO, is way too constrictive when it comes to this. I have some figures here that show a 3 year lease versus a 3 year purchase plus resale end up with the lease coming out ahead, so I don't think that they are necessarily bad, but you won't be able to enjoy it!

<-- 21,000 miles over 1 year combined.

 

so the ongoing money factor is around 4-5%? That's pretty low compared to what my dealer quotes me.

 

Check your credit report and make sure that the current FICO score is not affecting your ability to obtain the lowest rate possible.

It pays to order a copy of your credit report before embarking on a major purchase on credit. Get a copy from each of the 3 main bureaus:

www.equifax.xom

www.transunion.com

www.experian.com


Also, keep in mind that length of employment, other debts, income, your paying history and so on and so forth also have a direct impact on your FICO score.

Knowledge is power and getting acquinted with your credit report will enable you to shop around for the best deal possible and you will also know when someone is trying to take you for a ride.

 

Thanks for the help so far. I've already obtained my credit report and I know that I am in good shape. However, the local credit unions are not doing any auto lease, and leasecompare.com only carries leases that require you to pay sales tax up front.

Does anyone know if there are other good leasing companies?

 

I too was looking to lease a Mini Cooper S and after I configured the car around 27K the lease numbers were for 36 months/15k miles per month at around $460/month with roughly $2200 down which covered fees and taxes and first month(what salesman was saying that is considered a no down ). I just laughed and said I will be looking around. At those rates you can lease cars that are around at around $35K+. Needless to say I wasnt happy to hear those numbers.

 

psymon, my numbers aren't any better than yours. I am hunting for better deals online without much success. How about you?

 

Another factor to keep in mind is the residual value of the vehicle to be leased, which is determined by, in this case, Mini Financial. I am leasing a 2003 MC, the lease started in February 03. I gave all my numbers to a friend and he tried to lease about 6 months later. His numbers back from Mini were very different than mine and on checking he was told that this was because Mini had re-evaluated the residual value of the vehicles, now that more of them were getting out there. My MC has an MSRP of about $21K, I put $2500 down, I am leasing for 4 years at 12K per year and my lease is $253 per month. Oh, through Mini financial, you can adjust your lease if you are driving more than the contracted amount of miles. It is a reasonible cost.

 

I went in to lease a base MC and when the sales guy sat down and said the the car was $XXXXX plus $2200 for extended maintanence for four years, I told him I was only interested in a 3 year lease so he could keep the extended program. His response was "too bad" we don't sell/lease them without the mark up. So, I bought a used, loaded 2004 MCS from a private party for the same money. These dealers are out of their minds if they think I'll pay a premium for a new car. The only reason they can is because WE let them. A lease is only a good deal if you are ONLY paying down the depreciation (or less) of the vehicle during the term of the lease. Otherwise it's better to buy the car and sell it in a few years - and never lease longer than the warranty coverage for the vehicle otherwise you are paying to fix THEIR car. My $0.02

Good luck with the lease. Let us know how you do.

Matt

 

ttt

 

Sorry to resurrect an old thread, but we are trying to decide whether to lease an MC or MCS as a third car - it will be a daily driver to keep some miles off the Subaru Legacy GT and MCS-C we bought.

The basis of a normal lease is paying the lost value from purchase until lease end, plus an extra 'fee' and processing/initiation costs. With the high resale of Mini's in mind, wouldn't lease costs be extremely low? From what I have read so far, that's far from reality. Honda does a $159/24 month lease on a $16K Civic. We would love a > $200/month lease on a basic MC, since the MSRP isn't much more than the Civic.

Am I missing something here? It's almost more attractive to lease a Civic (though not as fun). What the??

 

First, better to resurrect an old thread than to create new thread on a topic that has already had a few hundred threads started..

Honestly, I used to be a fan of leasing... until I moved to VA. I've found that the differences in how the taxes work (at least towards military members) in VA is just insane... I'm not a big fan of having to pay sales tax on my monthly payment, and then get hit with a multi-hundred dollar personal property tax bill on top of that once a year...

Plus, I no longer can limit my driving to less than 1500 miles a month...

 

So, this is more of a VA tax law issue than one of the Mini lease program? I am seeing people post $425 monthly payments on a $27K car. That's INSANE.....you can own it for just a few bucks more....why lease?

I am perfect candidate for a lease....less than 15K/miles a year on the car, no plans to mod it (we have the MSC-C and LGT to spend money on).

 

I don't know if the numbers you cite are due to the funky taxes in VA, but it's due to those taxes that I won't lease a car an live in VA at the same time....

However, one of the reasons why leasing was so popular 4 or more years ago was because the interest rates being offered when you did a traditional loan was typically 3 percent or more than the interest rates being offered when you leased a car.

But with the cut rate financing deals got big in 2002 the interest rates on leases didn't drop... So then leasing was a less attractive option than a traditional loan.

Now that interest rates for car loans are starting to creep back up, there rates for a lease may become more favorable.

The big thing to remember when financing a car through a dealer, be it a typical car loan or a lease... The terms will always favor the lender... Even if resale values are high, the terms will be structured in such a way so that it favors the lender and not the buyer...

I've leased 4 cars, not a single one of them was remotely near the value of the buyout amount by the end of the lease contract.