I'm thinking of getting a new car … why shouldn't I LEASE one?
If you are looking to build wealth, leasing is a bad idea.  But so is buying a new car.  All cars lose value once you buy them.  New cars lose anywhere between 30-60% of their value in the first 4 years of ownership. Buying a good quality, used car is the way to go if you are looking to build wealth.  And keeping the car for a while is also desirable.  Re-leasing every three years is no way to build wealth. The American Car Payment is probably the biggest factor holding many people back from building wealth.  Don't fall into the trap - buy a used car and drive it for as long as you can until the maintenance gets too pricey.  Then upgrade to a better used car, etc. If you cannot buy a car outright with cash, you cannot afford it.  Period. You SHOULDN'T lease one if you are going to get an economy car, if you don't drive too much (<15K / year), and you want to hang on to the car for a long time.  Otherwise, if you are a regular driver, driving a leased new quality car can be cost effective. Many cars now have bumper-to-bumper warranties that last as long as the lease (say 80K). So there is rarely any extra costs apart from regular maintenance. The sweet spot for most new cars is in the 5th, 6th, or 7th years, after they are paid off. But at that point, you may find you have maintenance bills that are approaching an average of $200 - $300 per month. In which case, a lease starts to look pretty good. I owned a 7 year old Honda Accord that cost only $80 less per month in maintenance than the new leased VW that replaced it.  Haven't looked back after that. Into my 3rd car and 9th year of leasing. Here are the reasons I did not lease my current car. When you lease, you're tied in at a monthly payment for 48 months or more. The only way to get out of that payment is to transfer the lease or buy out the lease. If you buy/finance, you can always sell the car or trade it in to get out of the payments. Or you can pay down more of the vehicle to lower the payments. Most leases calculate the cost of leasing based on the 'residual value' of the vehicle. Often these values are far lower than the actual worth of the vehicle if you owned it for those months and sold it yourself. So when you do the math, the lease costs you more -especially with today's low financing rates. "Also consider how cars fare under your ownership: Does your current car... If any of the answers to these questions are ""Yes"", you're probably going to get hosed with fees when you return the car." I agree with Speedbird389 - I leased an economy car 10 years ago, paid the residual at the end of the lease because I knew the car would last a long time, but that cost me $5000 more than if I had bought it in the first place... I never understood why people lease rather than buy or finance.  I'm financing a new civic 09 @ 0.9%.  At the end of the 5 year terms I will have paid less than $800 in interest. I have an eight year old Kia Spectra that my wife is after me to replace -- but it hadn't been giving me any trouble at all.  Soon after she started telling me I should replace it soon it started having problems; compressor, tires, and so on.  How did she know? Anyway, so now I'm looking -- not ready to buy yet, but I'm looking.  The reason I won't be leasing is mileage.  I live 45 miles from where I work, so with incidental driving, I put at least 100 miles a day on a car.  That's about 26,000 miles a year if I do nothing but drive back and forth to work. On a monthly basis the lease is advertised as being less than most payments, but that is with a mileage limitation.  Since most leases I've looked at top out the mileage well below that mark I won't be leasing. I am looking at the new cars that are available now -- but I don't plan on buying until next year, and buying a lightly used car that is only a year to two old.  So I'm looking at what I will be buying while I can still find information about them. So yeah, mileage is a strong reason why I'm not considering leasing. "It's a very simple equation. If we forget about the stress and limitations that come with the so-called ""lease"", and make the following assumptions: Then after 3 years of using this new car: I will never understand why people still ""lease"" a car. Even for very low income people who have to have a car, financing a per-owned decent car would do, but it's just ""show off"" seduction and lure that either unknowing minded or idiot teenagers fall for."
"DO NOT buy this car. First, I want to say I love BMW's.  There's a reason why they call them ""ultimate driving machine"" and why other car manufacturers compare their new models to BMWs.  I own 330i and I absolutely love it.  Every time you get into the car, it just begs you to push and abuse it.  Everything from steering response to throttle to engine sound.  Awesome car.  However... 1) BMW is not known for their reliability.  I've had to do numerous things to this car and if I didn't do the work myself (i like tinkering with cars), it would be a pretty big money pit (and actually still is).  German parts are more expensive then regular cars.  Labor will run you if you take it for service.  Right now my car is on jack stands while I'm fixing an oil leak, replacing cooling system components which are known to fail and doing work with the cam timing system which uses bad seals. 2) If you buy a used car which is 3 years old, just remember all the wearable items and everything that wants to break, will break 3 years sooner on you.  Someone else already pre-enjoyed your car's maintenance-free days.  At 60k-80k things will start to go.  Ask me how I know.  So you'll start paying for maintenance way before your 5-year loan expires.  Compare this 330i to the Acura Integra I used to have.  Acura (aka Honda) had 194k miles when I sold it and I NEVER ONCE got stranded with the Acura. 3) Fuel economy is not that good and btw you have to use the most expensive gas. 4) If you are really set on buying a BMW because you enjoy driving and won't drive like an old lady (my apologies to those old ladies that drive at least the speed limit, but you are not the majority), then still do not by this one and check out auctions.  I bought my 2003 330i in 2005 for 21k when it cost over 40k new.  You could probably find one with less than 20k miles on it. My final advice is either a) learn to at least do basic maintenance or b) stick to always buying new cars which don't have any issues in first 4-7 years, then move on before you have to schedule your life around your cars. on the bright side I doubt you'll have to ever replace the exhaust and you can buy tail lights on e-bay for roughly $60 :)" Why would you trade a lower interest rate over a higher one?  I wouldn't use the mortgage to pay off the car.  Also, you should have loan/lease payoff on your auto insurance, which if the car is totaled means your loan would be paid by insurance.  I don't think you'd be able to take advantage of that if your car payments become one with the mortgage.  Finally not all mortgage interest may be deductible. Also, I can't think of any way you'd be able to use the car loan to pay off the mortgage.  You wouldn't be able to borrow more than the car is worth, and for a new car it loses quite a bit of value immediately. $27,000 for a car?!  Please, don't do that to yourself! That sounds like a new-car price.  If it is, you can kiss $4k-$5k of that price goodbye the moment you drive it off the lot.  You'll pay the worst part of the depreciation on that vehicle. You can get a 4-5 year old Corolla (or similar import) for less than half that price, and if you take care of it, you can get easily another 100k miles out of it. Check out Dave Ramsey's video.  (It's funny that the car payment he chooses as his example is the same one as yours: $475! ;) )  I don't buy his take on the 12% return on the stock market (which is fantasy in my book) but buying cars outright instead of borrowing or (gasp) leasing, and working your way up the food chain a bit with the bells/whistles/newness of your cars, is the way to go. A big part of why the insurers are pulling is is the uncertainty.  The ACA model worked in MA and is based on market forces. There is no reason it shouldn't succeed other that being actively sabotaged by the GOP. No legislation this big works out of the box yet this one has not been allowed to improve for 8 years and the GOP was rewarded for that sabotage.  If the insurance companies had clear understanding of the marketplace for the next few years you would not have this problem.  There are changes that are needed. IMO first thing is to get rid of the employee mandate. If it was up to me Id change it so no company would offer health insurance. I don't get my car insurance through work why do i get my health insurance from them. But that is long term and we need to ease into it.  There are other issues as well but they are all fixable.  The overall costs are an issue and that is not addressed in ACA at all. That I don't have an answer for but the ACA didn't make it worse. "I'm impressed.  She must have a substantial income to agree to a $500/month car payment.  I imagine her income is about 20K per month for that to make sense.  What kind of work does she do?  To answer your question, typical lease do not work the way you describe.  Paying an extra $2000 will allow you to skip 4 payments (provided the payments were exactly $500) any time in the future.  It does not modify the terms of the lease which would include the payment amount.  Also one does not receive a fiance charge reduction benefit as with a loan.  Essentially you are providing a loan to the leasing company for free. To be explicit you cannot tell the mortgage company anything as she is applying for the loan, not you.  She can tell the mortgage company the new payment is $400, but she would be falsifying the application which is not advisable. Perhaps the mortgage company is doing her a favor.  They are indicating her life is out of control financially.  Either she is attempting to purchase way to much home or her consumer debt is out of control.  It could be a combination of both.   My first paragraph was written to be ""tongue in check"" in order to demonstrate absurdity.  Without a substantial income and an substantial net worth, a 500/month car payment is simply ridiculous.  While it is someone average, when you compare it to the average income (~54K/year) you understand why 78% of US households live paycheck-to-paycheck (are broke), and have no retirement savings. For your and her sake, please stop giving all your hard earned money to banks." Yeah dang. Guess it's probably written deep in the contract that this can happen and nothing is absolutely guaranteed.   Any specific experience on rental car chains? I've recently started using National and love the pick your own car experience...much faster and smoother but is more expensive (and luckily reimbursed mostly as well) In general I'd say, yeah, if you can pay cash, pay cash. If you pay cash, then by definition you pay zero interest. If you get a loan, you'll pay interest. Most people get a loan to buy a car because they don't have the cash. Possible reasons not to pay cash when you could: One: Technically you can pay cash, but if you did, you would have little or no reserve for emergencies. Like if the car costs, say, $20,000.00, and you have $20,010.00 in your bank account, then technically you could afford to pay cash, but you probably shouldn't, because you don't want to have just $10 left. What if tomorrow something comes up? Two: Arguably, you have a place to invest money that pays more than the interest on the loan. Like say you can get a car loan for, whatever the going rate is today, say 6%. And you know a place to invest your money that is very safe and almost guaranteed to pay 10%. It would make sense to borrow to buy the car, invest the cash, and then withdraw money from the investment to make the payments on the car. You'd end up 4% ahead. There are a lot of catches to that strategy, though. The biggest is that the more the investment pays, the more likely that it is risky. If you thought the investment would pay 10% but it ends up paying only 4%, then you will lose money by this strategy. Also, there's the psychological element: Many people SAY and fully INTEND to invest their money, but then find other things they want to buy and so spend it instead. If you pay cash, you're committed. Don't buy the new car. Buy a $15k car with $5k down and a 3 year loan and save up the rest for your car. A $500/mo car payment is nuts unless you're making alot of money. I've been there, and it was probably the dumbest decision that I have ever made. When you buy a house, you end up with all sorts of unexpected expenses. When you buy a house AND are stuck in a $500/mo payment, that means that those unexpected expenses end up on a credit card.