Obtaining An Affordabe Car Lease

Poorly informed naysayers are quick to dispel car leases with a wave of the hand and comments like “Lease” Pure scam!” or “Lease means you’ll never own that car!” Thankfully, those comments are no longer true, though long ago, due to fraudulent “deals” perhaps they were true. With the nation involved in a weighty recession those in the automobile business have created affordable car lease programs that enable you to drive what you desire and often it?s for substantially less money than actually purchasing such a car!

First you must understand that a car lease is not a car rental. Leasing is a financial instrument, much like a mortgage will do for a home, and it is in no way connected to the rental of a car.

Currently it is said that approximately twenty to twenty five percent of all new vans, SUVs, trucks and cars are leased. In luxury cars, it’s even higher; it’s approximately seventy five percent! This alternative financing method to a car loan will offer significant lower payments to the consumer!

Why car leasing? A number of reasons have influenced the popularity of having an affordable car lease. First car prices rose, often times out of most consumer’s reach. Secondly, the monthly budget of many people has been adversely affected by the rising costs of the necessities of life, such as food and housing.

Thus lower monthly payments for a vehicle that ordinarily would be out of reach for the majority of consumers has brought tremendous popularity to this alternative financial method, the affordable car lease!

An important factor is the fact that when you negotiate a car lease with the dealer, you are also negotiating for the purchase price. There is no set price, it’s negotiable. This is an important point to understand, for after you sign the lease agreement, the dealer sells the car to a leasing company, it is not retained by the dealer, therefore price is what influences your monthly payments that you will have to make. There are leasing companies and there are also credit unions, and banks that make these agreements.

Some purchasers also find their own leasing companies, and negotiate directly with them, often times saving quite a bit of money. Look around these leasing companies, credit unions, and banks, and when you find such they may even have lower cost leases due to advance fleet purchasing agreements already made with the dealers.

Part of your lease agreement will list the following: you are agreeing to keep the car for a set number of months, and you are agreeing to meet regular monthly payments, while keeping appropriate insurance, paying vehicle taxes and licensing fees, and you promise to take good care of said vehicle. At the end of the lease period it will be stated that you must return your vehicle to the leasing company with normal wear and tear. You’ll agree to pay for any extra mileage over and above those stated in the contract, as well as any damage.

Based on what you’ve negotiated, there may be an option to purchase your automobile at lease-end for an agreed upon specified price. Also, you may negotiate for the right to use the car as a trade-in against a new car. Walking away may be the other agreed upon stipulation, however you may be walking away from equity value. Most don’t want to give that back to the leasing company without some recompense.