What would you do? Weighing up options...

[Mohsin]

Guys,

I still have just under 2 years left on my lease deal, but as my mind wanders, I am pondering on what to do when the time is up. Do I -

- Give the car back, start a new lease deal with another similar car? Will have to fork out another lump sum for the initial deposit...

- Give the car back, buy a new, similar car on pcp? Relatively higher monthly payments but car is mine and I can do as I wish...

- Give the car back, buy a used car with personal savings/loan? Would work out similar payments to new car, but without balloon payment at the end...but would have to worry about things going wrong, etc. Car would be older but be able to get something really cool, i.e. M135i etc...

- Purchase this lease car at the end of the term with personal savings/loan? Similar to above, but know the history of the car, but still, things could go wrong.

- Purchase something really cool but old for a few grand cash like.......a C43 AMG and be ready for the running costs  (You know this is amazing car for the money gosh I've been reading too much pistonheads)


So yeah, early days yet but just putting some thoughts down into writing 

[andrewparker]

Yep, so early you've got to question whether it's even worthwhile thinking about.

[davyk31]

Can't see an M135i being a particularly cheap purchase.

[corgi]

- Give the car back, start a new lease deal with another similar car? Will have to fork out another lump sum for the initial deposit...

If you think that the lease rate is reasonable then why not... the only issue is that you are spending money on something that you will never own. But that's fine people do that all the time by renting houses...

- Give the car back, buy a new, similar car on pcp? Relatively higher monthly payments but car is mine and I can do as I wish...

The car is not yours until you have paid for it. With PCP the ownership of the car stays with the PCP company until you have made any final payment.

- Give the car back, buy a used car with personal savings/loan? Would work out similar payments to new car, but without balloon payment at the end...but would have to worry about things going wrong, etc. Car would be older but be able to get something really cool, i.e. M135i etc...

Could be a good plan, you're saving on the depreciation. You can mitigate the cost of things going wrong by either creating a repair fund and/or buying a decent warranty

- Purchase this lease car at the end of the term with personal savings/loan? Similar to above, but know the history of the car, but still, things could go wrong.

Again could be a good plan... but watch it... some lease companies like to have their cake and eat it. Most will base their budget on the car being worth 90-97% of CAP Trade Clean (or similar) but they will not sell it to you for anything like that... so they've made a profit on your lease payments and then want to make a further profit on the sale to you... when in reality it reduces the risk for them of sending it to auction...

- Purchase something really cool but old for a few grand cash like.......a C43 AMG and be ready for the running costs  (You know this is amazing car for the money gosh I've been reading too much pistonheads)

I did this a while ago and bought some thing cool from Stuttgart (and it isn't a taxi with a big engine  ) my 911 C4S Cabrio - it has been and still is great but remember whilst you can buy a "supercar" for the price of a Mondeo... the running costs are still those of a "supercar" which for some can be eyewatering. If you're going really cheap £2-5K then don't spend the money making them perfect... buy well, service them properly and sell them down the line for little or no loss.

A lot will depend on what you use the car for and how many miles you do. If you don't do many miles then doubling the fuel consumption has very little impact...

[Mohsin]

Thanks for the response Corgi...

Interesting what you mention about purchasing off the lease company. When I spoke to my lease company directly, they were quite open in saying they would rather sell it to me as it saves them the hassle of sending it off to the auction...will have to wait and see what they say come end of term.

Yep, early days yet though!! This is what boredom does to you...

[corgi]

Interesting what you mention about purchasing off the lease company. When I spoke to my lease company directly, they were quite open in saying they would rather sell it to me as it saves them the hassle of sending it off to the auction...will have to wait and see what they say come end of term.

One of the more enlightened... I did say "some", not all...