Mike H.

Hey guys,

Thinking of leasing the new TL. Can anyone tell me what the lease residuals and the MFs are for these cars? TIA!

Regards,
Mike

TL23

i was told the following:

36 month lease (15k miles) - .00225 MF 56% residual NAVI
36 month lease (15k miles) - .00215 MF 58% residual non-NAVI

i don't know why non-NAVI has a higher residual

TLXLR8S

i was told 55% for the non navi on a 42 month lease. and drops 2% every month.

Mike H.

Who do I ask to get more accurate numbers? Banks?

Shoofin

what's the difference? You can't change it ya know..

Mike H.

I believe you can from what I've been told. It depends on the company or whoever you are leasing the car from. It's not a firm number. I'm just trying to find out what companies/banks/etc. out there handle leases so I can make a few comparisons.

Shoofin

The best bank to use for the TL is American Honda. With the exception of the different terms of lease, you can NOT negotiate a residual amount and money factor. 36 mos 12k miles has one residual, 15k miles has another. 39 mos 12k has one residual, 15k has another..Get it? Got it? Good!

spidey07

I was able to negotiate everything but the residual on my lease. Eliminated all fees and all I had left was the financed amount (again negotiated money factor and APRs) and rent charge.

The first thing shown to me by american honda made me laugh so hard I almost busted a side, so I obtained leasing elsewhere.

smoore

You need to be careful comparing leases to ensure that you are not comparing apples to oranges. I have sometimes found that dealer leases are open to negotiation and that manufacturers' leases are not. That is particularly the case in Canada.

There are two big drawbacks to dealer leases. First, the actual terms of the lease are often less foregiving than the manufacturers' lease. For example, many dealer leases do not provide GAP coverage, which in my opinion is essential. The wear and tear provisions are often more onerous and they sometimes are more restrictive on who can drive the car and where. Second, dealers often interpret their lease provisions more restrictively. I have found some dealers are a lot tougher on what is and is not normal wear and tear.

The other thing to be careful about when dealing with dealers is to ensure that you are negotiating a closed end lease. On an open end lease the residual can and often is inflated to make the lease payments lower. However, at the end of the lease the lessee has to make up the difference between the residual and the actual market value of the car. I still encounter some dealers (not Acura) and leasing companies which try to pass off an open lease as a closed lease.

Although less common now with the legislated disclosure provisions, some dealers misrepresent the interest rate or money factor (multiply the money factor by 2400 to get an approximate interest rate) on the lease. I can remember negotiating for a 1996 Nissan Maxima and I was advised that the interest rate on the lease was 6.5%. When I used my financial calculator I determined that it was over 8.5%. I simply walked out of the dealership.

You can obtain financial calculators that will do these calculations or use ones on the web (see "visible lease" at http://www.leaseguide.com/lease08.htm) The advantage of using them is that you can solve for the cap cost of the vehicle and determine exactly what you are paying. The real game playing is with the monthly payments. If you assume that a new TL is $34,000 and that it has a 55% residual on a 36 month lease at 5%, then every $15.00 a month you save on the lease payment is really a $500 reduction to the price of the car. On a 48 month lease with a 50% residual it only takes a $12 a month reduction to equal $500. Often people do not realize how much an extra $10 a month in the lease payment is really costing them.

In Canada many of the large leasing companies actually use the manufacturer's lease (because it provides the best money factor) but get a better cap cost on the vehicle. This makes leasing through them cheaper than going to the dealer.