[ddvette9]

I have always bought cars. Always. My theory is that when you are ready to trade-in or sell you have equity (down payment) built into your next purchase as long as you owe less than what the car payoff would be, which I usually do.

However, I keep seeing all these "aggressive lease" discounts and the dealerships really pushing leases.

I drive about 12,000 miles per year and will have about $10,000 in cash to either put a down payment or finance a lease with.

I have no idea about leases and am a total noob. I keep seeing residual numbers and this and that.

Without having to sit on youtube or edmunds for hours, would anyone mind lending a helping hand who has many years of experience of buying and leasing cars and explain some of the basics of BMW leases and what I should know going before I splurge on a car.

I have always had very low car payments per month and stretched my purchases out 72 months with low interest.

[pdubb]

Never put down a lot of money on a lease. All that money is gone at the end.

There is something called Money Savings Deposits (MSD's) where you can apply MSD's to your Lease Deal to lower the Money Factor (% interest rate to lease) These MSD's will lower your MF which will lower the interest rate for the lease, in return lowering your monthly payment AND you get that money back at lease end to maybe roll into another lease.

Money Factor is basically the interest rate. Whatever a dealership or BMW provides you, just multiply it by 2400 to get the % in whole numbers.

Residual amount is what the value of the car is at lease end. So if its 62% you are leasing/paying 38% of the vehicle in a way.

Check out RideWithG.com He spells out the lease forumla and gives good examples on understanding it.

My .02. I would buy. Unless something has occurred in your life where you need that money and a lower monthly payment, I'd buy.
Like you said, more equity in the car, and you own it.

BMW raises their residuals so the lease numbers are cheaper. But you're usually stuck with a residual value of $35,000 on the car when Kelly Blue Book will tell you its worth $32,000. Which usually pushes you into another lease with BMW to avoid the negative equity.

Many more aspects to it, but this is a quick over view. If you have an questions feel free to PM me.

P

[Lucky13]

My 2 cents are that there are as many reasons to lease as buy having bought or leased 17 BMW's. The advantage of leasing is you can change cars every 3 years and not get screwed on a trade in. I leased my M235 but paid cash for my wife's X1 because we plan on keeping it 5-6 years. I may buy my M235 if I like it for residual because I only put about 5,000 miles per year on it and it will be worth more than residual. I've had BMW's worth more than residual a 2004 M3 and less than residual a 2007 X3 at the height of the recession when cars were not selling and gas was still high. If you like changing cars a lot go lease or you will take a hit unless you want to sell it yourself which brings up a lot of other issues.

[phoenixbmwlife]

Originally Posted by ddvette9

I have always bought cars. Always. My theory is that when you are ready to trade-in or sell you have equity (down payment) built into your next purchase as long as you owe less than what the car payoff would be, which I usually do.

However, I keep seeing all these "aggressive lease" discounts and the dealerships really pushing leases.

I drive about 12,000 miles per year and will have about $10,000 in cash to either put a down payment or finance a lease with.

I have no idea about leases and am a total noob. I keep seeing residual numbers and this and that.

Without having to sit on youtube or edmunds for hours, would anyone mind lending a helping hand who has many years of experience of buying and leasing cars and explain some of the basics of BMW leases and what I should know going before I splurge on a car.

I have always had very low car payments per month and stretched my purchases out 72 months with low interest.

Go to the post your deals thread and read from page 1 and you will learn everything you need to learn about leasing a BMW.