Spec me the best vehicle on a personal car lease

Adam said:
I can see why a lease on a new car might be a winner here. If the OP is stretched to only have £200 to spend on the car that leaves very little for maintenance and running costs beyond petrol.

Going for a bank loan is all well and good, but if something goes wrong then he could be repaying the loan without the use of the car.
Click to expand...

But the chances of anything going wrong so dramatic that its off the road for any length of time is slim (providing he doesn't buy something french...), plus he'll have something to show for it after the 2-3 years instead of walking away 5 grand down with no car
 
I think I am going to try saving up another £1000 and see where I am then. I have been put off the idea of lease car considering after 3 years I get nothing for it apart from choice to take another new car, hand it back or buy it off them. My other issue is you can't do anything to a lease car either.
 
sovietspybob said:
But the chances of anything going wrong so dramatic that its off the road for any length of time is slim (providing he doesn't buy something french...), plus he'll have something to show for it after the 2-3 years instead of walking away 5 grand down with no car
Click to expand...

Let's say he goes for a £10k loan over 60 months at 5.9%. His monthly payments will be £192.15.

If his budget is £200 per month, this leaves absolutely no margin for error. If things are as tight as he says, then how will he pay for repairs, tax, servicing etc.

An all in solution where he has a warranty behind him, tax (at least for the first year - do some leases tax the car during the hire period as well?), servicing paid for etc might give him the peace of mind that there will not be any unexpected bills heading his way.
 
Adam said:
Let's say he goes for a £10k loan over 60 months at 5.9%. His monthly payments will be £192.15.

If his budget is £200 per month, this leaves absolutely no margin for error. If things are as tight as he says, then how will he pay for repairs, tax, servicing etc.

An all in solution where he has a warranty behind him, tax (at least for the first year - do some leases tax the car during the hire period as well?), servicing paid for etc might give him the peace of mind that there will not be any unexpected bills heading his way.
Click to expand...

So he should get a 5k loan over 3 years, payments circa 150 and 6 grand to spend on the car. As I already posted, simple no?

I specifically came to the 5k number because that, over 3 years, matched the sort of sum he was talking about on a lease.

Anyway hes seen sense now - it's a bad idea and 99% of people here seem to agree
 
I just liked the idea of a brand new car. Having only owned old heaps since I was driving 16 years ago, I just fancied a nice new car. My car history:

Ford Escort 1.3 (kept it for 8 months, wrecked it)
Citroen AX 1.1 (bad mistake, paid on finance through a dodgy garage, paid for it for years to come)
Seat Ibiza mk2 1.4 (best car I owned, had it 8 years)
Seat Ibiza mk2 2.0 GTi (bought cheap, paid twice over in repairs, thrashed to hell before me)

Not much for 16 years of driving. I just wanted a modern car with modern features and smelt like new haha
 
I guess I have car envy when I drive around, seeing people 10 years younger than me with nice flash cars.

Of course it's my own fault for ******* money up the wall in my youth instead of saving.
 
Ignore everyone else - you dont know what their situations are financially. Most kids in flash cars have probably had them bought by mummy and daddy - you can be safe in the knowledge that what you're driving has been earned through hard work (I'm assuming)

Plus, a poverty spec fiesta or C1 isnt exactly a flash car, just because it will say "13" on the front doesnt make it flash. New car smell wears off soon enough too
 
iaind said:
So he should get a 5k loan over 3 years, payments circa 150 and 6 grand to spend on the car. As I already posted, simple no?

I specifically came to the 5k number because that, over 3 years, matched the sort of sum he was talking about on a lease.

Anyway hes seen sense now - it's a bad idea and 99% of people here seem to agree
Click to expand...

It's not what I would do (buying a new car) and I would certainly favor your approach, but you would need to keep £1k+ aside for repairs.

Of course then I saw the OP mention he couldn't "do things to it" and now I don't really care what he does :D
 
Adam said:
It's not what I would do (buying a new car) and I would certainly favor your approach, but you would need to keep £1k+ aside for repairs.

Of course then I saw the OP mention he couldn't "do things to it" and now I don't really care what he does :D
Click to expand...

haha I didn't mean boy racer stuff if that was what you think I meant by it
 
1k+!?

Having a bit of a slush fund for maintenance and repairs is sensible, but saying 1k upwards is a bit drastic. Thats fine if he's buying an old M3, but what do you expect a 4 year old petrol focus to throw up that'll cost a grand to fix?

Major car bills are often the result of neglect - not paying attention to problems or general maintenance until MOT time....cue a big bill. Of course you might be unlucky, but its unlikely.

Personally, I have a separate account and I have a standing order of £100 into it every month - so £1200 per year. Insurance and tax are paid for out of that (~£650 for both) so I'm not paying silly interest for monthly insurance payments which leaves about 600 for maintenance (annual service and MOT, tyres etc) and I've always got plenty for unforseen repairs too. It's worked for me for quite a few years on various "normal" cars
 
By the time you pay tax, let's assume £150, a service at a conservative £150 again. Over the course of 3 years that's £900 gone already without anything else going wrong and needing repairing. That £1000 may not go very far at all and in this situation where so little disposable income is assigned to the car, it's certainly needed.
 
Did you not read my post above, at all?

By paying a small amount into a separate account, you can easily cover all your motoring expenses. You originally said you need a grand just for repairs, not it's turned into somehow needing 3 years tax and servicing......which is odd as I've never paid that in advance!
 
Exactly, a "slush fund" isn't for routine servicing, taxing, insuring, etc, it's for the unpredictable outlays such as breakdowns, accidents, and the like.

Obviously, manufacturers do offer service plans whereby you can pre-pay a few services in advance (to avoid inflation), but the likelihood is that these are largely pointless, as most people looking to save on servicing will go outside the main dealer network anyway.
 
As I said, I combine my routine costs with a slush fund - by the time the routine stuff is paid for, there's sufficient funds there to cover any unexpected expenses. The bonus of doing it my way is that the slush fund increases in size - so if you have a few years where there's nothing unexpected, you can treat yourself to something nice :D

Saying you need a at least a grand spare to repair a 4 year old Focus and using that as an argument for an expensive lease is just stupid really
 
Ok buy a 2nd hand car from a dealer. honda and many others come with a 12 month warranty and breakdown cover. Then in 12 months time get AA cover with the upto £500 repair cover. If you start saving for it when you buy your car it will in effect only cost about £15 per month (actually £30 ish but spread over the 2 yrs)

Put a minimal deposit down I bought a 55 plate fabia Vrs 5 yrs ago with a £100 deposit £189 per month with the option to hand it back and walk away half way through finance agreement if my circumstances had changed (or I put 200k on the clock and it wasn't worth a snot)

Edit:
Just checked and basic cover with repairs is only £86 per year.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom