re: Pros and Cons of Leasing v Buying a Vehicle

quote:

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Here is my guess on the advice from my life experience. His friend, having worked at a car dealer, was probably a hustler that enjoyed fine things in life and was horrible with money. Likely had poor credit and barely 2 nickels to rub together after his bills were due.

Given all of that, his friend loved cars and routinely bought something different. With that and the fact he had some experience at dealerships, his friend was able to figure out how to most cheaply lease a vehicle.

So while his friend gave advice on how to "cheaply" lease a vehicle that was in his friends eye, good financial advice. His friend was completely ignorant to how much money he was spending every 2-3 years on vehicles and how little savings he had because of it.

I know no one has argued this in this thread, but its simply impossible to lease a vehicle for eternity and it be a "cheap" way to have any vehicle long term. Buy something used and hold onto it as long as possible.

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What a fricking presumptuous post, . My friend is a “baw” who works shift work at plants in and around Baton Rouge. He’s from fricking Vidalia for Christ’s sakes, not some already, shady, scheister of the car-salesman stereotype. He drives a 10 year-old beat up F150. I couldn’t tell he gave 2 shits about fancy, shiny, new toys.

But he is pretty sharp, nonetheless, and picked up some things while working at the dealership. So he leased his wife a damn Toyota Highlander with every intention of buying after the lease term is up. He’s not putting her—or him—in a fricking Lexus SUV, you fricking prick.

And I really appreciate usc’s advice on here. I purposely made the thread title what it was because I was curious on the general pros/cons of leasing v buying. He has been responding to that, not my specific situation, which again, was purposely left out of the OP. I learned a lot.

I also wanted advice for my specific situation as well, and I appreciate everyone who gave it without being such condescending assholes. I have decided not to go with the lease—I was always leaning that way, but wanted to make sure I understood some of the minutia of leasing that I didn’t know. The thing that really sealed the deal for me finally was realizing that, even though you lease, the entire value of the car—whatever it was negotiated down to—counts as debt. I didn’t realize that, so that quite obviously would be a negative in my debt to income factor when buying a house, which was always my ultimate, long-term goal. It’s gonna be much harder for me this go around with only 1 income and child support payments.

So this thread ultimately had 2 purposes: 1) to get advice specific to my situation, and 2) to have an educational discussion about leasing, because quite clearly, a lot of people don’t know enough about it. If this thread can help just one person(besides me) one day make a better financial decision on a vehicle, then I feel like I—no, We, have done our jobs.

:lol;

Seriously, I do appreciate everyone’s input. Wish it could have been a little more civilized, but hey, this is the internet.