Lease vs. Buy for 3-minute commuting wife...

stabone131

Lease is up on my wife's 2013 Rav4. She'd like to get the XLE Highlander as we have a new kid on the way. However, her job is literally 3 mins. from our house - so she only put 20K miles on her Rav4 on a 36K-mile lease. With next kid, she won't drive to work for 6 months so I'm guessing we won't even come close to 20K in the next 3 years.

Does it make sense to lease when we're nowhere near the 36K lease max? Does it make more sense to buy?

Toyota Highlander XLE
State: NJ
MSRP: $40,973
$1000 down
Dealer 1st lease offer (36 mos.): $400/month
Dealer 1st buy offer: $689/month

Michaell

stabone131 said:

Lease is up on my wife's 2013 Rav4. She'd like to get the XLE Highlander as we have a new kid on the way. However, her job is literally 3 mins. from our house - so she only put 20K miles on her Rav4 on a 36K-mile lease. With next kid, she won't drive to work for 6 months so I'm guessing we won't even come close to 20K in the next 3 years.

Does it make sense to lease when we're nowhere near the 36K lease max? Does it make more sense to buy?

Toyota Highlander XLE
State: NJ
MSRP: $40,973
$1000 down
Dealer 1st lease offer (36 mos.): $400/month
Dealer 1st buy offer: $689/month

Toyota does not offer 10K leases, but other brands do.

If you are averaging about 7K per year, you should buy it and keep it for 10-15 years - after 15 years, you would have just barely broken the 100K mark, and the car would have been paid off for most of those years.

carboy21

Just buy out your 2013 RAV. Its the best deal you will get.

Mr_Shiftright

I think they want something a bit larger carboy.

I agree with Michael, as long as you are ok with keeping the Highlander at least 5 years. With that low mileage, you should have plenty of equity in it if you do decide to sell it in 5 years or so, and calculating your monthly costs of a 5 year ownership vs. 3 year least, you'd come out considerably ahead per month in cost to own.

stabone131

Thanks for the replies. Yes, we do need a bigger car so keeping the RAV4 is not an option.

Would it make sense to lease the Highlander for 3 years (saving about $200/month) and then buy it out when lease is up?

Michaell

stabone131 said:

Thanks for the replies. Yes, we do need a bigger car so keeping the RAV4 is not an option.

Would it make sense to lease the Highlander for 3 years (saving about $200/month) and then buy it out when lease is up?

Not necessarily. There are costs with a lease that don't exist when you buy. If the intention is to keep it many years, just buy it from the start.

stabone131

Update/Question:

We decided to buy and have been shopping around. The best offer we've received to date is:

NEW JERSEY:

Toyota XLE - Midnight Blue, Captain chairs, Protection Plan, NAV, Sunroof (all not-optional options as we specifically want a midnight blue one with captain chairs).

$40,097 OTD

$37,289

$1490.23 NJ sales tax (off $21, 289......offering $16,000 on Rav4 lease trade-in)

$349 doc fee

$400 license plates

$569 last 2 payments of our Rav4 lease ( total 'payoff' is $16,569)



How's this for a deal?