Car Leasing

[greenpants]

Has anyone here ever leased car using a leasing company off the internet or elsewhere? I get a car allowance from work and I'd like an alternative to the stresses of private ownership and maybe get a new car as well.
Can anyone recommend a company who won't "bend me over"

cheers
Dan

[Scuttler]

Hi Greenpants

I looked into this in some detail when I chose my current car.

In my situation it was a no brainer basically because any mileage above 10,000 - 12,000 miles per year is heavily penalised by almost all leasing companies. Added to this that at the end of the term you have an asset which you can sell on or use as the deposit for your next car.

Again I don't know your deal but if you're allowed to buy a car up to 1 year old then most of the depreciation has already been factored whereas leasing the car you pay the depreciation.

Also a lot of cars have a period of free servicing (mine was 60,000/5yrs whichever is first) which is transferable. So you'll just be paying for consumables (lights, tyres etc) which I'm pretty sure you'll have to pay for if you lease the car anyway.

Finally the leasing option tends to force you to hand the car back in almost showroom condition or penalises you heavily. With your own motor you can sell it on and the odd scratch may go unoticed but if not you certainly won't be penalised as heavily as a lease car.

[Woz]

I went and bought an 11 month old Mondeo for 9 grand for my salesman with 8k miles on the clock after leasing for 12 months and being royally shafted. Would not lease again if you popped my cock in a vice and turned the handle.

[Scuttler]

Originally Posted by Woz

Would not lease again if you popped my cock in a vice and turned the handle.

Would said cock be flacid, semi or full on.....apparently it makes a difference to the rates

[Nick Kay]

Same situation as me around 2yrs ago...

Option 1: Find a leasing company, then find the car
Option 2: find a car, then find who'll lease it to you

OK, so are you looking at :
1. PCH/PCL: Private Contract Hire/Lease, i.e. its not your car, never will be your car but the leasing costs should be lower
2. PCP: Private Contract Purchase, i.e. where you'll have the option of buying the car at the end of the contract period

I decided on the car I wanted and then googled companys that leased it, played them off against each other & got the best deal I could...

Things to watch out for:
1. With some cars +/or lease companys, it might be cheaper to NOT take maintenance on the vehicle and pay for servicing costs yourself
2. Make sure you know what the excess mileage rate is - anything over 10p/mile is way over the top - I contracted to 7p/mile
3. Going for a higher annual mileage will be cheaper than going for a lower annual mileage (and monthly cost) than going over the contracted mileage and paying the excess (see above)
4. There are sometimes some silly deals on cars. FOr instance when I changed jobs I was going from company car to private. Didn't know whether the job was going to pan out, so looked for a car with a 12-month lease. Got a 407SW - the cost/month for 12months was lower than for 23months! - Peugeot had a load of 407SWs they had to shift...

HTH

Nick

[greenpants]

thanks Guys.

I opted out of my company car last year and went for the allowance instead. I bought my own car but it's now approaching 3 years old and I'm getting stressed about something breaking and it costing me a fortune! It's going in for a service on Monday and I know Audi are going to extract my wallet via my a*seh*le!!

I've had compnay cars for the last 10 years and I'm finding owning my own is a real PITA!

I really don't want to own a car at all. Thats why I kinda leaning towards the PCH deals. I do about 20k a year btw.

cheers
Dan

[Nick Kay]

Reclaim from the taxman, i.e. if you get (say) 15p per mile for use of your car on company business then you can reclaim:
- 1st 10k miles against 0.45p/mile
- subsequent mileas against 0.25p/mile

i.e. if you do (make the maths easy) 20k business miles a year and you get 0.15p/mile from the company then you can reclaim:
10,000 * (0.45 - 0.15) = 3000
10,000 * (0.25 - 0.15) = 1000

So you can offset £4000 against tax, so if you pay 40% then the Govt owes you £1600 (i.e. 4000 x 40%)

BUT, don't forget that you car insurance now needs to cover you for business use, not just SD&Commuting...

[DannyB]

Originally Posted by Nick Kay

Reclaim from the taxman, i.e. if you get (say) 15p per mile for use of your car on company business then you can reclaim:
- 1st 10k miles against 0.45p/mile
- subsequent mileas against 0.25p/mile

i.e. if you do (make the maths easy) 20k business miles a year and you get 0.15p/mile from the company then you can reclaim:
10,000 * (0.45 - 0.15) = 3000
10,000 * (0.25 - 0.15) = 1000

So you can offset £4000 against tax, so if you pay 40% then the Govt owes you £1600 (i.e. 4000 x 40%)

BUT, don't forget that you car insurance now needs to cover you for business use, not just SD&Commuting...

Ooooh, when did it change to 45p? Was 40p last time I bothered to do a tax reclaim. (2.5TD 4x4, company pays 12p/mile fuel allowance.... They do pay an annual car allowance as well though)

Danny

[Scuttler]

Hmm.....it's 40p up to 10000 and 25p thereafter still AFAIUI

[Nick Kay]

Sorry, did that from memory

Its still worth claiming anyway